A SERIOUS ATTEMPT AT COMEDY
A SERIOUS ATTEMPT AT COMEDY
Very seldom will I use the word "great" to describe anything I do. Really, that's a word for others to use, if they choose to, in reference to something I have done. Sometimes that word "great" is used in conjunction with the word "disappointment" to describe something I've been part of; a book, a match, or maybe even a three- year tenure with a wrestling company. But I will go on record as saying I had a "great" comedy show last month in Plattsburgh, New York. But that great show was surrounded in both mystery and revelation, and I came out of it with both the feeling that I wanted to earnestly pursue the serious business of comedy, and the realization that I was going to have to work extraordinarily hard to do so.
We only had about 50 people in attendance that night in Plattsburgh - or about 250 less than had stood in line to meet me at the local mall earlier that day. 300 people had shown they cared enough about me to forego a beautiful summer afternoon to stand in line, make a purchase, take a photo, and share a few moments with someone they seemingly liked and cared about. But when I inquired as to their interest in coming to the show, the faces became strained, their discomfort apparent, the excuses transparent. "Um, uh…I'd like to, but I have to do ..something…with someone..somewhere." Odd. But even odder was my realization later that evening, that many people who had paid extra money specifically to meet and greet with me before the comedy show had left the club after meeting me... without staying for the show. They obviously liked me; they'd paid money and gone out of their way to meet me. They just had no interest in seeing me do comedy.
Those adventurous to stay had a great time – see, there I am, throwing the G word around again. But the two promoters of the show heard the same two comments over and over again: I didn't know what to expect, and I didn't think he'd be that good. So, the challenge, as I saw it, was to make people more aware of what they might expect, and to do my part to make sure the shows are as good as I can make them when people make the decision to see me do something other than what they are used to seeing me doing.
Honestly, it's not a challenge I know I'll be successful in. It's like going to see Will Ferrell or Adam Sandler in dramatic roles; yes, they've both done some great work, outside comedy, but it's not quite the way that people like and feel happiest seeing them. Funny, but one of my inspirations is actually Justin Timberlake, who has been able to take people who literally could not stand his music, (me being one of them) and turn them into fans of his comedic acting. His SNL stuff is just priceless!
As many of you know, I've been putting some clips up on the web, and I really appreciate the feedback. Well, not all of it. Really, I only appreciate the positive feedback. The negative stuff..not so much. But no less an authority than the Insane Clown Posse, whose upcoming Gathering of the Juggalos should prove to be my most interesting comedy challenge, touted the benefits of You Tube as the great equalizer – a way to get the material out there, so people can make up their own minds, instead of relying on a few reviews, or opinions.
Yet, taking a cue from the world of sports entertainment, from which I have learned almost every lesson in my life, I know I need to take the next step of getting material out there that is of a better quality than the few things now available. Really, I shouldn't be putting a story out there the first time I tell it. It should be refined and worked on, and presented in a more polished form than the clips I've tweeted about so far. Indeed, the three clips out there represent the first times I've actually told those specific stories. So, I've been doing guest spots on Long Island over the past few weeks, trying out new stuff, polishing up things I've done before, trying to make sure it's the best it can be when seen by a larger audience. Unlike my microphone time in wrestling, where I can wander out in front of an audience with just an idea of what I'm going to do, comedy really does benefit from the honing, tweaking, and polishing process.
But my material needs to be of a much higher video quality too. It used to baffle me when wrestling fans and even personal friends would dismiss guys like Bruiser Brody and Stan Hansen as being and then ask me if I thought I'd ever get to be as good as Outback Jack and Uncle Elmer. Unfortunately, like so many others they equated video and production quality with actual talent, and dismissed the guys they saw on the old AWA shows as being bush league and saw even the guys on the bottom of the WWE barrel as being major league.
With that in mind, I am looking at my August 24 show at The Brokerage in Bellmore, NY (Long Island) as the most important comedy show I've ever done. I'll be having the show professionally video-taped with a two camera shoot, with the express intent of airing it on You Tube, where viewers get to see it for themselves and decide if it's good or not. Hey, comedy is not a one-size-fits-all type of thing, and my style is not going to be for everybody. But I'd really like for all of you to have the opportunity to watch and decide for yourselves. I'll have a new clip to Tweet out in a couple of days, shot by a simple flip-cam followed by the professionally shot stuff towards the end of August.
As some of you may recall, I did several shows under the "Total Extreme Comedy" banner a couple of years ago. Though I had a good time on most of the shows, there were some elements at play that were just not conducive to any long-term success. Ticket prices were too high, there was nothing "Extreme" or "Total" about the comedy I, or Colt Cabana, or Bruce Pritchard performed, and expectations may have been a little unrealistic. Really, should any of us, with a cumulative total of about seventeen comedy shows under our belt, have been booked into the same 3,500 seat theatre that Elvis used to play? Probably not. I look forward to working with Colt again (looks like we have November 3rd in Cleveland together) but think both of us, separately, or together will be content to work in a more realistic environment – rooms in the 100-400 person range.
Warning: I am going to beg here! Please help me out. I really can't be successful at all without a little help from all of you. Watch my stuff when I tweet it out there. Re-tweet it if you think it's good, and mention it to your friends – even if they're not wrestling fans. Almost every non-fan who is bold enough to venture forth to one of my shows has a good time, and the audiences I do guest sets in front of, many of whom have never seen or heard of me, are almost always entertained and pleasantly surprised at my ability to string sentences together. Maybe you can even take the step of Tweeting my links or mentioning my comedy to successful comedians whose work you enjoy. Sometimes, it just takes the right person to see the right clip at the right time – a possibility that is FAR greater with some of you helping me out.
For all of you in the Long Island area – please come out to the show on the 24th. The Brokerage is an amazing and intimate place to see a show. I've already lined up fellow wrestler and comedian Dan Barry to host, and hilarious Irishman Mick Taylor to do a set, and am working on some major surprises to make the night as funny and as memorable as it can be. With the right production values, it will be far more like Monday Night Raw, and far less like Verne Gagne's old tapings at the Tropicana – even if anyone who chose Outback Jack and Uncle Elmer over Brody and Hansen under any circumstances, should be forced to do some kind of community work.
Here's the information: tickets are only $12, and may move quickly
THE BROKERAGE COMEDY CLUB
2797 Merrick Rd (at the corner of Bellmore Ave.)
Bellmore, NY 11710
(516) 781-LAFF (5233)
50% of ticket sales will be donated to http://rainn.org
Feel free to watch the 1998 Hell in a Cell in its entirety or some of my Japanese stuff from 1995-96, before making the decision to help me out – even if it's just out of sympathy.
Very seldom will I use the word "great" to describe anything I do. Really, that's a word for others to use, if they choose to, in reference to something I have done. Sometimes that word "great" is used in conjunction with the word "disappointment" to describe something I've been part of; a book, a match, or maybe even a three- year tenure with a wrestling company. But I will go on record as saying I had a "great" comedy show last month in Plattsburgh, New York. But that great show was surrounded in both mystery and revelation, and I came out of it with both the feeling that I wanted to earnestly pursue the serious business of comedy, and the realization that I was going to have to work extraordinarily hard to do so.
We only had about 50 people in attendance that night in Plattsburgh - or about 250 less than had stood in line to meet me at the local mall earlier that day. 300 people had shown they cared enough about me to forego a beautiful summer afternoon to stand in line, make a purchase, take a photo, and share a few moments with someone they seemingly liked and cared about. But when I inquired as to their interest in coming to the show, the faces became strained, their discomfort apparent, the excuses transparent. "Um, uh…I'd like to, but I have to do ..something…with someone..somewhere." Odd. But even odder was my realization later that evening, that many people who had paid extra money specifically to meet and greet with me before the comedy show had left the club after meeting me... without staying for the show. They obviously liked me; they'd paid money and gone out of their way to meet me. They just had no interest in seeing me do comedy.
Those adventurous to stay had a great time – see, there I am, throwing the G word around again. But the two promoters of the show heard the same two comments over and over again: I didn't know what to expect, and I didn't think he'd be that good. So, the challenge, as I saw it, was to make people more aware of what they might expect, and to do my part to make sure the shows are as good as I can make them when people make the decision to see me do something other than what they are used to seeing me doing.
Honestly, it's not a challenge I know I'll be successful in. It's like going to see Will Ferrell or Adam Sandler in dramatic roles; yes, they've both done some great work, outside comedy, but it's not quite the way that people like and feel happiest seeing them. Funny, but one of my inspirations is actually Justin Timberlake, who has been able to take people who literally could not stand his music, (me being one of them) and turn them into fans of his comedic acting. His SNL stuff is just priceless!
As many of you know, I've been putting some clips up on the web, and I really appreciate the feedback. Well, not all of it. Really, I only appreciate the positive feedback. The negative stuff..not so much. But no less an authority than the Insane Clown Posse, whose upcoming Gathering of the Juggalos should prove to be my most interesting comedy challenge, touted the benefits of You Tube as the great equalizer – a way to get the material out there, so people can make up their own minds, instead of relying on a few reviews, or opinions.
Yet, taking a cue from the world of sports entertainment, from which I have learned almost every lesson in my life, I know I need to take the next step of getting material out there that is of a better quality than the few things now available. Really, I shouldn't be putting a story out there the first time I tell it. It should be refined and worked on, and presented in a more polished form than the clips I've tweeted about so far. Indeed, the three clips out there represent the first times I've actually told those specific stories. So, I've been doing guest spots on Long Island over the past few weeks, trying out new stuff, polishing up things I've done before, trying to make sure it's the best it can be when seen by a larger audience. Unlike my microphone time in wrestling, where I can wander out in front of an audience with just an idea of what I'm going to do, comedy really does benefit from the honing, tweaking, and polishing process.
But my material needs to be of a much higher video quality too. It used to baffle me when wrestling fans and even personal friends would dismiss guys like Bruiser Brody and Stan Hansen as being and then ask me if I thought I'd ever get to be as good as Outback Jack and Uncle Elmer. Unfortunately, like so many others they equated video and production quality with actual talent, and dismissed the guys they saw on the old AWA shows as being bush league and saw even the guys on the bottom of the WWE barrel as being major league.
With that in mind, I am looking at my August 24 show at The Brokerage in Bellmore, NY (Long Island) as the most important comedy show I've ever done. I'll be having the show professionally video-taped with a two camera shoot, with the express intent of airing it on You Tube, where viewers get to see it for themselves and decide if it's good or not. Hey, comedy is not a one-size-fits-all type of thing, and my style is not going to be for everybody. But I'd really like for all of you to have the opportunity to watch and decide for yourselves. I'll have a new clip to Tweet out in a couple of days, shot by a simple flip-cam followed by the professionally shot stuff towards the end of August.
As some of you may recall, I did several shows under the "Total Extreme Comedy" banner a couple of years ago. Though I had a good time on most of the shows, there were some elements at play that were just not conducive to any long-term success. Ticket prices were too high, there was nothing "Extreme" or "Total" about the comedy I, or Colt Cabana, or Bruce Pritchard performed, and expectations may have been a little unrealistic. Really, should any of us, with a cumulative total of about seventeen comedy shows under our belt, have been booked into the same 3,500 seat theatre that Elvis used to play? Probably not. I look forward to working with Colt again (looks like we have November 3rd in Cleveland together) but think both of us, separately, or together will be content to work in a more realistic environment – rooms in the 100-400 person range.
Warning: I am going to beg here! Please help me out. I really can't be successful at all without a little help from all of you. Watch my stuff when I tweet it out there. Re-tweet it if you think it's good, and mention it to your friends – even if they're not wrestling fans. Almost every non-fan who is bold enough to venture forth to one of my shows has a good time, and the audiences I do guest sets in front of, many of whom have never seen or heard of me, are almost always entertained and pleasantly surprised at my ability to string sentences together. Maybe you can even take the step of Tweeting my links or mentioning my comedy to successful comedians whose work you enjoy. Sometimes, it just takes the right person to see the right clip at the right time – a possibility that is FAR greater with some of you helping me out.
For all of you in the Long Island area – please come out to the show on the 24th. The Brokerage is an amazing and intimate place to see a show. I've already lined up fellow wrestler and comedian Dan Barry to host, and hilarious Irishman Mick Taylor to do a set, and am working on some major surprises to make the night as funny and as memorable as it can be. With the right production values, it will be far more like Monday Night Raw, and far less like Verne Gagne's old tapings at the Tropicana – even if anyone who chose Outback Jack and Uncle Elmer over Brody and Hansen under any circumstances, should be forced to do some kind of community work.
Here's the information: tickets are only $12, and may move quickly
THE BROKERAGE COMEDY CLUB
2797 Merrick Rd (at the corner of Bellmore Ave.)
Bellmore, NY 11710
(516) 781-LAFF (5233)
50% of ticket sales will be donated to http://rainn.org
Feel free to watch the 1998 Hell in a Cell in its entirety or some of my Japanese stuff from 1995-96, before making the decision to help me out – even if it's just out of sympathy.
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