14 - Stand-up Comedy
Dave Chappelle - House of Blues
While what we consider to be “funny” is subjective, no matter where you fall on the sense of humor scale, all of us should recognize stand-up comedy as the unique and necessary art form it is.
Comedy is vital to navigating through life’s turbulent times. Sometimes things are so dark, so insane, so completely fucked up, the only way to handle them and put them in perspective is to laugh at them.
It’s a powerful tool in processing grief and also discussing topics often considered too taboo for society at large.
Race, gender, class, sex, politics, religion, addiction, sickness, and death, are all made more palatable when filtered through the lens of comedy.
Good stand-up is raw, biting, honest social commentary, using dick jokes as its trojan horse to enter society’s gates, dropping one hard to swallow truth bomb after another once it’s safely penetrated the fortress. Dick, trojan, swallow, penetrate - where’s my hour-long special, Netflix?
All kidding aside though - jokes are no joke.
What makes them funny are the little nuggets of truth at their core.
Jokes that hold a mirror up to our faces, showing us our hypocrisy, our biases, the dark thoughts we suppress, until we laugh at something fucked up and it reveals a part of us we often try to forget exists.
Comedy speaks truth to power, explores sensitive topics in an entertaining way, and is an integral part of our culture, and defines what we consider to be acceptable or unacceptable - always toeing the thin line of that boundary, and sometimes crossing it.
Imagine the nerves of steel it must take to actively want to speak to large groups of strangers, all eyes on you; being tasked with making an audience of people with different lifestyles and experiences and beliefs laugh collectively.
I don’t even feel comfortable being the one to say grace at Thanksgiving, in front of loved ones, and there’s people out there making controversial topics the subject of jokes, in front of complete strangers, for a living.
All I can do is sit back and respect the craft.