Standup Comedy

The next thing I know I'm standing in the backroom of the Laugh Factory in Los Angeles. Ahead of me is a line of about half a dozen prospective comedians. The sounds of laughter filter back to us from the main room up front but the atmosphere is far from funny. Every five minutes another comedian is called and the tension mounts. The breathing becomes louder and the hands sweatier.

Finally I'm at the head of the line looking through the passageway at the emcee. My name is called and suddenly I feel like a paratrooper standing at the open door of an airplane with the jump light flashing. Saying "geronimo" to myself, I leap towards the stage. 

I turn to the audience and see nothing but bright lights. Suddenly my brain cells go numb. Years of witty elocution die in an instant. The five minutes allotted to me on the stage seem like five centuries. I open and close my mouth emitting sounds which are supposed to be funny material. It's more like the death throes of a gasping fish lying on the beach as the audience watches impassively. A signal is given that my five minutes are up and my agony is mercifully ended.

Another would-be comedian has bombed out. It's not an unusual scene. It happens many times every night in the Los Angeles environs. On any given night scores of comedians nervously try out their material in nightclubs throughout the Los Angeles area from the Horn in Santa Monica to the Ice House in Pasadena and all points in between. Some of the comedians get the laughs and the rest usually remain on a perpetual bomb run.

Many of the nightclubs in Los Angeles with comedy or musical acts have audition nights once or twice a week. Auditioning affords aspiring comedians the opportunity to break into the serious business of being funny. It also allows clubs to provide free entertainment to their customers (many of whom are other auditioners). The process of signing up for an audition spot and then anxiously awaiting the moment till you're called to face the audience from the stage resembles a medieval type ritual which can be called "trial by performance." Failure to succeed in this ritual results in the most dreadful punishment of all to comedians—a silent audience. 

One of the most frenetic audition nights is Sunday night at the Improvisation. The line outside the Improvisation usually numbers over fifty people waiting for a chance to sign up for an opportunity to entertain an audience or engage in an act of self-humiliation whichever the case may be. The animated bargaining among the comedians to get their names on the signup list for an audition spot often exceeds in humor anything that happens on the stage later that night. Many a comedian makes a good living by arriving at auditions early and then auctioning out his place on the line to the highest bid. der. The people who don't get on the audition list either groan resignedly or make a mad dash towards the other clubs in town that are having auditions the same night. 

Illustration by Val O'Riley.

A visit to the nightclubs on audition night can give you more insight into human behavior than a college course in psychology. There is often no relationship between a comedian's real personality and his stage personality. Some of the most glib, outspoken people suddenly become complete introverts on the stage. More often than not it's that quiet fellow sitting morsely by himself at a table that later has the audience howling. 

Most comedians have an ambivalent attitude towards their audiences. If they get laughs, they love the audience; if not, they feel the audience just wasn't right. Sometimes comedians will have their cronies strategically situated throughout the audience in order to induce artificial laughter for their less than funny jokes. 

Not all comedians are necessarily likeable people. Take the case of Larry. Larry has the remarkable ability of antagonizing his audience right away. With small beady eyes he looks like a suspicious lizard in heat. Each of his fingers is covered with rings which he is constantly trying to sell to people in the audience in order to raise his rent money. The audience thinks that Larry's ring selling is part of his act and laugh at his efforts to raise a few extra pesos. However Larry is deadly serious since this is his main source of income. 

Once Larry finishes his sales pitch he begins his comedy routine which immediately bites the dust. At least Larry must be given credit for being very realistic about how people feel about him. He often asks his audience "How many of you hate me already? 

When the audience responds with a loud applause, Larry returns the feeling and everything proceeds downhill from there. Soon the mutual enmity in the room reaches a feverish pitch and Larry closes out his act with assorted obscene hand gestures signifying his absolute hatred of the audience. 

Comedians can be quite creative when it comes to raising money. While Larry earns money selling rings on stage, another comedian named Jerry used to sell his routines during his act to other comedians in the audience. For example, Jerry would tell a joke about how teflon caskets were invented to keep corpses from sticking when you flip them over and before the laughter died down he would put the line up for sale for thirty dollars. After selling the casket joke, Jerry would follow through by putting his pistachio nut junky routine up for sale for the special discount price of $49.95. 

Although getting laughs was secondary to making money, Jerry was doing pretty well in the former endeavor. In fact before long I was watching Jerry delivering his jokes on several television shows. He was becoming so successful he started buying back some of his own routines. It looked like Jerry was headed straight to the big time. 

Just as he started to get his head in the clouds, he fell down to earth with a loud thump. Suddenly he wasn't funny any longer. 

No one can really explain why a comedian stops getting laughs. Maybe his material becomes stale or perhaps it might be a case of too much exposure on television since the general public tends to have a low boredom threshold for paying attention to new personalities. Remember Woody Woodbury? 

Jerry still made valiant efforts to recapture the audiences but to no avail. Then one night his downfall became final. He stopped in the middle of his unfunny act and shouted at the audience. 

Illustration by Val O'Riley.

"Hey, how come you people aren't laughing anymore?" 

No response. 

"Don't you realize I'm funny?" 

No response. 

"How about if I hit myself? Will that make you happy?" 

No response. 

"Okay, then I'm going to turn this place into a smorgasbord for sadists that can advertise itself as 'All You Can Beat.'" 

Poor Jerry proceeded to slap himself on the face with a shocked audience watching. Then the slaps became punches and bruises appeared on his face. This caused a great deal of harm since Jerry was a rather powerfully built individual. The audience began laughing and the more damage Jerry inflicted on himself, the louder they laughed. 

Finally the manager of the club helped a sobbing Jerry off the stage. Someone in the audience said "Aww, I already seen that routine in Vegas." 

Some comedians have been on the audition circuit for years. Danny is in his late forties and has been auditioning for over twenty years. His ambition was to become famous before his hair turned gray. Failing this, his goal now is to become a hit before all his remaining hair falls out. He may well have to wait another twenty years to achieve this result.

So desperate for a laugh is Danny that he won't leave the stage until he gets a positive response from the audience. Unfortunately he tells jokes that were already outdated in 1957. You can't expect the audience to laugh at his Eisenhower jokes when most of them aren't even old enough to remember "I Like Ike" buttons. 

Many times a club's manager has turned off the lights and shut off the microphone in an attempt to get Danny off the stage. However Danny has always kept on fillibustering with his jokes in the dark-ness. Even when he's escorted off the stage his routine continues. It is not unusual for Danny to keep screaming his jokes from the audience even when there is another act on the stage. Despite his efforts the audience will still maintain its deathly silence. After a while self-delusion takes over and Danny yells out "Hey, I really killed them!" 

Maybe senility has caused Danny to carry a phantom laugh track in his head. 

One of the biggest hazards of working before an audience is stagefright. There are many forms of stage fright and perhaps the most unusual example was the night I saw a comedian who will forever after be known as "Sprinkler System." 

At first I saw a young man looking supremely self-confident walk up to the stage. He seemed very relaxed as he engaged in some easy banter with the emcee before going into his routine. However as soon as Sprinkler System faced the audience, every muscle in his body froze including his vocal chords. For several moments Sprinkler System stood on the stage in a catatonic state. The only part of Sprinkler System's body that was working must have been his bladder since a small trickle was detected going down his leg. The small trickle soon turned into a swollen river and before long the bottom half of Sprinkler System resembled Niagara Falls. The manager screamed at Sprinkler System to get off the stage but he stood his wet ground. The flood waters on the stage built up and spilled over onto the front row of tables. As the manager dragged Sprinkler System off the stage a familiar voice in the audience said "Aww, I already seen that routine in Vegas." 

Each nightclub that has audition nights has its own particular flavor.

Illustration by Val O'Riley.

The Laugh Factory is located on Sunset Boulevard in Los Angeles which gives a clue as to its clientele. There is a widespread belief that the audience at the Laugh Factory is packed with television producers looking for new talent. 

Every comedian has the dream of being "discovered" by a producer who will then have him appear coast to coast on national television. On the rare occasions when this dream comes true, it often turns into a nightmare. Faced with the prospect of hitting the big time with an appearance on the Merv Griffin or Johnny Carson Show, many comedians will push the panic button. The days and weeks prior to going on these shows are filled with the anguish of self-doubt whether or not they will bomb out and put a permanent end to their careers. Cases of "prime time nerves" are so common in Los Angeles that many doctors prescribe special talk show tranquilizers to calm the comedians down. Not all audition nightclubs are as high class as the Laugh Factory. 

There are clubs in Los Angeles where you have to step over the plumbing on the stage to reach the microphone. These clubs are diplomatically advertised as having a "leisurely atmosphere." At least it sounds better than calling them dumps. Many nightclubs employ waitresses who are hoping for a lucky break to become actresses. I have yet to hear about an actress who is hoping to make it as a waitress.

The End.

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What's a Classic Article anyway?

This article originally appeared in the very first issue of the printed edition of Laugh Factory magazine, from February 1983.

Laugh Factory Magazine cover from February 1983 (Vol 1, Issue 1), featuring Dustin Hoffman.