The Unfunny Truth
(An episodic look behind the scenes of the lives of Stand-Up Comics)
Crooked Views
By Joseph Anthony
*These Blogs are “my truths!” I stake no logistical claims, nor research to support my opinions and experiences.
Part 3 — The Comedy Industry (Understanding Who’s-Who)
It is not like TV or the movies folks — “kid, I’m gonna make you a star!” There are a lot of hands in the pot when it comes to whether Comedians work or not, advance in their career, or stay put. Yet strike career oil and you can pretty much throw this whole blog away!
I will try to pigeonhole the different industry titles (the characters in our little play) and what their role is but believe me, I am leaving out a ton of loopholes and silly little power plays. There are many chickens pecking away at the feed, which is in sparse supply, on the Working Comic’s level. The term Booker is like a Chinese fan (aka a folding fan). Closed, it seems neat, compact, and sure. But open it and suddenly you have all these folds and designs and colors. This beautiful metaphor represents a small portion of the people who book Comedians for both paid and unpaid work.
Unpaid work! Are those not contradicting terms … you are thinking? Ding-ding you win a prize. But in comedy, the club Bookers, especially in the large cities where clubs are viewed as high profile, implore this practice of comics working for free and it is referred to as “a spot.” Because they have provided you a stage and potentially an audience, even though you are providing a service (your talents) which is why the patrons are there drinking, eating, and paying in the first and last place, this is presented to you as an opportunity. Practice, exposure, get seen, paying your dues … no matter how it is phrased, it is still Comics working for free and it is some right of Booker passage that is largely abused. Is there such a thing as an open mic and should comedians have places — and be appreciative of those places — to hone their craft in front of real paying customers, at the expense of an owner who has overhead, ABSOLUTELY! But the fish that is dangled in front of the faces of talented comics most other times (i.e., be seen, work out, etc.) is 8 out of ten times, far from the reality of what is taking place or will ever happen in that establishment. In a large metropolis, it is a numbers game. Population traffic is high, making it easier to cultivate an audience than say in a strip mall in the suburbs of PA (that is a different breed of other potentially venomous Booker’s still to be discussed). These city clubs are already charging more for everything they offer because well, it is a city. Aside from the justifiable higher rents, quite simply, they can! Location, location, location … the three rules in business real estate. Not only are most of the comics on those shows working with no salary but they literally must bark. Yes, like a dog! That is the term that is used for Comics having to stand on the street to lure people into the club. In turn, they get stage time and sometimes a few bucks for the patrons they brought in. Then without a change of clothes or a facelift of any kind the same people that begged you to come in, go up on stage, and are now your performers for the evening. Doesn’t that take some of the mystique or credibility out of the entertainer you are seeing? Isn’t it a tad degrading and archaic? I think so and that is why I never did it in New York City. Hey, maybe I am being too harsh. Some of these clubs with a cover charge (technically used to derive talent salaries), high priced drink minimums and food available (and oh yeah, some people on stage with a microphone) will pay you ten bucks to perform on a weeknight. After tolls, gas, parking, meals, and tips … you must tip, because your insecure mind is thinking, “if the staff likes me, they’ll put in a good word to the Booker.” Like after ten hours on his/her feet slinging trays a waitress/waiter is thinking about you, or if it does happen, that Booker in a city club does not give a shit … you have now netted an average ($60). Parentheses mean a negative on an accounting ledger just in case there is any confusion.
Long gone (at least in New York City and is sparse to my understanding in LA these days) are the days of being Scouted. *See Part — 2 Comedians, for more on “The Boom”, to understand why. You are being seen all right … by tourists who were either barked in or had free tickets in their hotel room. But certainly not by industry people that could offer you an opportunity. Iconic rooms for exposure or to catch a glimpse of someone about to break out, such as The Comedy Cellar in NYC or The Comedy Store in LA are resting on their laurels — it is all illusion. They are still tough to break into (and clickish) and they use the hierarchy of yesteryear to weed out the Comedians they choose to give stage time to or not. The audiences still get a treat, but it is a digital world people — a bold, new, lazy, fearful to take chances on newer talent, digital world! So, no one … layman or struggling comic alike … should be enamored or intimidated by the legacy of these name brand clubs.
Phew! I am sitting here thinking, as I write this at 7 am, out of work, on a Thursday morning, that Bookers might just have to be their own newsletter and I will tackle the other Royalty sitting behind the desks of the comedy industry in Part 4 of my blog series. That is ok as my subscription numbers are still weak and I am making sure that my over three-decade-long career is even tougher when I return to it, post a Covid-19 world, so yeah, I have got some time to work on this series!
“Act now… and get my 8-Track box set — you too can be a Booker!” What makes a Booker? What is their background, experience in entertainment, and why do they have this position of supposed power, decision making, and salary control? “Well Johnny, let’s take a look!” I did the chasing and ate the rejection and heard all the lies once too. BOOKERS were so powerful in our (Comedians) minds…and their own! They held the keys, and we were always made to believe that over there (Comics who were working/chosen) were doing something different than we were and we wanted so bad to win them over and prove ourselves and get in, over there. Then you find out that these Guru’s of entertainment, these almighty decision-makers, have absolutely no talent themselves or formal training (not even an ancestry of a family in the business) for their position. They were Comics or tried to be, Coat Check Girls, Bartenders, Bouncers, Seaters, and worse … I mean more. Much like when you scratch your head when a person who hates children becomes a schoolteacher, at the core, many Bookers have this sort of disdain for Comedians. Are they jealous? Disappointed that they could not do what we could? In many cases, yes. In other cases, they probably just saw an opportunity, from their vantage point behind the bar, that this was an easy way to make money if you could feed on the desperations and aspirations of others. It does not hurt to be a good Salesperson either. They are NOT Agents (we will get to that in a later issue, because even most Agents are not Agents, by textbook definition — they are just Bookers with an opportunity to double-dip as per a contract). No, they are “Headhunters” like in the corporate world. Put several warm bodies on several stages each week and you make a salary. Whether it is a set fee from venues (a budget) to do so, or if you are in fact already getting a salary from a venue each week and on top of that taking a fee from your clients (*JUST WAIT until we explore Managers … hang in there folks, it’s all coming out), that’s how you derive a salary. The whole time, you (the Booker) must pretend to understand what and who makes a good show and convince Comedians, and perhaps the club, of the same. In reality — get a phone, a big Rolodex of names (of course the smartphone has replaced that), a computer, and a stack of headshots (also replaced by the .jpg file), and the most important thing is knowing who is available and when (like a Bingo board) and you are in business. It never hurts if the talent strokes your shallow ego occasionally either. Then you too can play Comedy Chess and the ones that you personally do not like (and that can just mean that their comedy is not your cup of tea, so screw the audiences, because you have the POWER), can email you their open dates from now until you see them standing on a bridge threatening to jump and even then, you will still yell up, “don’t jump, just send me your avails!”
We Comics are at a loss when it comes to acceptance, or lack thereof, of these terms. The conversations between us (called bitching) are all the same and it gets depressing and boring. This Writer grew weary of conversations where I could finish the others’ sentence a long time ago. Therefore, many Comics become the Bookers themselves, as much as the quote-unquote real bookers hate this. Well, I can sit home, or I can do exactly what they do is the mindset. Further resolution becomes, so I won’t perform at a comedy club — which most comics will tell you is the ultimate playing ground for artistic expression and creativity — but I’ll buy a self-contained sound system and hang a backdrop up in a restaurant or a firehouse and hire my friends. Another common analogy/quote amongst Comics is, “every good thing I got, I got from other Comics.” Sadly, some of those Comics turned Booker learn the game all too well and become even more treacherous in their monetary and selective practices. But in many cases, we just open a whole new market for ourselves and each other to share our craft and make some coin. Ironically, these private events and fundraisers can be a thousand times more fun than legit clubs. There is less pressure. The audiences love the shows. They are not studying the check during the headliners closing bit, which he/she slaved over for 5 years and it is brilliant, but no one’s listening to it. There are much fewer politics. We are not afraid that we are probably being scrutinized and will not be able to come back to the club again as a result. Essentially, we get similar, many times greater, perks (you are that towns’ Star of the year rather than the clubs’ flavor of that weekend) without all of the rules!
There is a breed of bookers that seem as if they rose from the soil of some forest somewhere. They fall between the Comic Booker and ALL the other Bookers who have offices and staffs, etc., as these Bookers work from home and if not alone, usually with their significant other or some Comedian (aka no talent ass kisser) desperate for a feeling of power over their peers. Somehow, they have survived on the scene for an awfully long time with a multitude of steady clients and a mill of new ones all the time. Financially, they are skilled at holding their venues up at “PenPoint”, in terms of budgets. They book nothing mainstream, as it were, such as a comedy club or a casino, yet they have tons of nontraditional work, which these days has become the more traditional for Stand-Up Comics if they want to work consistently and make money from it. For some unknown reasons many of them look unkempt in appearance or are bizarre creatures in character or personality, but they have a slew of fundraisers and comedy nights for every organization you can possibly dream up and even a few consistently running comedy rooms (i.e., restaurants, catering halls, etc.). We know that some dabbled in comedy but came to terms that it was not their thing and realized they could make good money cultivating work and comedy clientele. Still others have backgrounds that are a complete mystery to Comedians. Whatever their training, they really do hold the quintessential Janitorial ring of keys to the unfamous working comic’s kingdom. They are the nemesis of the comedy club because they have successful venues, with large audiences, and are sometimes geographically close to a standard running comedy venue, which has expenses such as staff and advertising. Often, the only thing they provide for their clients is us, the Comedians. We cherish them and yet we do not understand how they attained the volume of work that they have. We curse them, do impressions of them when we are together, but we certainly do not want to break ties with them either, for they book EVERYTHING ELSE that needs a Comedian and offers a decent salary for one night’s work.
Look, folks, let me clear the blurred lines of the following misleading facade also. Atlantic City and Vegas are very cool places to be and it sounds even cooler to tell people, “I’m playing at XYZ casino!” Certainly, sounds like a milestone, and the surroundings, for the Comic, are a whole lot better than having to park your car on the grass in the back of a building and then waiting in a basement to go on. But it was easier to get the gig with no Chaser lights, slot machines, or sexy clad drunk women … and here is the cat out of the bag … and we most likely made more money at that one-night stand (incidentally it rained and there’s mud on our shoes now) then we did/do for that one week, every two/three years, at a casino. And we certainly did not have to deal with the egos and ignorance that goes along with trying so hard to get that work just so you can say to your neighbors, “yeah, I’m working in AC this week.” The misnomer about casino’s as well as opening for “someone” in a theater, is that we are being paid great. WE ARE NOT! Who controls this? That is right, the masked, caped, mysterious in origins, Booker!
Stay tuned to “The Unfunny Truth,” series for: Agents, Managers, Club Owners, and other odd and eccentric comedy venue presenters.
