First stand up routine, ready for your critique

Hi I am new the forum just joined yesterday. been a big comedy fan for a long time and am going on a course in march. I have started writing a few things down and so far have about 8 pages!! don't worry im not going to bore you with all just let me know what you think! also there are two opening would aprerciate if you let me know which one is better!! thanks

1. Hello how is everyone doing here tonight? Good Good. Now I realize my voice sounds like a have a peg perminently stuck to my nose!!.. its a disease.. People always say have you got a bit of a cold? To which I reply actually aids is a serious disease...but recently I have stopped saying that I find it to be a bit of a mood killer... especially on a first date!

2.Hello how is everyone doing here tonight? Good Good. Now I realize my voice sounds like a have a peg perminently stuck to my nose!!.. its a disease.. People always say have you got a bit of a cold? To which I reply NO ITS AIDS...but I think I freaked some girl out the otherday...after all it was only our first date!!

(opinions please on which opening is better)

Now I should probably introduce myself my name is ... which is a joke in itself... I'm 1/4 stupid 1/4 starving and 1/2 an alcoholic. Or you could say Irish Nigerian and English! Now I'm not saying the Irish are stupid but I'm just saying they think a Siamese cat has 2 heads! and I'm not saying all Africans are poor I'm just saying if any of them have made it here tonight you know got a plane then a train then a bus and then a cab.. I think I'm going to go ahead and cancel my Oxfam subscription!! And I'm not saying English are alcoholics I'm all for a good drink I'm just saying when you start drinking a bottle of j'adore for men because its 30 % alcohol. You've gone to far...

No being an alcoholic is a sad thing... my dad was an alcoholic sadly he is no longer he is with... us which means no more discount at Oddbins... Some times I would go round there and he would be acting really strange... then he would drink a bottle of wine and he would go back to normal! since he passed I found myself asking myself all kinds of questions like... what would I prefer daddy or chips... well my dad passed about two years ago and at this point has probably gone a bit mouldy so without sounding like an ungrateful basted I think I would have a portion of chips.

Does anyone else do this... depending on who I 'm talking to depends on the area that I say I'm from... so to a nice sophisticated group such as yourselves I'm from Kew but if I was in some pub in Kingston talking to someone who looks like the knife weilding type.. And come one you all know what I mean by that... with the hoodie and nikey trainers and normally of mixed origin! And by mixed origin I mean moved here from Manchester ! Then ill say I'm from north sheen sounds a little less posh!!
 
I was on the way up to the pub with a few mates and a feeble looking an old Man had fallen over in Richmond outside the theatre had a massive cut on his eye brow and the upper class people just looking at him like two of them had bumped in into each other in ASDA you know they kind of knew they had seen him but just ignored it...so I though as a teenage representing modern society I think right I'm gonna show these upper class snobs that were not all a bunch of knife brandishing, hoodies, that produce kids faster than.........??? So I Walked up to him and asked if ok but he Obviously wasn't so I called the ambulance ... Tell I lie I was a bit excited at this point I had never dialled 999 before .. As I said before I live in Kew ! I should probably mention By this time my mates where already bored and walled into the pub! But I waited out.. in the cold.. on my own.. Not that I'm spiteful or anything but it was only £2 a pint up until 9 and it was 10 to when I first saw this guy.. that's all I'm saying ... anyway the ambulance came 5 past 9 ,,, the basted's.. so after I helped him in the ambulance and all that I kind of gave the upper class citizens a look and I saw a few of them kinda of nodding the head.. like what a great lad.. me mate come out the pub and say you know what u do all that for?... I said I snuck a £20 out of his wallet!!

The other day we where all huddled round at work discussing our who got paid most... as you do...when we should have been working... boss said look if u want to have a mass-debate about this don't do it here go somewhere more private ... Obviously I miss understood I got fired for having a wank in the meeting room

I have always been a fan of 8 out of ten cats so I thought maybe I could come up with a similar show
I was thinking of names and I thought 4 out of 5...dogs but it reminded me to much of the spice girls.

when I was a school I was kind of one of the popular kids until about year 9/10 then I found out the so called "losers" were the one's that had all the best parties... then I heard that at these parties girls where getting pissed and kissing each other. As they do.....so I did the obvious thing... I bought a pair of thick glasses... demanded for a head brace...and starting quoting from Startreck voyager.
 
I remember one time my mate had a house part... his house got ruined... I remember waking up in the morning and having to clean piss from the beds, sick from the floor, and shit smeared across the wall.... then after all that I still had to go to his house to clean up there as well!!
 
Football hooligans always say "who are you" that's because 80% work in a call centre and the other 20% who say "you want some" well that's because they work in a fast food restaurant and there just enquiring about the chips...

Thanks Tao

Quick point, why do 99% of comedians open by asking how the audience are?

Generally the comedian doesn't care (and clearly isn't listening to the response but getting ready with his/her first gag) and secondly if the audience are a bit low energy and don't really answer it creates an awkward atmosphere at the start of the set.

IMHO just say "Hello" and get on with your first joke.

Sorry Tazman, this isn't aimed at you in particular but is a general thing that annoys me about stand up.

Also I'd avoid opening with an AIDS joke, you need to win the audience over before you hit them with anything "controversial" or potentially shocking.

Now I should probably introduce myself my name is Tao... which is a joke in itself... I'm 1/4 stupid 1/4 starving and 1/2 an alcoholic. Or you could say Irish Nigerian and English!

If you're going to do this joke (ignoring the stereotyping for a moment) then it needs to be the other way round e.g.

My name is Tao, I'm one quarter Irish, one quarter Nigerian and one half English, in other words I'm stupid, starving AND an alcoholic (although I'd change this to "in other words I'm binge drinking eejit who'll send you scam emails from the office of my father, The President" or some such).

Reading through the rest of the set there's some decent gags struggling to get out but you need to ruthlessly edit some of the unfunny bits and the filler, some of this can be done by re-writing but some of it you will have to work out on stage from audience reactions.

Good luck on the course, I think it'll help you to condense your material into a more coherent set. The great thing is that you are obviously taking the time and effort to write plenty of stuff and the more you write (and edit) the more "killer" material you'll eventually produce.

Let us know how you get on.

thanks for the feedback lol I do agree with you with "how is everyone doing tonight" is such a comedy cliche.. I also agree with point about the first line.. what do you think of some of the jokes in there?

Thanks for feedback

cheers man appreciate!!

Quote: Tazman @ February 3 2011, 12:45 PM GMT

thanks for the feedback lol I do agree with you with "how is everyone doing tonight" is such a comedy cliche.. I also agree with point about the first line.. what do you think of some of the jokes in there?

Thanks for feedback

View original

If I'm totally honest there's a mixture of some nice ideas (mostly not yet made into fully formed jokes) and a few very obvious jokes which have been done before (e.g. mass debate).

I like the "4 out of 5 dogs" line, I think that would definitely work well, even though a reference to the Spice Girls is a little out of date (perhaps update it to "Girls Aloud"?).

Stand up is very hard and, no-one writes a perfect set first time, so please don't be downhearted at any of my comments, you've got some good ideas in there but you'll have to work on them and try them out in front of a live audience to see what will work on stage.

Personally (as a full-time stand up), I think it's great that you've put a lot of effort into your writing and have signed up for a course, this suggests to me that you've thought about what you are doing and aren't one of the many people who sign up to do an open spot because their mates down the pub said that they were funny (but, in reality, haven't thought about how to make strangers laugh).

Oh and lastly, stand up is 90% in the performance, watch some of the top comics and you'll see that they can sell what, on paper, is the weakest of material, but they can wring laughs out of it because of their supreme confidence and performance skills, skills which you can only develop by practicing and performing as much as possible.

yeah will definitely update that! no I appreciate the feedback not downhearted atall.. yeah I know I wonna do stand up always have the only restriction I find is my age as im only 18.. I feel as though people find it more easy to laugh at some one mabey more mature someone who they can relate with more!!

Quote: Tazman @ February 3 2011, 1:01 PM GMT

yeah will definitely update that! no I appreciate the feedback not downhearted atall.. yeah I know I wonna do stand up always have the only restriction I find is my age as im only 18.. I feel as though people find it more easy to laugh at some one mabey more mature someone who they can relate with more!!

View original

True, but being young hasn't held back Daniel Sloss or Kevin Bridges and Josie Long and Daniel Kitson both started out in their teens.

I didn't start doing stand up till I was 30 years old so feel free to ignore my advice, but I would've thought that the way to appeal to older audiences is to find a way of bringing your youthful experiences of the world into their way of looking at things, try to find common ground, most people will know a youngster, either as a son or daughter or even grandchildren, just avoid (or at least explain) any references that they won't get.

will do thanks for the tips and all the advice !

Tao

My name is Tao, I'm one quarter Irish, one quarter Nigerian and one half English, in other words I'm stupid, starving AND an alcoholic (although I'd change this to "in other words I'm binge drinking eejit who'll send you scam emails from the office of my father, The President" or some such).

Hilarious

yeah thanks from the reply will be editing that.. thanks for the input!