Humor

The humor project

The humor project was designed to both help us students releave some stress at the beginning of the Zenith project, our biggest project of our Freestyle career. We had to compare two humorists in a study, describe how we would implement the techniques used by those humorists in our project, and finally, create our humor project. This project was really entertaining for me, I was really nervous about how I was going to do in front of all of my peers, but it came pretty naturally, at least I felt like it did at the time. It was reassuring to be able to put myself out there in front of the people I had been going to school with for the last year and a half and get a positive response in return.

 

Satire Comparison

Eugene Lonesco’s Rhinoceros continuously chips away at the ideals of the main character and forces him to conform; Slaughterhouse Five, however, throws the character into increasingly difficult situations that cause him to simply give up.

Over and over again, the characters in Lonesco’s book shout, “oh, look a rhinoceros!”. At first, the people are shocked at the sight, but the main character, Barenger, does not find the rhinoceroses very surprising to see. When Jean, Barenger’s friend, asks what Barenger thinks of the sudden rhinoceros stampeding around town, Barenger says he thinks “nothing…it made a lot of dust…”. His muted reaction to the absurd occurrence he was faced with made him seem resistant to the ways of the people around him, which in this case was a metaphor for the rising of the Nazi party in Germany. Pilgrim’s absurd experience was with the “Tralfamadorians” that captured him and took them to their planet of Tralfamadore. He was much less resistant to being abducted by the aliens. Both men showed a sort of apathy and/or misunderstanding of what was happening to and around them. This shows the hopelessness that many people felt both as citizens in warring countries and as soldiers in said war.

During the course of Slaughterhouse Five, the phrase “so it goes” is repeated over and over again after the mention of someone’s passing. This also shows the Pilgrim sees the world as an inevitable string of fate that we are all doomed to follow without being able to change anything. Pilgrim accepts the things that are going on around him with a sort of depressed apathy, whereas the people in Rhinoceros end up jumping into the strangeness. When Mrs. Boeff’s husband turned into a rhinoceros, she exclaimed “I can’t abandon him!” when others tried to get her to stay away from her husband and jumped onto his back. She didn’t just accept that her husband had turned, she vowed to join him. Throughout the book, Pilgrim is shown as apathetic and not trying to make things any better or worse of his situation. When Pilgrim was told to strip he “did as he was told, took off his clothes” (81).

The main messages of this story are very similar, but they show completely different ways of coping with things that are unimaginable. Pilgrim was resigned with his fate, not bothering to change anything, since he saw everything as inevitable.

 

Humor Study

Steve Hofstetter and John Mulaney are both stand-up comedians, but their sets give off very different vibes. Steve Hofstetter’s comedy is very cynical for the most part. Most of his jokes surround either things in the news or things he has observed others do. He points out the stupid things that people do, and his liberal comments are often fairly divisive with his audience members. He has become well-known for his off-the-cuff style and his infamous dealings with hecklers. The fact that his shows are liberal has almost become a joke in and of itself as he will often ask hecklers if they knew who he was when they bought their tickets if they have something to say about his politics.

John Mulaney, on the other hand, is relatively unproblematic. Possibly due to his fame, he shies away from things that may be seen as “problematic”. He is a liberal comedian, there is no doubt, but he often does not bring up his politics in his show to the same degree that Hofstetter does. His act is a lot more jovial and he typically does not cover any serious topics. He mostly talks about funny situations that he was directly a part of or describes things that he imagined could have happened in a given scenario.

Hofstetter and Mulaney are both narrative-driven comedians, but whereas Mulaney is more focused on his interactions and those that deal with him directly, Hofstetter tends to give others a hard time. Hofstetter does talk about himself in his act, but his humor is a lot more observational and critical of others. A lot of his jokes are about people doing or saying stupid things, whether that’s one of his fans or a politician. He gives everyone around him a hard time. Mulaney has a much more personal set as he often talks about either the shows he likes, like his many jokes about Law and Order, or his childhood, “the Salt and Pepper Diner”.

The snarky style that Hofstetter has is most likely a big reason that he hasn’t made it as big as other less problematic comedians have like “Fluffy” and Mulaney himself. Some venues may be a lot more hesitant to book him due to his divisive jokes and willingness to clapback at a heckler in the audience. He has a fairly large following, but not as large as others, though it is arguable that the following that he has is a lot more loyal to him due to his willingness to “say what’s on everyone’s mind”, much like a liberal version of Donald Trump, ironically.

The kind, kid-next-door vibe that John Mulaney has is much more inviting to new and broad audiences. He never makes you feel alienated and you often find yourself resonating with his stories even if you’ve never been in the type of situation he’s describing. His famous “the one thing you can’t replace” story of going to an underclassman’s house and watching the place get trashed over the course of the night isn’t something that everyone can say that they have experienced, however, we all know people that do stupid things for no good reason. We have also all been in situations where we ourselves have done stupid things because of the environment we were in and felt regretful about our pasts.

 

implementing techniques

In my stand-up routine, I plan on using a light-hearted and self-deprecating tone. I feel like John Mulaney’s style is more what I am going to be aiming for, as his storytelling skills are incredible and I plan on my routine being mostly narrative-based. I also want my routine to be focusing mainly on the interactions that I’ve had with people and not just on the idiocy of people around me, though that will most-likely be an element as well.

My narrative is going to be about me when I was around 14-16 and really, desperately wanted to be different. So much so that I almost started testosterone. While not many people can relate to the extremity of my wanting to be different, everyone has been that cringe-y young teen that wanted nothing more than to stand out from the crowd, for better or worse. Since I want my audience to relate to my stories, I will implement the kind and friendly style that Mulaney has in most of his sets. This should not be too difficult since I already know and am comfortable with a lot of the people in my class.

I also, want to put a little bit of political commentary into my skit, much like Hofstetter does, because it has a lot to do with my main topic, which loosely centers around being non-binary. I want to be careful though, because I don’t want to make being non-binary a joke, I just want to show that my thoughts on being non-binary were very flawed and led to many uncomfortable situations that could have easily been avoided had i just not cared so much about being different. Individualism is great, but the way I was going about it was toxic for me and the people closest to me.

It has been a big struggle trying to accept what I just narrowly avoided, so i think the best way to heal from that is to try to joke about it. Truth and pain. A lot of comedians heal that way, and I’ve already come to terms with what I did, so I do not see the harm in trying to make it into some sort of joke, much like how Hofstetter often jokes about his divorce. You could tell that it actually really affected him at first, however, he has since said that the divorce was the best thing that the two of them could have done in their situation. They were both better off not being together.

I want my stand-up routine to end off on a pretty happy note, so I’ll probably talk about the benefits that came from that experience in the last bit of my act. It probably will not be as funny, but I also want to leave the audience feeling good, I do not want them to be feeling sorry for me or in general have a bad taste in their mouths at the end of it.

 

project proposal

Are you working with a group? Yes* or No

No

Which form of humor are you planning to develop? Will it be a LIVE or pre-recorded performance?

I want to do a stand-up narrative act live.

What is the subject (or, in the case of satire, the target)? Why did your choose this subject?

I was going to mainly target my life and the ways that I’ve changed over the years. I have a lot of material, because I was a really cringey kid.

Which comedic tools/techniques do you plan to use, and why?:

I plan to use anecdotes from my life and connect them in a funny way that follows my life in California and my family in Arkansas. There will definately be some self-deprecating humor mixed in, because I find that the be the type of comedy that comes from me the most and my friends both relate to and find funny

Why do you think this is the right humor project for you? (If you have a group, can you assure me that everyone is invested in this idea and you won’t have trouble getting everyone to contribute meaningfully?) What makes you excited about this idea? What are some potential pitfalls you wish to avoid?

I really like making stories and thinking up new worlds, so telling a story to the audience is something I think I’ll be pretty good at. I also tell my friends stories all the time, so it’s not too different from what I do a lot.

If you get approval today, what’s your next step?

I need to figure out exactly what stories I want to tell and what order I want to tell the in so that I will have smooth-ish transitions between ideas.

 

humor script

We were all trash as kids. No matter how cute your parents thought you were, we were all garbage. I was a particularly rambunctious kid, so I was especially awful.

My dad often reminds me of when I was younger and he would take me to New Orleans and forced him to carry a suspicious amount of ones to give out to the street performers.

One day on that trip, keep in mind I was about six, my dad took me to some bar, ya know as you do with a wild child (gotta get them to slow down somehow). Although in his defense it felt like half of the real estate there was taken up by shady clubs and run-down bars, so there wasn’t much else to do.

Anyway, I was getting bored, because what is a six year old supposed to do in a bar before the age of “do you have games on your phone”? And I apparently really liked whatever song they were playing because I got on the bar and started dancing my heart out. I had declared myself the dancing queen and had to prove myself worthy of the title.

My dad, of course, was mortified and tried to get me down, but the bartender was cool with me dancing up there. Which now that I think about it, definitely violated some food safety laws, even New Orleans has some standards. And also? What was my dad thinking letting me do that? Even if the bartender was cool with it, I was infamous in my family for being disaster prone.

One time, when I was like eight or so, my dad decided that he’d take me to Taco Bell. I, of course, went for my standard order of nachos and  started digging through the bag to get to my food and my dad saw me and stopped me.

“Now em, I want you to be real careful when you eat okay, I’ll let you eat in the car as long as you promise to hold on to your food and not make a mess, this is a brand new car so be extra careful.”

And I was like “yea dad, of course, I won’t spill don’t worry.” and so, with a hesitant last look at me, he nodded and drove out of the parking lot.

It was all good for a few bites, until my dad hit the brakes a little too suddenly for me and my nachos shot out of my lap and into the floor.

My dad turned and looked at the mess in his new car, looked at me, looked back at the mess, looked at the car in front of him, and just screamed “Goddammit!” and punched the steering wheel. So, not only had I ruined his floorboard, but he also now has a permanent indent in his steering wheel as a constant reminder of what I disappointment I am.

 

stand-up performance

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