I Was a Teenage Stand-Up Comedian in Hollywood!

“There is a thin line that separates laughter and pain, comedy and tragedy, humor and hurt.” ― Erma Bombeck

“Life is a comedy to those who think, a tragedy to those who feel.” ― Jean Racine

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I really have worked as a Stand Up Comedian in Hollywood and around in small venues in Southern California when I was a teenager. I did this gig, off and on, from 1979 until early 1981 or so. I was very popular and got paid... 

OK. That's not exactly true. I wasn't a teenager, I was about 21 or 22 years old when I was a stand-up comedian; and it's probably a bit of a "stretch" to say that I was "popular." I did get paid a couple of bucks each time too (which was often more than I got from being in a punk band!)

Months before I became a Stand-Up Comedian, I was playing in a punk band and, from that, I got to see how the stage set-up was done for concerts. (I wrote about my punk band in: The White Stripes Jack White and Me (A True Story) (robot55.jp/blog/jack-white-and-me-a-true-story/) I saw an opportunity to be able to go on stage, tell off-color jokes and actually get paid a little bit (plus it was a great way to meet girls!) I figured that, in between the bands - while the Roadies were changing equipment on the stage - I could go up on stage and entertain the troops. 

I actually went to clubs and owners to sell myself and my routine. For a while there, I got jobs; a lady from the department store I worked at actually got me lots of jobs too. She got me jobs at some sort of social events! She could have been a good manager! At that time, I was telling jokes in front of crowds of 50 ~ 200 people, one or two weekends a month for a short while!

Sometimes I did so well, and the crowd liked my jokes so much, that the fans were crowding the stage and throwing coins at my feet. I am not exaggerating!

Other times, with the very same act and original jokes I wrote, even the next night in front of a different crowd, it was like I was giving a speech at a funeral; it was dead. I definitely am not exaggerating about that either.

I was always confused as to why I was such a hit one night, then the next night, it was terrible! The difference was like night and day!

(Photo of me, as Nigel Nitro, circa 1980 - I would later write under the pen name "Ricky Zipp" using this same photo)

The first time people threw money at me, I was mad because I thought they were throwing stuff at me to get me off the stage. That was until a friend told me, "Wow! You were great! People were even throwing money at your feet!"

Getting up on stage, by yourself, is much more difficult than people can imagine; you are completely alone. If you are in a band on stage, that's scary enough, but, with a band, you have your band members and instruments to hide behind. Being a stand up comedian is just you, naked (figuratively speaking), on the stage with a few dozen or, even hundreds of people just staring at you. Their eyes pierce you and their expectations are quite high (or incredibly low - which can be a problem too!) Their eyes and faces are saying, "Entertain me! Make me laugh or get off the stage!"

Being a Stand-Up Comedian is a very rough job.

My very last stand up routine was at my university at a talent show; I was MC'ing the event. People were roaring with laughter. I couldn't figure it out. They were laughing in all the wrong places! I later asked a girl why people were laughing so much and she said, "Your facial expressions were hilarious!" I couldn't figure that out either. If anything my facial expression were of confusion because I couldn't figure out why people were laughing at my jokes in weird places! It was then and there that I decided that I wasn't good enough and didn't have what it takes to be a Stand-Up Comedian.

But I'm very glad I tried my luck as a Stand Up Comedian. Being a Stand-Up Comedian is a great way to become a great public speaker. It is also a good way to overcome inhibitions and to learn how to control a crowd's behavior.

How and why did I ever first become a Stand-Up Comedian? Let me explain further...

In about mid 1979, a few months after Sid Vicious of the Sex Pistols died, my punk band broke up. I was quite disillusioned with the entire "Punk Thing" by then anyway. Sid dying (he was my hero) was the last straw for me. (Well, I had lots of "last straws," actually.)

But, I had loved being on the stage as a Punk band vocalist and wanted to stay and hang out in Hollywood. So I decided try try my hand as a Stand-Up Comedian. It made sense to me at the time.

Being the front of a punk band was powerful. It was also a lesson in crowd control. When my band ended, at first, I wanted to start another punk band but everything I tried just didn't work out to my liking. Also, I had learned a lesson from playing in a band with other people who weren't so dedicated; having to depend on other people sucks!

Being a Stand-Up Comedian is really just you against the world, it seems. It's a great experience and, no matter your age, I think everyone can benefit from having to stand up in front of a bunch of strangers and give a speech.

After all, giving a speech and doing stand up comedy are first cousins in the public speaking world.

In Japan, you can sometimes see young people standing at a busy train station and giving speeches. I hear it is a kind of initiation at some companies to make their new young employees overcome their inhibitions and become better representatives and salesmen. I think it is good.

I will always fondly look back to my 20 or 30 times as a Stand Up Comedian. Sometimes I was the funniest guy! King of the hill! Other times I was a pathetic little loser standing butt-stark-naked in front of a crowd of people without a friend in the world!....

Both are great learning experiences.

Everyone can benefit from public speaking exposure like that.

Like they say, "Don't dream it. Be it."

This blogpost reprinted courtesy of Robot55. 

 

Burlesque Booming in Tokyo!

In these last ten ~ twenty years, there’s been a boom in younger Japanese girls getting into Geisha. They aren’t “TRUE” geisha, of course. Long ago, many of the "true" geisha were sold like slaves into geisha agencies usually to pay off massive family debts. Today’s young geisha likes the fashion and costume and make up of old Japan and the world of the geisha. To today’s geisha it is fun and an art form more than it is a lifestyle or a life’s work as it was to traditional geisha in a feudalistic society.

Miwa Rock

But, along with the art of geisha, today’s young Japanese Tokyoite woman has fallen into love with another sort of dancing and art form that was popular in the west from the late 1890s until the late 1950s and that is Burlesque.

Burlesque has found a great comeback in the west, and now in Japan too due to recent Hollywood movies like Burlesque from 2010. Burlesque starred Cher, Christina Aguilera, Alan Cumming, Eric Dane. It was about a small-town girl who ventured to Los Angeles and finds her place in a neo-burlesque club run by a former dancer.

Movies like this, is it said, have been inspired by modern burlesque superstars like Dita Von Tease. Dita is the Michael Jackson Superstar of Burlesque dancing! Maybe some of you haven’t heard of her, but look her up. She has to be one of the most beautiful women in the entire world today! (Photos of Dita Von Teese here Va-Va-Va Voom!) 

Oh, and a funny note is that she was married to Marilyn Manson!

Anyway, because of Dita and the movie “Burlesque” this kind of art form has a revival boom going on in Tokyo today.

One of the Top dancers is a girl who goes by the name of Miwa Rock. Miwa tells me that there are 14 Burlesque dancers in Tokyo today but only five (and she’s one of them) who gets paid for her efforts.

I saw her dancing once and the guys and girls were going crazy and giving her 1000 yen (about $10) tips!

It really blew my mind to see younger Japanese people today mimicking these sorts of western styles and dance fashions that were so popular 70 years ago.

It just goes to show that these trends come and go in cycles and one must always keep and eye open for them to catch them while they are going and see them real time.

(Here's a video that I made with my best friend Ken Nishikawa of a Psychobilly rock band named Bobby's Bar that Miwa Rock appeared in for us. The entire atmosphere of the entire event was breath-taking.!)

Here's Miwa Rock's Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/miwa.rock.5?fref=ts

Here's her blog (Japanese only): http://ameblo.jp/miwa-rock1025/

Dancing With the Stars, Spray Tans, Mindless American TV

Every morning, like clockwork, I turn on my computer to do work and to write this blog. Every morning I see something on the top page of Yahoo that just makes me roll my eyes. (Yes, I know everyone uses Google, but I use Yahoo to get the financial and stock market news).


Everyday, at the top of the page, Yahoo has their 5 "hot" stories. These are always incredibly stupid and useless. Usually it is about an unusual football play (when, upon clicking, you see that it is not so unusual at all)... Or it it about some idiocy involving some Hollywood person getting a divorce or the dress s/he is wearing or something else.

Here's what was at the top of Yahoo this morning: $2.5 million dollar bra, Wal-Mart's sales, Golfer gets angry, 10 strange sports venues, Billy Crystal hosts Oscars? Hoo hum...

In a few words, God! American society is stupid! 


You know this stuff is there because Yahoo is "giving people what they want"... There is never any news about anything that actually matters.


But sometimes, even Yahoo can have something so stupid, so asinine that it irritates me to hell. Yesterday had a link to the person who does the tanning for the people on "Dancing With the Stars"! Jesus! I just have to read about that! 


The article is just Hollywood fabulous. Let me quote:


Each season of "Dancing With the Stars" features a revolving line-up of contestants and professional dancers, but one thing remains the same: spray tans are a big part of the show. And that's where Julie Nostrand, the owner of South Seas Skin Care, comes in. All season long, she's spent every Sunday flying from Loveland, Colorado, to Los Angeles, to ensure celebs look luminous in the ballroom and in front of the camera. omg! caught up with Nostrand to find out more about what the stars do to get glam.


Isn't that just ZZZZZZzzzzzzzzz......... Oh, where was I?


No wonder the USA is all f'ed up. Ask Anyone says the average American watches 6.7 hours of TV a day!!!!


Average American watches 6.7 hours a day of TV.


How, in the hell could anyone spend 1/3 of their waking time on TV?


But for more, er, "serious" info let's go to our Neilsen ratings: 

According to the A.C. Nielsen Co., the average American watches more than 4 hours of TV each day (or 28 hours/week, or 2 months of nonstop TV-watching per year). In a 65-year life, that person will have spent 9 years glued to the tube.

The average child will watch 8,000 murders on TV before finishing elementary school. By age eighteen, the average American has seen 200,000 acts of violence on TV, including 40,000 murders. At a meeting in Nashville, TN last July, Dr. John Nelson of the American Medical Association (an endorser of National TV-Turnoff Week) said that if 2,888 out of 3,000 studies show that TV violence is a casual factor in real-life mayhem, "it's a public health problem." The American Psychiatric Association addressed this problem in its endorsement of National TV-Turnoff Week, stating, "We have had a long-standing concern with the impact of television on behavior, especially among children."

Millions of Americans are so hooked on television that they fit the criteria for substance abuse as defined in the official psychiatric manual, according to Rutgers University psychologist and TV-Free America board member Robert Kubey. Heavy TV viewers exhibit five dependency symptoms--two more than necessary to arrive at a clinical diagnosis of substance abuse. These include: 1) using TV as a sedative; 2) indiscriminate viewing; 3) feeling loss of control while viewing; 4) feeling angry with oneself for watching too much; 5) inability to stop watching; and 6) feeling miserable when kept from watching.

OK, 4 hours a day or 6.7 hours a day of watching TV!? Are you kidding me? Don't these people work? How can anyone, in this day and age, have the time to watch that much TV? Why would anyone want to watch that much TV? These people are truly sick, especially when they feel miserable when they cannot watch enough TV!


What's to watch on TV? Nothing good.


I heard from my friend who works at NHK that recent surveys in Japan show that the average Japanese under 30-year-old watches an average 20 minutes of TV per day.


If these statistics are true then the USA is definitely done for. People in the USA no longer read books, they don't know their basic geography. They don't know the difference between John and Yoko staying in bed to protest the war or Lenin doing the same. They think Falafel is a political party in Pakistan and the people in Eye-rack had nooklar weapons.


They think Mexico is in Central America even though Central America doesn't exist... And, they think Napoleon is an ice-cream sundae at 31 Flavors. They couldn't pick out "Grease" on a map of Europe and don't care about "Cheese eating surrender monkeys" anyway. 


As Fred Reed writes in Dark Ages:



The night closes in. Read the surveys of what children know, what students in universities know. Approximately nothing. We have become wanton morons. As the intellectual shadows fall again, as literacy declines and minds grow dim in the new twilight, who will copy the parchments this time?


No longer are we a schooled people. Brash new peasants grin and peck at their iPods. Unknowing, incurious, they gaze at their screens and twiddle, twiddle. They will not preserve the works of five millenia. They cannot. They do not even know why.


Twilight really does come. Sales of books fall. Attention spans shorten. Music gives way to angry urban grunting. The young count on their fingers when they do not have a calculator, know less by the year. We have already seen the frist American generations less educated than their parents. College graduates do not know when World War One happened, or what the Raj was. They have read nothing except the nothing that they read, and little of that. Democracy was an interesting thought.


Ours will be a stranger Dark Age than the old one. Our peasants brush their teeth and wash, imagine themselves of the middle class, but their heads are empty.


We are witnessing the end times for the USA as we've known it for all these years.... It's too bad that, when the drunken giant in the room finally collapses, his fall is going to break everything on everyone else's tables.