An On Night Off

Friday November 28th, 2008 - Elgin, IL

A night off tonight. I had a gig but it was still a night off. Jim McHugh booked a benefit show to raise money for another youth baseball team and we had to fill 90 minutes. These kinds of shows are very easy and they usually end up being shorter than 90 minutes due to raffles and giveaways before the show and introductions of all the people who helped out.

Jim works his ass off on these shows and I appreciate him thinking of me to be on them. He handles all the communication with the group and also puts the lineup together so all I need to do is show up and perform. That’s all most comics want and I am no exception.

It doesn’t interest me in the least to have to go sell a show but I think it’s coming to that very quickly in our business. Clubs aren’t what they were and we all need to branch out to make a living and keep working regularly. Jim is on the right track with this and I hope he succeeds because the more shows he gets the more I will be on. We match up very well.

He’s trying to carry on the idea of the Chicago Style Standups which is still an excellent concept. Several experienced comedians on one stage at one time riffing back and forth is an entertaining show. It’s also very easy to do because we all have a lot of solid material.

Cherry picking the best bits on any night isn’t hard at all. Most of us are headliners so if we are only on for 20-30 minutes it’s like a night off. Then, if the show goes well we’ll be able to come back in six months or a year and have a show that’s almost completely new.

Tonight was not that exact format. Jim decided it would be best to do a traditional show of one comic after the next. He did about twenty minutes to host the show and brought up Patti Vasquez who did about thirty minutes. The audience liked them both so I knew they would probably like me too. I was only supposed to do thirty minutes so I leaned into it.

If there’s one thing I know how to do it’s stand on a stage and let it rip. I talk quickly so the shorter I’m up there the more of an effect that has. Thirty minutes is like a vacation so I can put all the best bits in a row and keep pummeling them until they can’t get a breath.

That’s what happened tonight. I went up and started talking fast and kept going until the whole crowd was with me and I hammered them until they couldn’t take it anymore. They were strong laughers and I was able to get on a roll in a short time and when that happens it‘s like skipping a stone across a pond. All I had to do was wait until the laughs stopped.

There have got to be more shows like this to be had, right? I would think so anyway. If I could do shows like this in town and make even so-so money I’d totally do it. It still gives me a stage fix but I don’t have to sleep in a mildewy motel room and drive a zillion miles.

Jim McHugh is a good comic and he is the perfect guy to run these shows. There aren’t a lot of people who are good onstage that can sell a show too but he seems to be getting a feel for how to do it correctly. I’m very happy to be an Indian and not a chief in all of this.