A couple of weeks ago, we decided to force our intern, Spencer, to become a stand-up comedian (jump to Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4). Spencer's spent his time studying stand-up comedy and preparing to perform at an open-mic night, despite his fear of public speaking and his striking resemblence to an nerdier 14-year old Matt Damon.
Inexplicable phobias aside, Spencer followed through with the plan on Tuesday night. He got up in front of a crowd of angsty, self-loathing comedians at an open-mic night and told jokes for 5 minutes. Our plan for the evening was simple: the first thing we had to do was to psych Spencer out, and get his nerves going. The second thing we had to do was get Spencer some alcohol, to calm the nerves that we'd successfully agitated. On the way to execute Step 2, we interviewed him to see what was going through his abnormally large head. As you'll see, he was a little nervous:
I'm sure that every open-mic night works a little bit differently, but here's how the one that we went to worked:
Everyone who wants to perform puts their name into a box. At a given time, the room fills with dozens upon dozens of sweaty, scruffy, self-loathing comedians of all shapes and sizes. The person who's running the open-mic draws names from the box, and then awkwardly reads them off while someone sitting next to him fades the music (a discman plugged into a speaker) in and out around his voice.
After about fifteen or twenty names have been called, they stop, and that's the list of comedians who are performing for the night. Lucky for us, Spencer's name was called early on, and most of the uncalled comedians gradually and begrudgingly cleared out. The room cooled down a little, and everyone felt their self-esteem rise a slight bit, and then the comedy began.
The open-mic that we attended exhibited all different types of comedians. Some were funny, some were not. Some were normal dudes, and some were crazy old bag ladies with homemade pants who's act consisted of reading from old newspapers and talking in gibberish. The girl that went before Spencer was a first-timer, just like him. She did a decent job. Her jokes were okay, but it wasn't the right crowd, and she was met with awkward stares and mumbling. Then, after a cautionary word of warning from the MC about how hard it was to do open-mic for the first time, it was Spencer's big moment:
As you can see, Spencer did an excellent job. We were all nervous, especially after the MC's dark, cryptic warning to new-comers. Spencer won the crowd over with his first joke, though, and he was off to the races from there. We never doubted that Spencer's jokes would be funny. We did have some reservations about the crowd, though, because comedians, like terrorists, tend to be pretty harsh to people they don't know. It appears that Spencer's spritely, youthful energy and innovative perspectives appealed to them, and they wound up loving him. Spencer summed up the entire experience pretty well in a post-show interview that we conducted, about 10 minutes after he'd left the stage:
So, that's basically what it's like to take the first step into the world of stand-up comedy. Keep in mind that we lucked out like a perverted janitor at an all-girls lesbian training camp. Spencer was an excellent candidate for the experiment and everything fell into place perfectly, but if your first stand-up experience goes half as well as Spencer's did, then I'd say you're doing pretty well.
I concur, When he did the shai lebeuof or however the fuck his name is spelled i though it was terrible BUT in light of the fact that it was last minute improv he did very well for himself GO SPENCER
Spencer did awesome, with a little polishing he could do it for a living!- Therefor it's not as funny, god dammit, you should of made Noah's awkward ass do it!
Spencer, you killed! you awkward silly em effer. No, really, I don't think a lot of people could have pulled that off on their first try. You make us proud.
yea that turned out alot better than the adultfreindfinder thing.. very nice job fellas. i think spencers shirt was funnier than his performance though
Very disappointing, that went way too well
You should have fed him a lot more alcohol before he went up
It would have increased the chances of him pissing on himself or passing out
I guess it's better for him this way though
Spencer got fat in those 2 weeks! thumbs-up picture: normal chin, video below that: a huge blob of neck-fat. Don't start a carreer in stand up comedy, Spencer, it will kill you!
Nice job Spencer! Dude, you should have tied it all together with Pacino/LeDouche's homeless man-date ending up at the Jamba juice for penis enhancement boosts.
(26 Comments)
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Holy Taco Goes to the Bahamas
July 30th, 2009 at 10:55 am
yeah for spencer!
July 31st, 2009 at 05:21 pm
I concur, When he did the shai lebeuof or however the fuck his name is spelled i though it was terrible BUT in light of the fact that it was last minute improv he did very well for himself GO SPENCER
July 30th, 2009 at 11:04 am
Spencer did awesome, with a little polishing he could do it for a living!- Therefor it's not as funny, god dammit, you should of made Noah's awkward ass do it!
July 30th, 2009 at 11:24 am
Good work yo! It takes balls
July 30th, 2009 at 11:39 am
Spencer, you killed! you awkward silly em effer. No, really, I don't think a lot of people could have pulled that off on their first try. You make us proud.
July 30th, 2009 at 11:42 am
Good One Spencer, Good one.
July 30th, 2009 at 12:41 pm
Spencer is well on his way to getting laid. TAKE THAT NOAHLIMITS!!!
July 30th, 2009 at 01:32 pm
damn. that was a fucking great feature, guys
July 30th, 2009 at 02:30 pm
yea that turned out alot better than the adultfreindfinder thing.. very nice job fellas. i think spencers shirt was funnier than his performance though
July 30th, 2009 at 03:16 pm
Really funny. I'd watch more if he decided to do it.
July 30th, 2009 at 03:48 pm
Major kudos, man. That was pretty fuckin' good.
July 30th, 2009 at 03:54 pm
Can I get Spencer's number?
July 30th, 2009 at 06:37 pm
Oh... I see our next series coming...
"We make our intern date one of our readers"
July 31st, 2009 at 05:23 pm
Lets hope its a hot chick rather than a 47 year old who stands him up none the less
July 30th, 2009 at 06:32 pm
that was great! I would've thought that he had been doing standup for quite some time. big thumbs up spencer!
July 30th, 2009 at 07:38 pm
i notice you're wearing a t-shirt with pugs on it.
... wanker
July 30th, 2009 at 07:41 pm
although i have to admit, i liked your cadence throughout the performance. i think you could get good at that. good job.
July 30th, 2009 at 07:48 pm
.. and now, send spencer to a rap battle (hair) dressed up like the bad guy in You got Served.
July 31st, 2009 at 06:13 am
Very disappointing, that went way too well
You should have fed him a lot more alcohol before he went up
It would have increased the chances of him pissing on himself or passing out
I guess it's better for him this way though
July 31st, 2009 at 08:13 am
More of this please. This piece and the Adult Friend Finder have been my favorites so far. And titties. Lots of titties.
July 31st, 2009 at 08:21 am
Spencer got fat in those 2 weeks! thumbs-up picture: normal chin, video below that: a huge blob of neck-fat. Don't start a carreer in stand up comedy, Spencer, it will kill you!
July 31st, 2009 at 01:05 pm
Nice job Spencer! Dude, you should have tied it all together with Pacino/LeDouche's homeless man-date ending up at the Jamba juice for penis enhancement boosts.
July 31st, 2009 at 05:25 pm
That woudlve been fucking hilarious good idea. you might consider an open mic night
August 5th, 2009 at 04:40 pm
That would have been amazing! Great job dude, and good feature.
August 3rd, 2009 at 09:08 am
Good job...I actually liked it and I think most comedians suck
August 6th, 2009 at 03:21 am
make the next intern become a scientologist
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