Figuring out funny
Of all the things I have planned for the summer, I think the most daunting and potentially the most rewarding will be the three minutes of stand-up. I’ve been trying to pay a little more attention to others’ routines the last few weeks to figure out what I like and what I don’t. I’ve also begun to really appreciate what it is these guys do. Particularly the national guys. Anytime they commit something to TV, they almost have to completely scrap it from their live set. It’s all been done, right? So now they have to throw out their existing 45-minute set and start a new one from scratch. Tough stuff. White’s been doing his thing now for over two decades, but I guarantee he still sweats his act. Daily.
After the thing at Harvey’s back in March or April, I was kind of turned off on the whole stand-up thing. They threw three actual comedians up on stage and one amateur. The”real” comedians weren’t really for me, but they certainly got laughs. The sets were filled with gay jokes, Sam Adams jokes, “Gresham” jokes, and jokes about life on the road. Spare me.
But get this, when I announced my intention to do the three minute thing in front of a couple of friends and co-workers, they asked me to do my routine on the spot. It didn’t matter that I didn’t have a routine, they wanted jokes. Blah. So I told them a little about what I’d observed about the craft of joke telling and I told them about how I didn’t want to tell gay jokes, Sam Adams jokes, “Gresham” jokes, or life on the road jokes.
Sidebar: By now you’re no doubt wondering what a Gresham joke is. A Gresham joke is any joke poking fun at a particular part of town and its inhabitants. This is whacky FM DJ stuff. It’s sandbox humor for folks who never leave the county. That said, I think the same sort of people who love to see their hometown in the movies or on TV enjoy hearing Gresham jokes. It somehow makes the experience more relatable. A Gresham joke is a solid go-to for any comedian, not unlike a Buddy Holly cover for a bar band. It’s a solid basic that’ll play anywhere.
Anyway, I went on to talk about the night of comedy I’d seen and told one of the jokes I’d heard. When I hit the punchline, milk literally shot out of one of my friends’ noses. It was that funny. Only it wasn’t. At least not to me. But there’s a lesson here. Gresham jokes work. The audience loves them, so you should probably tell them.
Why am I telling you all this? Because Friday night I went into North Portland to check out the comedy stylings of the Curious Comedy Theater. It’s kind of weird how this whole thing came about. A friend of mine asked me to go check them out a few weeks ago. A friend of hers’ is performing there and she wanted to go check him out. Both of us got busy and weren’t able to make it. Then this week, I found a coupon in the Willamette Week and decided to go check them out.
They’ve got a very nice, very clubby, very warm space up on MLK in the Vanport Square. I paid my admission, bought a beer, and took a table down front, stage left. The group came out a little after 8 and introduced themselves. They also introduced a special guest they had for the evening. ’Twas local comedian Gabe Dinger. Gabe was the emcee the night I was at Harvey’s. I cringed and waited for the Gresham jokes to flow.
Only they never came. Gabe was quick, smart, and funny. It was almost like he was playing a jazz club instead of a rock-and-roll dive.
Gabe’s role in the first bit of long form was as narrator for an Armando. And he was quite good, riffing off a very weak audience suggestion with a good story about Halloween at a religious school. The troupe then took it from there, creating several clever scenes. None of them were garden variety, and none went for the lowest common denominator. Yet they weren’t so out there that they left the audience scratching their heads either. They’re a solid group and I’m looking forward to coming back.
There are a couple of places around town, including Curious Comedy, who offer improv and stand-up classes. I’m kind of resistant to the idea, preferring to do it myself. Like most things though, I probably can’t. And the point of the whole thing isn’t really to “learn” anyway. It’s about collaberation and networking, learning is a by-product. So we’ll see what happens.
