Intro to Stand Up Comedy: Write and Perform Your First Routine

1. Intro to Stand Up Comedy: Write and Perform Your First Routine: Hi, my name is Elizabeth. Dave, I'm an award winning stand up comedian and comedy teacher. I'm from Australia. You may be able to tell by the accent, And I've created sell out shows that have toured around the country to rave reviews. I started stand up from scratch ten years ago with absolutely no skills, no training, and no idea. But I learned a lot through trial and error. And five years later I won Best Comedy Award for my solo show, Superwoman Money Program. I've also studied clown and improv along the way, and I bring those skills into this class as well. I've been teaching people stand up since 2017 and I love it. My students have great things to say about my teaching. And in my experience, anyone can learn the skills to be a great stand up comedian. The only prerequisite is that you want to do it enough that you start and here you are. The only other things you will need for this class are very simple, just a pen, a notebook, and for one exercise, it's great if you have like a bigger bit of paper and some textures. You may also want to use the notes or voice note function on your phone to record and listen back. And it can be helpful for journaling your ideas. As a teacher, my focus is building your confidence as a comedian. So you're ready to try out your first five minute open mic spot. During the class, we'll explore your unique comic voice. Create your material through writing exercises. And we'll put it all together at the end with performance techniques. Okay, are you ready? Let's jump in. 2. Before We Begin: Stand Up Comedy Guidelines: Okay, before we begin, like pirates, I don't have rules, but I do have guidelines. The first guideline is to punch up with your jokes. If you don't know what that means, the targets of your jokes, the people who are the butt of the joke, who are being made fun of. They're ideally people or structures who have high status. They're above you in the pecking order, they have power. The opposite, which I don't recommend is punching down. That means making fun of people who are marginalized or are victims in the situation or have less power than you. I'm not saying you can't punch down, I just think it's really tacky. So I say it's better not to. The second is to only do your own material. No, no. In stand up comedy. To borrow another comedians jokes. If you have friends who don't want to do stand up comedy and they say lots of funny things, that could be fine to take what they say. But I'd still ask them if it's okay. Because ultimately the audience wants the authentic. We want to see your material, we want to laugh at your jokes. That's what you want to, which is why you're here. The final guideline is to be kind to yourself. Comedy is about play. It's about fun. It's about joy and creativity. Shame and self doubt are terrible. The stand up comedy, it's about fun. Try to have fun. Okay, let's go. 3. The Class Project: Okay, the project. The project for this class is creating your first stand up routine. So that's a short series of jokes three to 5 minutes long, that you can perform as part of a stand up comedy open mic night. Oh, we'll speak more about routines and open mic nights. Later in the class, you'll deliver the project by submitting a video. Ooh, ten points or a photo as well would be great. So you can take a video or photo of you performing at an open mic. Or you can take a photo of your set list which is ready to go for your first gig. There'll be more about set lists later as well. I'm so excited to see how you use the skills you learn during the class. And my biggest hope is that this gives you the confidence to just get out there and do it, get up onstage, grab the mic. So share your work in the project space below the class, and we can all be inspired. 4. Observation & Creativity: Okay, observation is a key skill in stand up comedy. And to start with, I want you to notice where you are funny, where you get laughs in your day to day life. You might notice that when you're getting laughs, there is something different that you're doing. Just something that is a bit out of the ordinary. It's really important to figure out what that something is. So for example, if you're telling a friend a really embarrassing story about something that happened to you and they start laughing, why? Try and figure out why did you exaggerate the humiliation of the story? Did you act it out playing both parts? Or did you use like a really surprising analogy they didn't expect? Or did you make up things that didn't really happen, like to stretch the truth? Or there might be like a spontaneous way of phrasing it that was like unexpected. A lot of comedy comes from these moments like these, just sudden associations or the way we speak in that moment. So it's really important to try and notice those. Take notes when it happens or just after, or if they're really good friends. You can even just stop the conversation and ask them. But take note of that so that you can think about it later. These things are the beginnings of your comic voice, so they're already there. We really just need to pay attention. So we notice the other thing to look out for, to notice is things that happen every day, that are funny. Like, did you have a really strange interaction at the cafe? It's like Mm, or did you see a weird sign that didn't make sense? Or like, did you make a really big mistake? Or watch an animal do something stupid? Or like overhear this really wild conversation on the train. Like there is comedy everywhere. There's just moments happening all the time. And we need to train our eyes and our ears so that we see them. You can take little notes in your phone or notepad, as this is a practice that will serve you in such good stead for your entire comedy career. Basically, you'll need it. Definitely start task, take brief notes in your phone or notepad. And this is a practice that you'll need later. Waking up your creativity. We need to wake up our creativity for stand up. As I said before, comedy is about creativity. It's that nebulous force that generates ideas, Art, magic. It's important to pay attention to what works for you and where, when, and why you feel creative, playful and free. It'll be different for everyone. So some examples could be like talking about a story with a friend, going for a walk in nature. Talking aloud alone while you're gardening, while you're in the shower, maybe you're free write each morning or maybe you're shooting hoops with a friend. Is that what you call it? I'm not sporty juggling in a cafe. I like that one because you get a cope. So explore and notice the things that you like. Like it's actually that simple. Like unless you're telling me that you only feel creative when you're drinking, taking drugs, or smashing cars with a cricket bat. In those situations, you're going to need to rein it in and find a new outlet. But otherwise, all bets are off. So just do what you want to do. What makes you feel Creative Task, I recommend doing a few pages of freewriting each day. It's an exercise created by Julia Cameron in the Artist's Way, which is an amazing book. Definitely read it. Freewriting is like doing reps at the gym to tone your creativity muscles. Julia says to do it first thing in the morning. But if that doesn't work for you, doing it is always better than not doing it. Whenever you can is fine. Don't judge what you write. Don't try to be funny. This is not about being funny. Just get your thoughts out onto the page without taking your pen off the paper. This exercise is about unblocking your creative engine. It's not about writing killer material straight onto the page. Also, if you try free writing and you hate it and it makes you miserable, you don't have to keep doing it. Try something else, but do something whatever makes you feel free, playful and creative task. Try a different option each week and see what works for you. 5. Finding Your Comic Voice: One of the best ways to learn about comedy is by watching a lot of comedy. What a surprise. Obviously seeing comedy live is comedy at its best. But online comedy can work too. One thing I recommend is not just watching the pros really try and see some local open mic nights or fringe festival shows, or video clips of competitions for new comedians hunt out the beginners. You want to see comedians early in their career or who have only performed a few times. It's useful to see their work and compare it to the pros. You can start to see how the sausage is made and you can see how you go from one to the other. It's also so much less intimidating to watch and mentally compare yourself to someone who's just starting out at the pub rather than a comedy legend who's done ten Netflix specials. I can tell you now I would never have started stand up if I hadn't seen my old housemate to a spot at a bar down the road and thought I could do that. Now that you've watched some comedy, what kind of comedy do you like and why? What you like is a great place to start when you're searching for your comic voice. Comedy is a very broad church. There are so many different options. I've created a comedy styles handout, which I've linked in the resources below. This lists many common styles of comedy and it also has examples and short clips of comedians who work in that style. Which style do you like best? And which comedians do you like best? Who are your favorites? Do note, this is not an exhaustive list by any means. And so many comedians work crosses more than one style. The clips are often just an example of that particular style or them working in that style. To give you an idea task, watching comedy is so important, please see the suggestions in the comedy handout. And just watch it. Just go and watch it. I can't say, in enough time go and watch comedy. 6. Joke Writing Structure Part One: Set Ups: In this video, we're going to cover part one of a joke writing structure. Part one is a set up. The set up is not the funny part of the joke, but it is probably the most important part. There are only two parts, but it's very important. A joke needs to have all the information that you need to understand the joke implicit in the set up. It all has to be included. When the surprise of the punch line is revealed, it all makes sense and the audience laughs. Anytime in a comedian's act where the audience is listening and not laughing, that's a set up, but it doesn't mean that set ups are boring. It's actually really important that set ups are interesting. Because if you can't get the audience on board at the beginning of a joke, they're not going to be there at the end of the joke when you're delivering the punchline and you really want them there so they laugh. How do we make set up interesting? I'm so glad you asked. The answer is attitude or emotion. We'll see the theory here set up plus punch line equals joke. When we're looking at the set up specifically, we've got a specific subject, so something that's very specific, not too generic. Then we add the attitude, and then we add observations. We'll get to punch lines later, don't worry. But now it's just set ups. You need to pick a specific subject, that's a subject that you want to write a joke about. For example, maybe we're going to talk about camping. Now you need an attitude attitude to that topic. Likely you're going to want an extreme attitude a bit bigger than you have in real life. Maybe you love camping, or you hate camping or camping. Makes you happy, sad, confused, angry, afraid. We are so much more interested in how you feel about something than we are in the topic. We are hard wired as social animals to respond to emotion. If you're telling us about something with no emotion, that's just a mind numbing Powerpoint presentation at the office. And we're all slowly fall asleep. If you are showing us a lot of emotion and you're really engaged and you're really fired up, we are hooked. That's interesting. Really just unleash your emotions. So we've got the specific subject, we've got the attitude, now we need observations. Sometimes observations are called a premise or an opinion, or a point of view. Observations are usually more insightful than funny. We're looking for something that makes the audience not in agreement, like oh yeah, that thing. A really good premise or a really good observation is very specific about what exactly is strange, infuriating, exciting, scary, or stupid about the topic. Say we've got camping and we've got the attitude of we love camping. Now we're going to think about what is kind of strange about camping like that. We love, but it's strange. So it is kind of weird when we have a house, but we go into nature and we build a tiny, less good house. And we sit in that for a few days, it's weird. And then we, you know, we cook food over a fire or we don't even cook it at all. And then we have to dig a hole to go to the toilet. Like it's actually quite weird when you think about it, but you love that. So I want you to get as specific as possible. Thinking about all the things that you do while you're camping. Like imagining how you set up your ten when you get there. What you do while you're there when you set up to go home. When you drive home, all the different aspects of it and think about, yeah, what is weird or strange or scary or stupid about camping, but why do you still love it? So those are the kind of observations that will create great set ups and possibilities for jokes. And you add a punch line. A writing exercise. I want you to write down ten of the most boring, happy thoughts you can think of. The more generic, the better, The more boring, the better. Imagine the dullest, good natured person that you know and the things that they would think. Cake is nice. I love going for long walks. Just boring, boring, generic. I know I just said to you that you need to be specific and really insightful. But for this specific exercise, this particular exercise, I want you to be generic, boring, dull, Write down ten. Put them away, and we will come back to them later. Okay, writing exercise. Another one. I'd like you to choose a few topics and practice developing a strong attitude about them. Like we said, think about whatever you actually feel about the topic. And then turn the volume up on that. Try to write from that space, that really emotional space. Now, these observations do not need to be funny yet. And it's important for you to write for yourself, not for the imaginary audience. You can't try to second guess what we want you to say or what we're interested in. Because really what we actually want is your opinions. Just don't worry about us for now. Go into the topic and think about what fascinates or annoys you, what scares you, or what do you love. Be really specific. Generalities, like in the other exercise are boring. So that was just for that exercise. The only time I'll ask you to write something boring, I promise. We've got here some questions that can help you to get started with your observations about your topics. So you can pause a video here or take a screenshot. Do you love it? Do you hate it? Is it hard or is it easy? Is it important or really stupid? Are you actually afraid of it? Does it remind you of something else is actually really weird? If you think about it, what if you looked at it from a different angle or an opposing viewpoint? I do this, actually we do this. What should I do instead? What should we all do instead? What's the ultimate end result of it? Those are some questions. Take them to your topic with your attitude and write some observations. 7. Joke Writing Structure Part Two: Punchlines: In this video, we're going to cover part two of the joke writing structure, which is punch lines. A punch line is the surprise of the joke. It's the unusual conclusion that we didn't see coming. It's a part that makes the audience laugh. There's three possible parts of a punch line. The afterthought, or act out, or analogy equals punch line. The first one, afterthoughts, is a way to think about punch lines. We also sometimes call punch lines a tag. An afterthought is, by definition, an idea occurring later. If the first thought you had is the set up, then the afterthought is the punch line. It's a less intimidating way to think about punch lines that I learned from stand up teacher Logan Murray. We use afterthoughts or tags all the time anytime we're following up, qualifying or commenting on something. We just said An example from one of my shows, I have a joke where I say my bank wrote to me because they're worried about me. Which is good because I am too. You can see that the first part is the thought, the bank writing because they're worried. And then the second part, that is the comment after thought that I'm making an afterthought continues the initial thought and then it takes it in an unexpected direction, but it doesn't completely just 180 and contradict it like an improv. We talk about yes and rather than no, which cuts it off. So as an example, if I said I got a rescue cat recently, Actually, no, I didn't. That's not a joke. But if I said I got a rescue cat recently. Oh, wait, no, sorry. Rescue boyfriend. Rescue boyfriend and boyfriend. So you can see there, I've taken a different direction. I haven't just said, no, I didn't get a cat. Also, sometimes the punch line can be wordless. So it is just an expression, or showing the opposite emotion to the one that's conveyed in what we're saying. So for an example, you know, my friend showed me her new hot pink haircut and I'm like, oh, I love it. You know, so that the punchline could be or also, oh, I love it. Said like that if your after thought tag punch line isn't funny, you probably need to up the emotion or be more specific. The more specific you can be in your thoughts and observations, the easier it is to find surprising. After thoughts, tags, punch lines. Your punchline can also come from you misunderstanding or being too literal, you being weird or stupid, like most people would logically conclude this thing. But you, oh my sweet summer child, you conclude something else that we did not see coming. Like I have another example with my bank. When they wrote to me because they were worried, they sent me some tips to save money. And one of them was buying cheaper makeup. But don't they know nothing is cheaper than something you find on the floor of the bus. That's an example of that. The other thing is, do not stop at one punch lines are like pringles. Once you pop, you cannot stop. There is always room for another punch line. Now we have analogies. An analogy is a way to expand on your observations in a funny way By juxtaposing two dissimilar subjects that don't usually go together. You're playing with possibilities and creating surprising connections. For example, I have a joke about intergenerational wealth and economics. And in the joke I compare baby boomers to the kind of housemate who puts the milk back in the fridge with just a line of bit left in the carton. So I'm juxtaposing two things that aren't the same to find the comedy act out. The third option in an act out, the comic acts out the situation of a joke, instead of just talking about it or someone or something. You perform it, you become it. You turn into the people or the thing that you mentioned in the set up and actually say what they said. For example, in the joke I mentioned before about where I use the analogy of the baby boomers and the housemates, instead of talking about that situation and the housemates, I'll become the housemate. This theory that the baby boomers are like that ****** housemate. Everyone's had one, that ****** housemate that puts the milk back in the fridge with just a tiny bit left in the cup. And they justify not replacing it by saying, oh, there's still plenty left, you could make a cup of tea all the while. They're holding a big old milkshake in each hand. And you say, this housemate, I actually didn't want a cup of tea. I wanted a milkshake as well. And they say, oh my God, you're so entitled. So you can see, I can play both characters. And it could be, you could retail an anecdote like that. All kinds of things. Like it's really engaging to become the thing rather than just telling us about it. Finally, I want to talk about rule of three. Rule of three is an important rule in comedy because there is just a super satisfying rhythm to three things together. In English, there's so many famous examples like the good, the bad, the ugly, mad bad. Dangerous to know, or bacon, lettuce, and tomato. The rule of three can also be used to build a crescendo, so you're getting more and more ridiculous. Or high stakes like man, President God. And it can even be used as an actual structure for a joke by introducing something, reinforcing it, and then subverting it. For example, I went to Costco yesterday, I got 20 liters of milk, a 40 kilogram bag of oranges, and a crushing sense of existential despair. Here's only 495, it's so cheap. So you see there I introduce one something, I keep going with it, and then subvert the logic that you're expecting writing exercise, I want you to take out your list from before. Remember those ten incredibly boring thoughts? Excellent. Grab those and have a look at it again. And try and add a negative, dark or twisted punch line that takes the original observation in a different direction. No one is going to read these, except you don't censor yourself. Just write whatever you want to for the purpose of the exercise. Get it out on the page, see where you go. For example, in the previous video, one of my observations was, I love taking long walks. Now I might write, I love taking long walks. It allows me peaceful time in nature to think about all the terrible mistakes I've made in my life. Or maybe I say, I love taking long walks in nature. It allows me peaceful time in nature to scope out places to bury the bodies. So you can see with even the most boring and crappy observations, you can still write jokes. That's the point of this exercise. You take something that is exactly what I told you not to do, generic boring, et cetera, and you twist it if you can come up with a joke for those, if you can come up with a punch line, you can do it for your own observations. Which is next writing exercise. Write some punch lines for your observations. Remember, you can always have more than one. Keep popping those pringles. Write a short draft piece of material. Now, putting your set up and your punch line together. You've got your topic, you've got your attitude, you've got your observations. Then punch line time. Remember, for the punch lines to work, we need all the information in the set up so that we can make the connection and get the joke that has to be there for the audience to understand. Take some potential punch lines with afterthoughts, analogies, act outs. You can have more than one option. In fact, I really encourage it. Now, if you did want to work with a story as a piece of material, think about how you'll tell the story out loud when you're going to reveal key pieces of information and how the story will finish, which is the punch line. 8. Creativity Hacks: A note on writer's block. I have personally struggled a lot with creative block, writer's block, whatever you want to call it. I've collected some strategies over the years that I wanted to share with you. If like me, you are regularly banging your head against this particular wall. Firstly, something that's super important to remember, There is no wasted work. I've been in a three hour devising session for a show, and it was a disaster. I felt like I accomplished nothing except paying for a venue to have a breakdown in and a director to watch me do it. But out of that awful rehearsal sprang an idea that completely fix another part of the show. A big part of creative work is just showing up and not being afraid of the results. We learn a lot so much from our mistakes. Don't be afraid to make them. Creativity is like nature. It's a perfect ecosystem. Nothing goes to waste. Today's ideas are composted to make fuel for tomorrow's breakthrough. Things I found that helped when I'm feeling really stuck, are taking some time to step away. Go for a dance, walk, stretch, anything you enjoy. Something physical is great here to lift your mood and release the mental feeling of stuckness. Do something else creative, that's unrelated to stand up. Work on something that has no real meaning, where you don't have pressure. Use a Pomadorotimer, Google it. Cut out distractions. Put your phone on airplane mode. Cue a specific album or type of music to your work time. Your brain automatically loads up the work time attitude on the jukebox. You can also do this with locations like where you work or rituals before you work, like making a cup of tea. Mind map with textures, use a whiteboard pen and paper, especially if you normally type. Okay, so mind mapping, what you do is you write down the subject, that specific subject that you wish to explore in the middle of a large piece of paper. And then you can use arrows, subheadings, or even diagrams to start writing down everything you can think of that relates to that subject. No matter how tangential or strange, this is your piece of paper. It's just an exploration. Here's one that I made earlier. For example, we were talking about camping. I've written that in the center of the page. And then brainstormed a bunch of things that, when I think about camping, stuff like creepy wildlife noises, mosquitoes, gale force winds, weird food, no showers, trying to get a fire started. All right. This is the first step then once you have a decent amount of associations, you can start scribbling down associations to the first set of associations. So you keep branching out, making strange connections until the paper is full. Here's one I prepared earlier. So we already had the camping one. We had our first set of associations. So now I've gone and added my associations to those. So, for example, with digging a hole to go to the toilet and trying to get a fire started, they both reminded me of the Apocalypse. And also roasting rats around the fire. While we tell stories of the old days, setting up a tent. I can't believe how hard this is, like, how did I get a degree when I can't do this with weird food? I have IBS and also the Apocalypse. With Gale force winds, I have being on the news because I'm dead. Or no showers, average Wednesday, but also the Apocalypse. Misery and rare and cold feet with rain. And then finally, creepy wildlife noises. I've got Manji and the Apocalypse. You can see there's actually a theme with a lot of things reminding me of the Apocalypse. Maybe the part of my set is that I love camping because I'm preparing for the apocalypse. You can start to see those things, they'll start to come through. You'll get these themes, it'll come up in your mind map. Feel free to play with different attitudes and emotions too. They may come up organically, like we saw, the themes came up organically. Or you can literally just try them on for size. You can think about if I loved camping, what would I associate with it? What if I hated it? What's the furthest away, weirdest connection you made? Are there any strange analogies that you can see? These will help you to create surprise in your jokes. Just that little extra bit of difference, Don't go too far. But that weirdness, strangeness will create the surprise even if you don't find a punch line in this activity. Although my bet is that you will. This can be great to just exercise those creative muscles. Get you thinking outside the box task mind map about one of your topics. I also recommend the following resources. It's in a little pedia at the bottom of the course. These resources include some thoughts from Ira Glass, links to Seth Godin, the Artists Way. Stephen Presfield is also a great theorist. 9. Editing Your Material: Now you have your draft material, it's time to edit it and tighten it up a bit. The key thing to remember with editing is that if it doesn't add it, distracts also show, don't tell. First off, we won't be laughing at your punch lines if we're busy trying to follow you on a convoluted tangent. Or if we've been distracted by something unrelated that you mentioned. Like if you have a joke about cars, but at the beginning you mentioned hairdressers. We'll be waiting to see how hairdresseres are related to it all. Also a mistake I often used to make when I first started is to deliver a punchline. And I'm going to keep going for a bit without any more jokes or follow a really strong punch line. With the weaker one, the best punch line is the full stop. Another thing to remember with editing is, are you writing how you talk? We usually don't. We have a different voice when we write and we use longer words or more complicated phrases, we have a different rhythm. We sound written. Try saying your material out loud without looking at your notes. You can do this alone or with a trusted friend. You'll automatically start trimming to make it easier to say, you'll just notice yourself doing that. You can record yourself doing this and listen back as well if you need. My English teacher in nine always used to say, show us, don't tell us. Instead of just describing a situation, get into it, inhabit it, make it immediate and personal. If you can act out dialogue rather than just describing it, it's so much more engaging like we were talking about before. Emotions mattered, so don't be afraid to show yours. We are way more interested in how you feel about the story than we are in the story. We've used exercises like the mind map to look for strange analogies and weird connections. These are great, but you can get too weird. There needs to be a logic to it, otherwise the audience will be too confused to laugh the structure of a joke. Say it's like this. We have a set up and a punch line. There's a bit of a gap. That gap is where the audience leaps to meet us. The leap is a surprise. It's the audience clicking and getting it, and it's where the laugh is. If the joke is too explicit, there's no surprise. And it's just like this, so we just walk across. Or if there's too much information missing or the connection doesn't have enough logic, the gap is too big and the audience can't make it. We can't understand you. We can't make the leap. We won't Laugh And as ever, back to Pringles, there is always room in front of the punch line. Don't cut those bits. It's fine to put a stronger one rather than a weaker one, but you can usually fit quite a few in. Don't be stingy with the punch lines. Another way of editing is editing with a friend. This is working with a writing partner, someone you know to help you edit. However, I have a very important word of caution. You need to choose your writing partner carefully. Some people are wonderful friends, partners, and family members, but they are not good writing and editing partners. As Mary Bamford says, jokes are like a baby bird that we're pushing out of the nest. They are fresh and wonky and we want someone who will be gentle with them while they find their wings. It is very easy to lose faith and discard a potentially awesome piece of material because it got a shabby response from a poorly chosen editing partner. On the flip side, you do want someone with some critical faculties. Like someone who just loves everything you do and never thinks you do anything ever wrong is probably not going to work either. Like you want somewhere a nice safe middle ground. You've chosen a ride or die legend as your partner. Now I have some questions that you can prime them with so you can get some super constructive feedback. The goal is to get positive construct objective feedback about what is working and what isn't working. Rather than subjective feedback which is like whether they like it or not, because again, they're not everyone. There might be lots of people who like jokes that they don't. If they do like your material though, that's awesome. What you can do is ask them to give you the answers to these questions as a way of soliciting that objective feedback. The first one is ask them if they understood it. Secondly, if they were distracted by anything that didn't make sense to them. Thirdly, were they expecting something that didn't happen or not expecting something that did happen? That can be really good to know. Finally, ask them if the material seemed immediate, if it seemed fresh and important to you. Okay, now you just pick a piece of material that you think needs editing. Perform it for your partner and see what they say. The final place to edit is onstage. This is a bit more advanced for after this course, but I wanted to tell you about it eventually. It's where you will be editing. As you do more and more gigs, you can record your sets and listen back if you can handle that. I know it's a really icky feeling, just I hate listening to myself. But the other option is you can see if you can get a friend to come along and give you feedback from the audience. What you want to figure out is what really lands, which is when we say it gets a laugh, lands gets a laugh and what doesn't, doesn't get a laugh. Trying to figure out why or why it does or doesn't work is really important. And the questions from before can help here too, to ask yourself cask is edit your material, Pick the stuff you really enjoyed from your observations, from your draft material and tighten it up a bit. See, here you go. 10. How to Structure and Remember Your Routine: Now you are structuring your routine. Basically, you're going to start with your best stuff and finish with your best stuff, or start with your second best stuff and finish with your very best stuff. So you can kind of let the middle take care of itself. Not that you should be lazy about it, but it's really important to get that strong thing out of the gate. So that's your opener, your first joke. And what I want you to think about is how does it feel to do that first joke? Do you feel good? Does it make you excited? That's the kind of opener you want. Also, what does it tell the audience about you? If you sound like a bit of a **** in your first joke, then maybe you want to let them get to know you first and pull that joke later. They've built up some affection for you. And how does your opener set up your other material? That's another question to ask when you're choosing that first joke. Now the middle, we've got our amazing opener. What do we do after that? First off, do your jokes relate? Could you get another joke in the segue from one joke to another? Or could you include a callback? What's a callback? You say, wow, it's a joke that references something that happened earlier, either in your set or in the night. In general, like the comedy night, you might see an opportunity to use a callback. Maybe you've watched the night and someone you saw something like, oh, that relates to my joke. Or you can see within your own set, like something relates to something else. And you can call back and mention it later if you can see an opportunity. Audiences love it, but don't force it. It's okay. You don't have to have one and now we're at the end. All right, so you are using a great punchy joke to end on your favorite. Remember, open our second favorite, this one favorite. Make sure you are so confident in your final punch line and finish it. Don't let it just trail off. Now you have your routine and we're going to create a list of keywords to remind you of your jokes. This is your set list. I would aim for about ten words for a five minute spot. It's basically what you can fit on the back of your hand or on a really small piece of paper. I don't recommend reading off your phone or reading at all. It really breaks the connection and it takes you out of the moment. Something really short and quick that you can glance at so that you remember the order. That's all you want. Finally, I want you to time your routine at home to check that you are under the time limit of whatever open mic night you go to. Some of them are 3 minutes, 5 minutes around. That is usual, but double check. It really sucks to get played off before you finish getting played off is when they play music to shut you up and get you off the stage. It sucks. So make sure that you've got enough time, you're just under the time limit, and you have time to say thanks and get off. Once you've done a few spots and you start having new jokes that you'd like to include in your routine, You can start by swapping them out in the middle of your set. When you've got something you're not sure about it, don't put it as the opener or the closer put it in the middle where after you've used an open, you know, works and knowing that it's going to be followed by a closer that you know works task. Okay, it's time to write your set list so you have all your material, figure out the order you want to put it in, structure your routine, and then write down your key words. Remember, only ten, not too many. Now you're ready, you've got your set list, and you're ready for your first open night. 11. Before Your Gig: Okay. Before the gig. So you have your routine, you have your set list, you are ready to go. So now you need to find an open mic night. What is an open mic night? Okay, So an open mic night is a show at a pub or club made up of lots of different comedians doing short routines or sets. There's usually an MC who opens a show and transitions between the acts. Usually with an open mic, it's in the name open. You turn up before the show to sign up or sometimes your book pond. In advance nights run a bit differently, so double check. Ideally, you'll have already gone to see this local open mic to watch some live comedy. Remember, you already know where you're going to go for your first spot. If not, have a look around pubs and bars in your area. Check out local comedy, Facebook groups and ask friends if they've ever seen live comedy anywhere around you. Once you've found a night you'd like to perform at, if you're unsure how to get involved, go along and check it out first. I really recommend this. It's great to see the space and understand where it is when it is who runs it. So while you're there, you can ask the MC or the organizer, which is whoever seems to be in charge how you get a spot. So what you need to do in order to perform at this night, Remember, be polite. Really just be polite. You should be polite anyway. But definitely do it here because you want something. Okay, Task, book a spot, That's it. Go book a spot. How to warm up. All right, So you've got your spot now. Okay, first you need to warm up. Stand up is a performance art form. It's not just about writing. It's literally called standing up, being on your feet. So we'll be getting out of our chairs to learn these techniques, vocal warm ups. When we're nervous, our throat and our neck can get quite tight and this affects our voice. We can do vocal warm ups before the gig to make sure we're ready to go. One of the first ways is to have a good yawn. The idea here is to open your throat and smile as you yawn. Really good yawn like that stretches the soft palette at the back of your mouth and it releases tension in the throat, creating more space for the voice. The next one is to hum gently. You feel the breath come in and then let it out on a gentle hum so you can hum through your range up and down, or hum a favorite tune. It's like a massage for your vocal folds, and it's a great way to start or to soothe a sore and tired voice as well. When you hum, try and feel the bones in your face. Feel that vibration in the bones of your face. Mm. I'm a comedian, not a singer. Mm. The next one is lip trills. These look really silly, so find somewhere where you're alone to do them. First off, you're going to place your lips loosely together and release air steadily to create a trill. Something like a so like this. If you're having trouble and get, then you need to push your lips out more to like more of a duck face, like Once you've got a steady sound, you can try going up and down your range. So wow. Oh, this exercise helps to release tension of the lips and the vocal folds and helps to connect breathing and speaking together. The next one is to practice tongue twisters. Everyone's favorite from when we were kids, you can try any tongue twister. Really, I've got a couple here. But just making an effort to try and clearly pronounce the recurring sounds you can over articulate for the purpose of the exercise, even though you wouldn't actually do that onstage, just helps to warm up all the muscles. Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers. Giddy Goddesses gathered in garrulous groups. Belly button bought a bunch beautiful bananas. Worldwide web, worldwide web, worldwide web free throws. Three free throws, unique, unique, unique diaphormatic breathing. This is a breathing technique to calm down your nervous system. It's great when you're nervous. Basically you put your hand on your stomach so you can feel the breath move in and out. Try to imagine the breath going down to your hand and then coming back from your hand. You want to breathe in for three and out for three, all right? Physically bend, stretch and swing your arms like it sounds. Bend over. Swing your arms around. When we're nervous, we get tense and this makes us more nervous. It's like a feedback loop of your body being tense, telling your brain you should be tense and your brain feeling tense and telling your body you should be tense. It all just makes us more nervous. Gentle movement helps to unlock this grid lock and it helps to discharge some of our stress response. It also gives you something to focus on other than your nerves. The final tip is getting present or into a play state. To do that, we're going to be looking at the space around us. It's not internal, it's external. We're looking around in the space to see what is there here that intrigues me. You're like a toddler walking into a new room. What do I want to play with? What's interesting? You can also imagine a mild electric current that is running down your arms and legs. Not so they're tense but they're energized. They're not floppy. You're going to be in that physical state of that energy and looking around for what's interesting, what do I want to play with? 12. At Your Gig: Okay, at the gig, you'll arrive beforehand. Definitely get there with a bit of time. Don't be in a rush. Maybe you'll sit with the audience or in the green room. It depends on the gig in the venue. Check the running order with the room runner or organizer. So you know when you're on and how you need to get on and off stage. You don't want to be scrambling, trying to figure that out at the last second, once the person before you goes up onto the stage, maybe you move to the back of the room or a spot where you can wait. And while you're there, you can do some breathing exercises or even a little bit of movement if you're out of eyes shot. If you can't move, breathe, and look around the room, stay present, and stay in that activated play state, You'll be called up. It's your turn, oh go onstage. Shake the MC's hand if they offer it. And then take the mice, take a deep breath. Say hello to the audience. It's time to deliver your material mic technique. This is a basic mic similar to what they'll probably have in most comedy clubs. The stands and the clips can vary a bit. If you're not sure how it all works and you haven't had a chance to check or play with it, it's okay to leave the mic in the stand. Just make sure it's at a good height for you to adjust the height. The spot is usually halfway down the stand. There's some lever or twist and you can bring it up. You want it about here in front of the face. If you do take the mic out of its stand, you just pop it out and make sure you move. Stand out of the way. Don't leave it in front of you. You look silly. Okay, that's out of the way. Don't fiddle with the mic if there's buttons on it. Don't fiddle with those. And don't pull on the cord, or file with the cord. You could cut your sound. That's really terrible. Once you've got the mic, if you're using it in front of you or you're using it in your hand, you want to make sure I'll turn to the side so you can see you're about this far away. You don't want to be too far away because then people won't be able to hear you. You don't want to be too close because then it's going to be really intense and the sound is going to be too loud. And they're going to hear P. This is a good distance. And also make sure that you have it. You stay with your face facing the mic. So stay like this. Don't turn and deliver a punch line off the mic. It is such a shame when you do this. All right? So if you have a chance to play with the mice before the gig, that's awesome. Just so you can get an idea of how you hold it and stand with it. And also how you get it in and out of the stand once you're on stage. Here are some performance tips. Firstly, most importantly, breathe. I can't stress this enough. If you don't breathe, you'll die figuratively and literally. The difference between fear and excitement is breath. Always take a moment and make sure you're breathing. Be aware of your body language. Try not to have a really defensive posture like arms crossed or really closed in, or be really stiff and not moving very much because that's a bit unnatural and makes us stressed. And if you're a fidgeter and you move too much, like you're always moving around, try and find a fixed point, which is a point where you stop and don't not move, but make your movements more deliberate. It's not just an uncontained explosion of movement that will distract us. Take your time. When we're nervous, we often speed up because we just want to be over. You'll destroy your comic timing If you're just trying to get through jacks as fast as possible, what you want to do is breathe. Continue at a normal pace. Try to look at the audience, make eye contact and see them as individual people. Listen to them. Treat them like someone you're on a first date with or an old friend that you're catching up with. You're trying to be charming and you're trying to connect as the audience. We want to feel that you're speaking to us, not at us. You're allowed to be scared. Every performer I know is including myself. It's nerve racking getting onstage, and if you're not nervous, if you're not scared, maybe you shouldn't be doing it because you don't really care. We get so nervous because we care and we want to do a good job. It's getting over that. That's a trick because if it was easy, everyone would do it. And they don't, because stand up takes guts. 13. After Your Gig: After the gig. So you did the gig. Oh my God, It's done. Congratulations if it goes well, hooray. Yes. Well done. Now, inson, repeat, my friend, do another gig. In the meantime, you can reflect on what went well and what you could improve after a gig. You can see if you're able to video it or a friend could come to give feedback. And you can watch that or hear what they say. But don't do it the second after you get on stage. Let yourself really bask in that post gig glow. And let your nervous system settle down before you get any notes if it didn't go quite as you hoped. Okay, remember the second guideline I had at the beginning? Be kind to yourself. Comedy is about creativity, play and joy shame, self doubt. Recriminations are terrible for comedy, so do not beat yourself up after a gig that didn't go that well. Every comedian I know, including, and especially me, has had bad gigs when they're really bad. We call them dying, dying on stage, because that's what it feels like. Oh, the horror. The horror. It's horrible. But guess what? It doesn't actually kill you. How cool is that? You're still around to die another day. As I said earlier, we learned a lot from our mistakes. It's actually good if you're making mistakes, nothing goes to waste. Today's gig is compost to make fuel for tomorrow's great one. If you have a bad gig, shake it off, learn what you can and get back on the horse. 14. You Made It!: Okay, you made it to the end. That's it. It's time to jump off the cliff and do your first gig. I believe in you and I am so excited to see your photos and videos and hear how you go. I'd like to thank all the amazing artists and comedy theorists who I've learned from all my comedian friends, my teachers, also, Logan Murray, Judy Carter, Julia Cameron, and Seth Godin for their wonderful books. Definitely check those out. Thanks also to Lucas for helping me to film this course today. If there's one thing I hope you take from this class, it's finding the humor and fun that already exists around us every day. I love stand up comedy for the way it trains you to see every mistake or misfortune, or **** up as a golden opportunity to make some killer material. What a way to look at life. Thanks so much for taking the time to learn with me. I hope you enjoyed the class. Please recommend it to a friend. If you think you know someone who'd like it, I'd love it to reach more people. And you can follow me on social media as well and leave a review below. Thanks.