Plan B Isn't Just For One Night Stands

One of the most difficult parts of stand up comedy is when you decide in both your actions and your heart to dedicate yourself to the art form. Dealing with the emailing of bookers, the bad nights in bars instead of being at home, the highs and lows of auditions and showcases, making money on a weekend gig, and losing money on a weekday run. It's in the commitment we find our place in this industry. Some soar. Some sink. Some got in when the gettin' was good. Others were cursed to be born at the wrong time, fighting the lucky ones born a few years earlier. Regardless of your current status or goal setting progress, one piece of advice you hear from the 1% who make it is to not have a Plan B. It's viewed by many as a weakness and lack of confidence in your abilities. While there's a romantism in thinking such a thought, I can tell you, it's those without a Plan B (on stage or in life) that sink instead of swim. So let's break down the multiple area of stand up ranging from the act to the career to the life you live and how a Plan B applies. Because at the end of the day, Plan B isn't just for one night stands.   

What a Plan B Looks Like on Stage 
The great philosopher and boxer Mike Tyson once said, "Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face." This is the definition of stand up comedy. You walk on stage and tell your opening joke and SILENCE. Or some guy yells out a heckle that gets a pop from the crowd. Plan A didn't work, so now it's time to have a Plan B. Sure, you can commit to the jokes you wrote, but is that really going to be productive?

A Plan B on stage might mean pleasant crowd work ("Thank you sir. I was afraid we would both bomb after that first joke. Clearly, you're the pro.") or shifting energy to go after them ("Okay shut the fuck up, buddy! If I'm not getting a laugh, no one is!"). It's a terrifying pivot, but sometimes it has to be done. 

Plan B might mean going into your best bit early and then forcing yourself to turn your second and third tier bits into better jokes. Louis CK, before the scandals, said he would start with his closer to force himself to write better jokes the rest of the set. It's a highwire act, but it's also thrilling. 

Plan B might mean going from clean to dirty or from dirty to clean. Sometimes you walk on stage and you punch the audience in the nose with some gross joke and lose them. Maybe shift gears and go find a more evergreen joke and go back to your shock jock routine later. The reverse can be true too. You started too clean, too bland. Maybe hit the crowd with a more risky joke. I don't swear too much on stage, but to survive bar shows I had to find material that was more in tune with dirtier minds. So I wrote jokes about accidently dating adult film actresses and hard conversations with my doctor about post heart attack blood flow issues. So I wrote MY VERSION of sex and dick jokes. And I feel like I can still say those jokes in most shows. 

In my first few years I would just plow through my set list, despite knowing I'm bombing. It was after watching a few pros make the switch when they bombed, I started pulling Plan B's out of my comedy tool box. 

Plan B Might Be the Type of Comedy Career You Have
Back in 2017 I watched Steve Martin's Masterclass. While 90% is unusable in today's comedy market, there was one idea that really stuck out to me. He states that not all jokes are for the stage. Some jokes are for sketches, screenplays, songs, or TV shows. Maybe you love doing stand up, but your jokes fall flat because they'd work better as a sketch or TV Show. I know a lot of comics who were doing straight forward stand up only to pivot to musical comedy and blow up on TikTok and the college market. They're now national touring comics. 

While most of us desire the Dave Attell experience of just walking on stage and everyone hangs on our every word, many comics found their home in comedy with the Plan B. They wrote sketches for SNL like Al Franken. They wrote and produced movies like Judd Apatow. They became talk show hosts like David Letterman. They wrote for Late Night Shows. They transferred their talents to other comedy platforms. I know it sounds funny that they took these lucrative jobs, but there's a reason many used these credits to get more stand up gigs later. Stand up was Plan A. Doing a 10 hour a day job was Plan B. 

Don't feel like if you switch from stand up to producing comedy shows you're "quitting." Albert Brooks, Jim Carrey, Amy Schumer, and Eddie Murphy all gave up stand up when they could. Meanwhile, Apatow went back into standup after building the careers of Seth Rogan (another former stand up) and others. Sometimes Plan B gives you the freedom to do Plan A later in life.

The key is not to limit yourself. Look at your strengths and dedicate yourself to those areas where people seem to engage the most with you. Success breeds success. So once you find an area you can excel in, it will only help you with other areas of this industry.  

Plan B Might Be Pivoting To Other Careers    
In Fight Club, Tyler Durden speaks of how our generation was told they could have anything, and clearly, we are seeing that was a lie, or at least a false reality for Gen X and below. It is in his words, "We've all been raised on television to believe that one day we'd all be millionaires, and movie gods, and rock stars. But we won't. And we're slowly learning that fact. And we're very, very pissed off."  
It's a hard reality that you might never get to be a full time stand up or work in the comedy industry beyond a certain point. Yet, there's a small percentage who get to make this a full time gig. I know many award winning comics who quit their day jobs and found themselves a year later back to the 9-5 grind. There's no shame in making sure you are housed, fed, and safe. Are there stories of homeless comics who made it? Yes. But that isn't a real pathway. If you sleep in your car for a couple days in between housing or moving, sure. If it's a year, then it might be time to reevaluate your situation. 

That doesn't mean you can't use your comedy skills to launch better careers. Plenty of comics transitioned into marketing careers, tech careers, customer service management, construction, etc. You can use your skills to become better than your 9-5 competition. I've gotten a lot of jobs ranging from writing OSHA approved white papers to biotech video scripts to comedy traffic school to sales manager by using comedy as a strength. Some hiring managers might think you're a court jester, but if you can make them laugh, you make them listen.    

This isn't Plan A for many, but I've seen too many comics with unrealistic expectations find themselves on the other side of financial ruins and depression because they're ten years in and despite killing it on stage, they're bombing in life. It's okay to move slow and methodical. It's okay to get up twice a week and work the other days to maintain a life worth living. When people say, "It's either this or nothing..." I feel for them.

Life is so big with so many pathways to meaning and purpose. I can promise you every successful comic you admire has problems too. Bill Burr once said there are plenty of men who lay in big comfortable beds with mortgages and families that wish they were sleeping on a futon with no bills and just the freedom of doing what they want. If reaching the highest points of comedy, acting, or singing was really a victory, then why do we read so many stories of those stars whose lives end in the rubble? 

Final Thoughts 
Plan B's are not a four letter word. Technically it's a 5 letter word. And sometimes Plan B's are just for a moment. Maybe you have to adjust your set from time to time. Maybe you have to rethink how to showcase your comedic talents. Maybe you have to work another job until your break comes through. Or maybe your break doesn't come, but you just get to be a stand up on your nights off. All of these roads are plausible and respectable. 

​I once saw a bumper sticker that said "other people's opinions don't pay my bills." Whether you internalize the need for success or you externalize it, because you need to prove yourself to others, both can lead to unwelcomed thoughts, behaviors, or pathways. You have to be true to yourself and your situation, knowing that in the end your Plan B might still be someone else's Plan A.