The real comedy behind comedy
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This document discusses comedy and comedians like Kapil Sharma, Jonny, Kyle Brauch, and the real work that goes into being funny for an audience. It touches on the traveling involved in the comedy business and different levels of comedy performance. The document expresses gratitude at the end.
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The real comedy behind comedy
- 1. THE REAL COMEDY BEHIND COMEDY -Nitesh Singh
- 2. Kapil Sharma
- 4. Jonny
- 6. Levels
- 7. TRAVELLING
- 8. Kyle Brauch
- 16. Thank You
Editor's Notes
- Believe it or not, most stand-up comics are not wildly adventurous individuals who have hilarious things happening to them every day. Comedians can get on stage and tell a story about something that happened to them that day and turn the entire room to hysterics. And truly great stand-ups make it look easy
- Why is stand-up comedy so hard to do? Being a stand-up comedian is a very tough job. Standing in front of people is never easy, but standing in front of people who judge everything you say and expect to laugh every few seconds is much harder. What motivates them to become comedians? Do they have unique personalities? Are they more intelligent than ordinary people? What are the daily lives of comedians like? As light-hearted as it seems to study comedy and comedians it is important to note that studying stand-up comedians is a serious business
- One of the things that I was curious to find out about comedians was what distinguishes them from other artistic vocational groups. Artists differ from each other in many ways, and one important distinction is between creators and performers (also called interpreters). Creators are people that produce a work of art that others usually perform or do not need a performer. Examples are writers, poets, composers, and choreographers. Performers are people that use their artistic skills to perform other people’s work. Such are musicians, actors, and dancers. Granted, sometimes a person could be both at the same time as in the case of singers singing their own songs, but this is not a requirement of the profession. Comedians, on the other hand, are different. The distinction between creators and performers is blurry, as comedians must perform their own creation. No other art, besides stand-up comedy, requires that the artist will both create and perform his own act.
- Comedians come in all forms and shapes. There is no formal education or specific course work you need to take in order to become a comedian, and there are comedians that were high school dropouts on one hand, and others that hold a PhD degree. Their level of formal education tells us nothing about how good they are as comedians. Many people want to become a comedian, but very few succeed or have the endurance to overcome failures. Stand-up comedy is a very competitive field with little job security. You might be considered a great comedian today, but nothing guarantees that the audience will love you tomorrow. Or next month. Each performance on stage is unique with its own interaction with the crowd. Jokes that put the audience on the floor one night, may not work the next night at the same club.
- There are different levels of comedians. From the Local comedy club to being theOpener for a show then Becoming the feature guy.The next level is the headliner, the guy that is advertised in all the billboards by the club prior to the show. He or she performs between an hour to an hour and a half. It might take 15-20 years to become a headliner, and most comedians will not reach that level of success.
- Besides the grueling career that is awaiting the comedians, their everyday is not easy, either. Most comedians do not have agents to manage their career they do it themselves themselves. It might take an average of 10-15 years for a comedian to be able to live off of comedy alone. Reputation is key, and if you are a good comedian, People will invite you to perform.To succeed in the business you must travel a lot perform in front of new crowds that have never heard of you and have a completely different demographic.
- How intelligent are stand-up comedians? Comedians have the opportunity to demonstrate different kinds of intelligence that are relevant to their lives and performances, for example, emotional and social intelligence. These are the kinds of smarts that give you the advantage when interacting with other people. Both of these intelligences are crucial to comedians’ success on and off stage. Off stage, comedians need to deal with bookers, club managers, and fellow comedians all the time. In order to succeed in comedy, you need to have the maturity and courtesy to engage with strangers, show up on time, and so on.
- On stage, comedians need to know how to respond to the audience. The ability to fine tune an act and tailor it to a specific audience is largely related to emotional intelligence Comedians need to be sensitive to how their act is perceived, and this sensitivity is essential to their success. Of course, being generally intelligent could take a comedian a long way. The most widely used measure of intelligence is the Wechsler test, known as an IQ test. It gives a numeric score where an average intelligence measures at 100 exactly. Mental retardation scores are 70 and below, and if you score above 130, you are in the top 2% of the population.
- According to a study, which included a sample of 55 male comedians, It was found they had well above average IQs, ranging from 115 to 160, with an average of 138. In a subsequent study with 14 female comedians, IQ scores were also high, ranging from 112 to 144, with an average of 126. Humor production test. (Activity)For example, In this you are given cartoons without captions and are instructed to write as many funny captions as they could think of, for all cartoons, in 10 minutes. This is a good measure of spontaneous humor that is used as a method that separates individuals with a creative sense of humor from others. The results showed that, as expected, comedians produced funnier captions than the students and also generated higher numbers of captions.
- It might not be surprising that comedians were considered funnier and have better verbal skills, since their job is to be funny using verbal humor, but it is important to remember that their performances on stage require different humor qualities than the caption creation task. Creating humor that is performed in front of an audience requires a large investment in time and includes endless practice and tuning in to the audiences’ reactions.The smarter a comedian is, the better he or she are in producing high quality humor.
- Recently ,A new self-report questionnaire to measure both positive and negative uses of humor was developed. The questionnaire measures two positive uses of humor in everyday life (affiliative and self-enhancing) and two negative uses (aggressive and self-defeating). Affiliative humor promotes social bonds and puts others at ease through telling jokes, saying funny things, and not taking oneself too seriously. Self-enhancing humor is the ability to see the funny side of life even in adverse and stressful times, and to use humor as a coping mechanism. Aggressive humor aims to tease and ridicule others through putdowns, mockery, and ridicule, typically to enhance one’s social status at the expense of the victimized individual (as in other-deprecating humor) or group (as in sexist or racist humor). Self-defeating humor is making jokes on oneself and laughing with others.
- Professional stand-up comedians use a mix of humor styles, both positive and negative. Many use aggressive humor on stage, including sexual and ethnic humor, which is often popular with audiences, even if it does not reflect comedians’ personal views or private humor use. Comedians tend to display an extraverted personality on stage, but are quite introverted in real life. This discrepancy suggests that their everyday styles of humor might be different not only compared to other people, but also compared to their on-stage persona.
- The ability to laugh with other people, share humorous jokes and put others at ease by using humor is no doubt an important role of a successful comedian, and hence explains why affiliative humor was a significant predictor of their on-stage success. Comedians must be sensitive to audience reaction and tune their act accordingly. Even if they use aggressive humor in their performance, they still have to take into account what a specific audience finds funny. Those who are high on affiliative humor may have an advantage since they can bring their own social experience to the stage. Comedians who score low on this scale may be more likely to “lose” the audience, and not know how to adjust their act properly.
- By contrast, the use of self-defeating humor in everyday life negatively predicted comedians’ professional success. Self-defeating humor is usually regarded as a destructive humor style, a style that individuals use to make fun of themselves and let others make jokes at their expense. Of all humor styles, this is the type that is used least often by comedians and others. Comedians who score high on self-defeating humor are perceived to be weaker, having a lower status, less dominant, and even more pathetic, and hence less funny. Previous research has consistently shown that self-defeating humor is associated with low self-esteem, lack of self-confidence, anxiety, and depression.
- Comedians’ professional success depends not just on their short-term spontaneous humor production ability, but also on their long-term skill, dedication, and ambition in crafting and refining an effective act that can be modulated for different audiences in different cities with different tastes, traits, backgrounds, and levels of inebriation. It also depends upon their fluent, strategic use of affiliative humor and self-deprecating humor when interacting with club managers, booking agents, and other comedians.