What I Did On My Summer Vacation...[Insert Laugh Here]

This summer has been great.  I started a doctoral program and finished my first two courses.  I got in some good running (even after recovering from an injury).  I got to finally go on my honeymoon.  I got a lot of different projects off the ground.  But my most exciting experience thus far has been the stand-up comedy class that I took at North Shore Community College's community education program.  This six-week course has been not just a great opportunity to start to think about and write stand up routines but also an opportunity to meet some great (and really funny) people.  

I took the class because I figured I could always spruce up my teaching with a bit of side-humor or just make my material potentially more engaging, but I've found the experience to be something more.  It's definitely unleashed a lot of creative writing around humorous content and it's been fun to develop a singular bit while getting a lot of content and writing for other potential future bits.  

The class format was simple but effective and run by the fantastic Amy Tee.  Class 1:  Introductions, discuss ideas about what you want to do, start to think about your script.  Several days before Class 2, send Amy the script or what you have thus far for feedback and tweaking.  Class 2: start practicing in front of classmates for experience and feedback and repeat.  Along the way, Amy introduces different pieces such as callbacks, persona, and getting used to the stage dynamic.  By the second half of the 6 week course, we're recording our bits to get of a sense of how we sound and look.  And like any good creative endeavor, this process proves effective when I look at my original script and where I have it now.  

Beyond the class, we will be doing a live performance on Thursday, September 17 at Timothy's on Route 1 in Danvers, MA.  Tickets are $20 and include both dinner and 10 soon-to-be-minted comedians going for their first performances.

Comedy Show in Danvers MA Flyer

Of course, the question I first get is if I'm nervous about performing in front of an audience of potentially 100+ people.  There is some nervousness in me somewhere, but it feels more like first-day-of-class nervous.  It's there, I acknowledge it, but it's not something that will prevent me from doing it.  If nothing else, it feels exciting to get the first experience out of the way because I think I'd like to actually do more performances in the future.  

It's always fascinating how random things (like taking a comedy class) can open up new ideas and generate something in one's self that wasn't necessarily there before (or has been very quickly coaxed into being).  If nothing else, this reminds to always to try new things.  


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By Any Other Nerd Blog by Lance Eaton is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

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