A Three Show Night

Saturday March 29th, 2008 - Chicago, IL

Three shows tonight and I’m plum tuckered out. People have no idea how much energy that takes and I’m sure they really don’t care. About halfway through the third show it’s a struggle to remember what material was already done and what wasn’t. It can be a mess.

More than once I’ve seen a comic repeat a bit in the same show and usually it’s the late one of a three show night like tonight. I can’t say I haven’t done it myself on occasion but it’s been a while because there just aren’t that many clubs that make us do three anymore.

Zanies in Chicago still does and I’d guess it’s because of the size of the room. They are dealing with only about 130 seats and I’d bet that last show is a big percentage of the nut for their week. It’s important to keep it. All the other Zanies locations only do two shows.

Most comedians are happy about that but not me. If I’m going to work I want to WORK and adding a third show is a test of stamina. Personally I love it if they’re good audiences but that’s not always the case. More often than not that third one is a total monkey house.

Tonight was a typical Saturday night. The 7:00 show was sold out but they were a little tight. They hadn’t eaten yet but weren’t drunk so they were at least listening but they were not great laughers and made me work for everything. I don’t mind working for my laughs but when I’ve done material for years and I know it works it’s frustrating to have to sell it.

The middle show at 9:00 is the money show. That’s the one that keeps us all in comedy when everything else is blowing up around us. Saturday 9:00 is the prime audience and it usually is the best show of the week. Tonight was very good and all of us did well. I liked them very much but not as much as that first show yesterday. Still, it was a very hot show.

The late show was the killer tonight but not how it usually is. There was a large party of about 25 or 30 people that were having a 21st birthday party for a kid who sat in the chair directly in front of my mike stand. His buddies were all on the sides of him and occupied the entire front row. The older people sat right behind them so they were their own show.

That makes it REALLY tricky because the people in the back feel left out if I don’t do a show for them but the people in front paid a lot of money to have a show for them. This is the kind of thing they pay us for. The 9:00 shows we’d do for free. The rush is worth it all and it’s addictive. That’s also the reason we do the late shows. We want more 9:00 ones.

There was an obnoxious drunk kid who wouldn’t shut up the whole night. He wasn’t an ass but he was distracting. I tried to gently slam him so his friends would laugh at him for talking and hopefully he’d quit but that didn’t happen. I had to deal with it all night long.

After two good shows I didn’t want to ruin anything so I just sucked it up and moved on the best I could. I’d have to slam the kid every few minutes and of course his buddies had a blast and wanted more. This was by far the most difficult show of the week. But I did it.