The development of the comedy club industry destroyed the uniqueness and intimacy of the profession but it also created jobs for comics and bred some great performers.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
When I was growing up in comedy, there were maybe 10 comics in the whole country. Everyone had a day job. You worked free for years in little clubs, then you got your big break and became a star.
At first, there was a separation of clubs and sketch comedy. Now there's all kinds of comedy, making us one big happy family.
A comedy club is a place where you work out material, you're trying material.
I've seen too many comics who got their own shows and were undone because they worked for an executive producer who didn't understand their comedy or their sensibility.
It may be true that the only reason the comic book industry now exists is for this purpose, to create characters for movies, board games and other types of merchandise.
As a comic, it's anti-comedy to be known. I think a lot of comedic actors get lost in this world of Hollywood and all this stuff. They lose what brought them there in the first place. I'm very trepidatious about it.
Years have passed since I have set foot in a comedy club. If the comic is doing badly it's painful, and if the comic is doing brilliantly, it's extremely painful.
Comics write to their point of view. If you're an exceedingly irreverent comedian, you've got to see where that point of view fits or produces the most funny.
What I've found in my career is that 70 to 75 percent of comics are nice and have some sense of social skills, but there are those who end up in comedy because they don't know how to socialize. I don't want to deal with that group.
Any comic is a tragic soul. Comedy is one of the things that allows one to survive. Particularly if one has been in the process of separating off the emotions, it's one place you can process them.