It's Thanksgiving today. In America, at least. Canada celebrated weeks ago, making us look bad. While some people have taken traditional holidays and rebranded them due to persona politics or values, Thanksgiving, if anything, is important because it helps us remember the good things in our life. We should focus on our wins and accomplishments at least a few times a year, as a way to track our successes and help us build road maps for the future. So I'd like to take a moment and write about three things I'm really thankful this year and what I learned this year.
1. Working as a Full Time Comic All Year in theaters, road gigs, and at JR's Comedy Club 2. Incorporating crowd work effectively this year 3. Learning how to use the F word for one joke to the ultimate effect I'm Grateful For The Venues I Played After the split from Flappers I wasn't sure how 2024 was going to shape up. On January 1, 2024, I might have had ten shows lined up for the year, as I was still planning to run the school this year. Being let go for them to save money was at first a jolt, but I got to hustling. And hustle I did. As I write this:
What I've learned this year is that every show has one thing in common: A crowd who came to be entertained. They may not always act that way, but they are paying to be there, either through a ticket or food/drink purchase, and you have to give them your best. Too often comics look at a room and think it's not "sexy" or fun and they want to do less time or not do it at all. After ten years of driving everywhere, I can tell you, each crowd deserves your best until they fully reject the experience. Yet, that so rarely happens. If it's happening a lot to you, it's time to rethink the act. I'm Grateful I Spent all of 2023 Working on My 2024 Crowd Work If you only knew how bad my crowd work was when I started. I was terrified of talking to audience members. My fears of offending people or not being funny tormented my comedy soul. But soon my 5-10 minute sets became 20-45 minutes and I needed to transition better into different topics. So in 2023 I awkwardly donated 5-10 minutes each set to crowd work until I started figuring out "catchphrases" and tricks that worked for me. In July 2024 I was headlining a 100 person show in club with an open bar attached. The opener struggled hard. I tried my first five minutes of material to crickets. So, like a modern day Rocky Balboa, I took my licks and came back swinging with 55 minutes of crowd work. Bouncing back and forth between tables and the bars, it was the set of my life. Of all the work I did, it was my favorite show of the year because it showed me how far I'd come. A year before the crowd work was so bad, I once hid in the kitchen after the show. That night I had two women ask me to join them for drinks. When they found out I was sober, that was it for them - but the offer was still an ego boost. While I still believe most of my act needs to be actual jokes and stories, the ability to shift has given me so much freedom and confidence; it has taken the material to another level as well. So whatever you are most afraid to do in comedy, I highly encourage you to spend 2025 working on. The 2026 version of you will thank you. Figuring Out the Power of a Few Blue Jokes As a mostly clean comic who doesn't swear much on stage, I have had a moral and professional quandary in when to use blue jokes or language. On one level, I like being able to do clean jokes and get big laughs. On the other hand, blue material can get the kind of "pop" comics dream about. Over the past decade I wrote some bar show jokes that were PG rated blue jokes. Jokes that used inuendo and misunderstanding language in a sexual way. I never wrote a pure "dick joke," but I did have a few puns and a story about my doctor warning me about impotence if I didn't get my health on track. All the jokes have worked over the years, but I never went the full blue. At the start of the year I wrote a bit about how my grandma has been helping me, and I tagged it with "Anyone else helping fund the dreams of an underachieving 42 year old?" Maybe a smile at most from the crowd. Never the response it got the first time I said it. I tried to punch it up to no avail. Then a few months ago I just said, "Fuck you then" to the polite silence. Huge pop. What I realized at that moment is that my hostility was best represented by a moment of blue authenticity. And considering I don't swear before or after that moment, it feels like a true comedic surprise. At the end of the day, words are currency. Using swear words too much can cause them to lose value. Just like every time we print more cash. Value decreases. Plus, using swear words effectively can help other jokes as well, creating the possibility of surprise down the road. I've written before how branding a show "clean comedy" hurts the edge of the night, taking away the potential for things to go in a different direction. What that one punchline did for me is show me a way to express myself honestly and yet not make the whole night some cathartic "getting away" with something dirty. It was freeing and liberating. I'm not saying you have ever go blue, but if you find a way to expand your comedic weapons, don't be afraid to see what happens. Final Thoughts With a month to go before for Christmas and New Year's Eve, I highly encourage you to think about the last 11 months and how far you've come in at least one area of our comedy career. It might not even be a geographical or financial win. It just be your confidence or networking skills. It might even be the amount of times you got up. No matter what you feel about 2024, you need to take at least one moment and be grateful. Because it's good for the current you, and the 2025 version of you will thank you later.
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Paul Douglas Moomjean Blog's About What's on His MindBlogging allows for me to rant when there is no stage in the moment to talk about what's important and/or funny to me. Archives
February 2025
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