Muster And Catch Up

Saturday March 8th, 2008 - Oak Creek, WI

Today I opened up another unpleasant situation and started to piece all my comedy class notes back together. Yesterday it wasn’t too bad as I started to make up the outline for my act and how I want to move that forward but today hurt a bit. The comedy classes are now in shambles because of both the loss of my other computer and my ex-partner’s antics.

I almost didn’t know where to start. I felt like a tornado victim picking up loose chunks of debris in the yard and trying to figure out what part of the house it used to be. I have an idea of where some of the stuff goes but no clear plan. This will take a while to rebuild.

The classes have been going in one form or another since 1993 and I hate to see them in this situation. I’ve really enjoyed the whole teaching experience and found out that I am a pretty good teacher. I love the idea of seeing people live their dreams and I also love to be a mentor to those who bought into my philosophy. Not everyone did but that’s totally ok.

Not everyone buys into every sports coach’s system either. There are people who hated Vince Lombardi but he won. I’m sure there are people who just enjoy hating but those are going to be anywhere. Gene Perret is one of the kindest and most giving people I’ve ever met and he said he gets those kinds of people too. If he gets them I have to expect it too.

Over the years I’ve had a few run ins with people over my teaching style or ideas but for the most part it’s been overwhelmingly positive. What I say to them I say for a reason and I don’t sugarcoat how difficult comedy and being in show business is. If they can’t handle it or don’t want to hear it that’s fine but I’m not going to baby anybody. This stuff is hard.

I think my biggest mistake over the years was not being good with money. I never did it for the money so I always tried to give the students way more than they paid for. I did that and more but I should have expanded it to the masses rather than just for comedy clubs. If I had brought it to corporate situations I bet I could have really made a boat load of cash.

There is still room to do that and I am getting the itch to teach again. I still have Uranus to build from the ground up and that’s no easy task but I hate to see the comedy class end on such a sour note. Zanies said I can still start them up again even though I need a person to do the administrative duties the other guy did. I am not in a position to do that myself.

I just like teaching. That’s why I trusted my business partner so much. He handled every student’s registration and payment and all I had to do was show up and have a lesson plan prepared. I was always tweaking and improving the lessons but losing all my notes put an even uglier twist to all of this. Not only do I not have any help but my notes are gone too.

Today I looked through some old notes and started to piece together a plan once again. I know how to teach a class and could do it tomorrow with no notes but I had a nice system going that really ran smoothly. I think I could put the classes online and take it nationwide in a short time. There are a lot of people who want to learn to be a comedian. I can help.

Sitting around pouting about how I got screwed isn’t going to help anyone including me so that’s why I dove right into it today. There are people that think everything happens for a reason but I’m not sure if I believe that. It did happen and now I have to deal with it. If I choose to let it defeat me it will. I don’t choose that. I am going to rebuild and try again.

Getting online with comedy classes is an idea I’ve had for years. For whatever reason it never got off the ground but now it’s a necessity. I’ve spent too many years working up a lesson plan and putting it into practice that letting it lapse would be a big waste of energy.

Helping new comedians get started was the legacy of my mentor C. Cardell Willis up in Milwaukee. He never even had a CD or a DVD of his act and that’s a shame. He was very funny but only a precious few ever got to see it. His mentoring skills were wonderful and he lives on in me even today. I want to have my legacy be the same and help others also.

I’ve already had over 1000 people take my classes in one form or another and I’m proud to have been able to touch that many people. I’ve made personal friends and seen a lot of people get to have the time of their lives in front of their friends and family. I can’t count all the times one of my students sees me years later and says ‘I still remember that night.’

‘That night’ is the graduation show where they got to go on stage and do five minutes at Zanies. I’ve had probably 50 or 60 of those nights over the years and I never get sick of it. I’m so proud of all the students and to see them have the guts to go up and let it rip makes me feel like I’ve contributed something to the betterment of humankind. I love that vibe.

I’m a ways off from doing it again in the next little while though. I will retype my notes and recreate my lesson plan and start over again. If my new web person Shelley can’t help me do this I’ll find someone who can. I think Shelley is the perfect one to help me though as she is a former student and knows what it’s like to go up there on a graduation show.

Whether I ever get famous or not is really not that important to me right now. I’d like to just make as many people feel good as I can for whatever time I have left. Doing shows or teaching classes would both qualify and so would being the King of Uranus who provides funny stuff to the masses. Fame wouldn‘t guarantee happiness. Money might rent some.

I don’t have to charge a lot for the classes and if I can get just a few stragglers in every city and town in America and Canada and Australia and England I’ll be extremely rich. It wouldn’t need to be embraced by the masses to be successful. I just need my solid core.

If I got over 1000 people in the Chicago/Milwaukee area I think I can do way more than that by being on the internet. That’s the long range plan anyway. For today I at least got it started in the right direction. This will take a lot of work but what else is new? I’m ready.

Tonight I had a good show at the Oak Creek Community Center in the Milwaukee area. There were about 300 people and they were great. I made a few bucks and it was close to home and that’s never a bad thing. I always love to do shows. That’s what keeps me alive.