Like every other profession, the world of comedy is filled with human beings, people who are sensitive, busy, well-meaning, and flawed—the same as all of us. And where there be people, there be politics.
I’m deeply sympathetic to Andrew’s recent, heartfelt post on this topic because I, too, recently learned that I’m in the doghouse at one of Seattle’s comedy clubs. Not for the same reason, though; in fact, the demoralizing part is that I’m apparently in shit city for something that never even happened.
The incident in question
As of June, I had been going to this club regularly for over six months, and knew that the upcoming weekend was a slow one (with no scheduled headliner). Since other new comics of comparable seniority and talent had been asked to do some weekend time, I approached the club owner:
“[Owner], is there a chance I could get some time at the [show] this weekend? It would really mean a lot to me.”
I can immediately tell from his tone and body language that, as usual, he’s annoyed that I’m talking to him. He doesn’t really like new comics, and something about me in particular has always seemed to rub him the wrong way (the bandanna? who knows).
“Aw gee, I’m not sure,” he said. “You should’ve been here on [day of last open mic] when we put the roster together.”
“Dang, yeah, I couldn’t be here on [day]. It was my Mom’s birthday, so I was with her—”
By this point, he’s barely paying attention to me; he’s fidgeting with impatience, and his eyes are darting left and right over my shoulders. He interrupts: “OK, go ahead and show up, we’ll try to get you some time at one of the shows.”
“Wow, thanks!”
The whole exchange lasted a total of about twenty seconds.
So I dutifully showed up for the early show on Friday and, when the roster was short-handed, I went up and did five minutes. It was one of my better sets, and the audience responded really well.
Flush with success, I was blindsided when another comic told me that I had better go talk to [owner], because he was pissed at me. The owner finished with a customer, saw me, and hollered, “CJ where’s your Mom? Is she in the audience? I didn’t see her.”
What?? Apparently he thought I had asked for stage time on the understanding that my Mom was coming to the show. Uh, no. No possible permutation of my words could have conveyed that idea, unless he only listened to like two of them.1
It ended with me apologizing for apparently not being more clear—not really warranted, IMO, but I was trying to be gracious—and him saying “don’t worry, it’s fine.” That, I felt, had settled things.
I was wrong. I recently learned that I’m banned from the weekend shows at that club because of the time “CJ said he’d bring people to a weekend show and then didn’t, because he was just scamming for stage time.”
Argh!!
That he basically ignored and misunderstood me the first time is annoying, but the fact that he apparently paid no attention when we talked about it afterward is just infuriating.
The owner imperative
Now, it’s his club. He can do whatever he wants, and he doesn’t owe me a damn thing. He’s got a business to run, and that business isn’t about being buddies with every aspiring comic who walks in the front door. Besides which, I’ve seen some people pull some ethically questionable shit in order to sneak up for some stage time, so I totally understand his instinctive distrust of new comedians.
But come the fuck on.
Despite it all, I’m still intensely loyal to his club. I’m deeply grateful for the open mic time I get there, and I always thank him for the opportunity whenever I get on stage. I genuinely want to repay his generosity by bringing a gaggle of paying customers on the weekend.
But instead I’m in the penalty box because he wasn’t paying any attention to me when I had the temerity to approach him. The whole thing is a brutally raw deal, but what can I do? I’m planning to talk to him about it again this weekend, but considering how spectacularly that’s failed in the past, I don’t have a lot of hope. Maybe I should bring visual aids?
I have 15-20 people queued up and looking forward to coming out to my next weekend show. I hope it’s there. But if not, it’ll be somewhere else.
Thanks for letting me vent, Internet.
- This is all the more absurd because I have stated plainly that neither of my parents are ever, ever, ever coming to any of my comedy shows. I’m too big a wuss. [↩]
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