I was just ruminating on some things while i tried to figure out what to blog about for the start of the week, and i stumbled across something that i have thought a lot about this semester. I just really don't know how much of a stand-up comedian's reception is based on the comedian themselves or the audience/atmosphere of the room. If you look behind the comedians during their performance, you can tell that some of them really have detailed, or very specific backgrounds. But at some point, the general feel of the audience depends on so many things that have nothing to do with the guy/chick on stage. If the audience is feeling just a little off one night, the first joke doesn't go over well, and then everything could collapse from there. Or, you could have a guy sitting in the back with 10 of his friends, cracking jokes for the past over the last hour and the whole comedy club is in a relaxed mood as the laughter has seeped onto their tables, and they are just ready to bust a gut at anything anyone on stage says.
So what do you guys think?
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I think you have a point here. But I don't think it is only comedy that this affects. It is the same with any crowd of people. Say, in the classroom - no matter how intelligent and articulate the teacher is, if the class is all hungover or tired, the lesson isn't going to go well. Or if you are giving a business presentation and your audience is at odds with itself (say, office infighting) then they might react differently to you than on another day. I suppose with comedy it is alot more about "atmosphere" that has less to do with an actual community of people, but there are the same dynamics at work.
ReplyDeleteWhat is really special is where then comedian can transcend those atmospheric pressures and win over the audience. I think the truly great comedians can manipulate (perhaps that is too negative of a term) their audiences in their favor. Perhaps that is where the "rhetoric" of humor starts to apply.
I've been thinking a lot about audience, too these past few days because I'd like to do a standup act for our final project, but I'm scared to death to do one in front of the class. I'm not embarrassed per se, but through this class I've come to realize that doing standup really is a talent and I am not talented enough to do it, especially in front of a classroom.
ReplyDeleteThe one quality of stand up is the often frightening exposure that the comedian opens him/herself up to..the audience is live (no laugh track) and you are alone--which is why for final projects I tried to minimize that aspect of it by making it a group situation. Some are very good at back-pedaling and improvising, while others are not. The phrase "I died out there." is common among stand up personalities. They either reach teh audience or they don't.
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