Friday Late Show

That's the answer that Steve Martin gave when he was asked why he left standup. I felt like leaving standup this past Friday night around 1:30 AM.

Now, I had a great time at the Baltimore Comedy Factory this past weekend. Thanks to Mickey Cucchiella and Joe Robinson. Thursday night was good and the 1st 2 shows on Friday night were awesome. I got a miniature standing O (3 people) after my set on show 2. It was a blast. Then the late show happened. Ugh. Outstanding young comic (Peabo) Bryson Turner opened the show to awkward chatter, disinterest, and drunken stares. Nothing he could have done. These people were not going to give in.

I went up determined to do something to win them over. One of my weaknesses in comedy is when I don't feel energy from the audience, I lower my energy. I mail it in. I can feel myself doing it and it pisses me off like nothing else. It's a defense mechanism that someone ho is afraid to fail uses to not feel so bad about himself when he eats it. You can blame the crowd all you want but they paid. They don't have to do anything...and these people took advantage of that right. A group of people were talking the entire time, most just stared with a glassy eyed drunkeness that reminded me of walking through an opium den in Instanbul.

So what did I do? I lowered my commitment. I made cracks on the side about how annoying they were about not laughing at stuff. This is such BS. I hate it when comics do this and I hate it when I do it. It's this lame attempt to shift the blame. 'This is funny. It's your fault'. In sports, if you give everything you have and lose, you just got beat. If you don't do everything you can, get yourself into trouble, then blame the ref when something doesn't go your way, you're a b*tch. Well, I was a b*tch on Friday night. Was the crowd tough? Of course. Could I have done my material to the best of my ability and still bombed? Yup. Did I do a half-a$$ job then piss and moan for 20 minutes about how the crowd sucked? Sure did.

Still, that Friday late show was a challenge. It would have broken the spirit of a lot of people. It broke me and I am still ticked. In fact, my set the next night at the Hyatt was only so so as it was still in my head.

Back on the horse tonight tho. Come see me this Saturday at Comix. I'm doing the New Jacks Show. It's a good one that humans can enjoy.