July 22, 2025 • 39 mins
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Welcome to Episode 444 of The Clean Comedy Podcast! This week JD and Seth talk about how they develop new jokes and what their process is for writing, performing, and revising jokes.
It's a great look at what pros do to develop longer sets as well as sets for comedy specials!
This is a money-making episode if you listen and take their advice. You can get more tips on producing comedy shows by picking up a copy of “How To Produce Comedy Shows For Fun & Profit” on Amazon.
Come see Zane and I! You can see all the tour dates at ZaneLamprey.com
Feel free to email me: jamesdcreviston at GMAIL.COM
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-clean-comedy-podcast-w-jd-creviston--4825680/support.
Grab your copy of “How To Produce Comedy Shows For Fun & Profit” here. Or search for it on Amazon.
Have a topic you want us to discuss? Reach out here.
Be Our Guest: Are you a clean comedian interested in being on our podcast? Contact us!
Stay Connected: Subscribe, rate, and review the podcast on Apple Podcasts. Your support helps us grow!
Welcome to Episode 444 of The Clean Comedy Podcast! This week JD and Seth talk about how they develop new jokes and what their process is for writing, performing, and revising jokes.
It's a great look at what pros do to develop longer sets as well as sets for comedy specials!
This is a money-making episode if you listen and take their advice. You can get more tips on producing comedy shows by picking up a copy of “How To Produce Comedy Shows For Fun & Profit” on Amazon.
Come see Zane and I! You can see all the tour dates at ZaneLamprey.com
Feel free to email me: jamesdcreviston at GMAIL.COM
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-clean-comedy-podcast-w-jd-creviston--4825680/support.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey, real quick, if you're a clean comedian or trying
to be one, you've got to get on my Clean
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so stop guessing, start growing, go out there, be clean,
(00:21):
get some green. Everybody. Welcome to Queen County Podcast. It's
Jad and I'm here with my co host, the amazing
and talented mister Seth Lawrence Seth. How's it going?
Speaker 2 (00:29):
Hey, Hey, hey, pretty good. I was just telling you
that I got back from a camping trip. We did
an overnight camping trip and I am just barely recovering.
Speaker 1 (00:39):
Oh man, I'm barely recovering from Grant Cayman, So I
feel you.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
Yeah, how was it?
Speaker 1 (00:45):
So? The whole trip was great, except for the flight home.
So the flight home got delayed. Then we were on
the tarmac for three hours in Grank Cayman. Then we
landed in Dallas, and because we were delayed by three hours,
we missed our flights home. So they gave us the hotel,
they gave us a food stipend, but they tried to
(01:06):
book us on like a late flight. And my daughter
for her birthday, my youngest daughter, for her birthday, we
bought our tickets to a concert in Hollywood at the
Hollywood Palladium on Friday, so if we took that late flight,
she would not get to go to a concert. So
we finally got it, got the right flight that we wanted,
(01:26):
but that flight was delayed an hour and a half.
Oh no, So we didn't get home until like basically
four o'clock, and we had to drive from Lax to
Agora Hills, where kind of where I lived. Then we
had to get her ready for the concert and then
drive her back to la Luckily, the friend that she
(01:47):
went with, their parents heard about all of our stuff
and they're like, look, we'll drive, like you don't have
to worry about it. We'll we'll do all this stuff.
So they were amazing. They saved us. And then once
I knew she was good to go, she was with friends,
she was going to go to the show, everything was happening.
I literally went and crashed. I was so tired, I
was so exhausted from all the traveling. It was like,
(02:08):
because I didn't sleep well in the in the hotel
because I was already nervous not making a flight. So
but besides that, Grant came himself, very beautiful, amazing. We
picked up starfish, we played with stingrays. I kissed two stingrays.
It was pretty awesome. Yeah, so you know, we snorkeled
(02:29):
in reefs and it was just it was a great time.
It was amazing.
Speaker 2 (02:33):
So that's awesome. Oh that's great, very very cool.
Speaker 1 (02:36):
Where where did you go camping at?
Speaker 2 (02:40):
So I spot up the Los Angeles Crest Forest at
a campground called Lake Campground, right next to Jackson Lake
up the Los Angeles Crest Forest area. It was fun.
So it's about an hour outside of l a hour
and a half it took us to get there and back,
so not bad.
Speaker 1 (03:00):
Not bad. And what'd you guys do up there?
Speaker 2 (03:01):
Yeah, honestly, we just went for the overnight camp out.
So we just left, made food, you know, and then
kind of hiked around a little bit, saw the lake,
and then came back today. So very quick trip.
Speaker 1 (03:17):
Yeah yeah, yeah, wow, that sounds man, that's a lot
to pack in in a small amount of time. Honestly,
I know.
Speaker 2 (03:23):
Well, it's just like camping. You basically have to pack
your house and then to go for one night is
maybe silly, but it's good. We only booked one night
because this morning, as we were finishing up cooking breakfast,
they had some camp people showing up, I guess forest
agents coming around telling everybody that they were shutting down
(03:45):
a few campsites because they'd had a water pipe burst
a couple days ago and they were out of water.
They were going to be shutting off the water today
at twelve o'clock. We had only booked for the night,
so we were going to be out by eleven anyway.
But you know, they let you kind of hold over
if you want, if there's availability, and they were like
there is, you know, oh, so.
Speaker 3 (04:08):
Getting so emotional about anyway.
Speaker 2 (04:13):
So it's good we only planned on being there one
night because otherwise who would have been kicked out? Anyway?
Speaker 1 (04:17):
So right, yeah, so I want to talk to you.
I I changed my mind about what I want to
talk about today because I think because I think I
don't know. Well, first of all, I don't know if
you've if you watched TV lately, have you seen this.
Shane gillis doing the SB So did you see that
any of those clips.
Speaker 2 (04:35):
I did see? I mean the yeah, yeah, the ESPN
Awards he did like a monologue, Yeah, I mean the
clips that I saw. It was pretty crazy that he
got away with it. It was televised and live, and
there were some of those jokes where I was like,
that's wild that he was able to make some of
those jokes.
Speaker 1 (04:53):
One of the things that I so, I watched it
again recently. I just watched the whole thing and one
of the things he said is that joke didn't work
all week, which means he's been practicing these jokes all week.
Speaker 2 (05:04):
Sure.
Speaker 1 (05:04):
So one of the things I want to talk about
is how do you practice a new joke. How do
you take a new idea, a new joke that you
want to work on and practice it so that you
can use Because you get to do your show, you
get to go do your like you kind of like
open mic show or whatever, you know, pretty often I
don't get to do open mics very often. Yeah, I'm
(05:25):
on shows. So then it's like, when I want to
do a bit, I have to write it, take it
to stage, try it that night. See what happens, if
it works or doesn't work, or what does what doesn't work,
review it and do it. But what is your process
like when you want to try a new joke? You
have this maybe you just have an idea for a joke.
Do you stud to write it out to you like
(05:45):
to take it on stage? What's your process for new jokes?
Because I thought it was really funny that he that
he kept the joke that he knew didn't work all week.
I would never I don't think i'd ever do that.
Speaker 2 (05:56):
Yeah, well is there I mean, I think there's a
couple of things going on. You know, when you're on
a televised deal, or you're prepping for a bigger set,
whatever it is. Sometimes you know, I have to operate
within these confines and you have a limited amount of
(06:16):
time in which to prep the required amount of material.
And sometimes you're like, well, I have essentially two jokes
that don't really work very often, but I'm getting down
to the wire and I need one of these to work.
I'm going to go with the one that I want
to tell, right. So that might have been his calculus there.
(06:38):
You know, there are a couple thoughts. I have one
is to answer your question. The other is a little
maybe self aggrandizing anecdote. But to answer your question, I
do not. I'm not the type of comic to write
out word for word what I'm going to say on stage.
About the only time I write anything down is before
a corporate gig to send it to HR for approval.
(07:06):
So I usually get on stage, even if it's at
a show. I mean, you know, we're always working out material,
and it depends on the caliber of show whether or
not you're really gonna try something you're working on or not.
You know, maybe Shane Gillis is probably at the level where,
(07:28):
even at the SP's he can be like, yeah, I'm
gonna try this out and see how it goes, right.
But I think for most of us anyway, the way
I work is I have an idea, either a premise
or a punchline that I want to get to, so
a premise that i'd like to play with or a
punchline that I want to to try to hit. And so,
(07:52):
for example, there's a joke I'm currently trying to flesh
out and it's essentially just a premise. The premise is
is I feel pretty strongly that if it's categorized. If
white people have come in and categorized it, there's some
form of racism at play. So like with dance, right,
(08:15):
like people just go out and dance, but it doesn't
feel like it was untel white colonialists that it was like, well,
that's salsa, that's R and B, that's jazz, that's tap,
and you know, most of the dances we're categorizing are
like ethnic African American dances or Hispanic dances. You know,
(08:35):
there's West coast and East coast swing.
Speaker 1 (08:38):
Okay, what about ballet? Do you count ballet well?
Speaker 2 (08:43):
And ballet? Right? But like yes, but you know what
I mean, Like there's pop and lock, there's we get
so specific when it's like that's we can't do that, Yeah,
so we got to give it a name somehow. So
I'm trying to play with that. So there's a premise
that I feel like, but I don't know quite where
the punchline is. So I'll get up on stage and
(09:05):
I'll you know, right now, it's kind of just in
the dance format. I've got to believe there's like other
ways that we can categorize it. The other avenue I've
taken with this joke is essentially using that.
Speaker 3 (09:21):
As one small bit, but then going to well, white
people actually just name a lot of stuff, and we
as Americans in particular, do it when it's wrong, like,
for instance, when it's inaccurate.
Speaker 2 (09:35):
Okay, So French fries. You know how French fries got
their name.
Speaker 1 (09:39):
No, I have no idea.
Speaker 2 (09:40):
So here's the history of French fries, and I think
it dates back to World War One. We're fighting in
World War One and we come across, you know, we're
fighting in Europe, as all world wars are is in Europe.
Speaker 1 (09:53):
Still would yeah, yeah, yeah, we got to visit.
Speaker 2 (09:56):
We gotta visit. So World War One, we're fighting, some
American troops, you know, start trying these fried potatoes and
they're like, oh, they're delicious, and they received them from
people who spoke French. Therefore they're French fries when really
they're Belgium. It was it was Belgium that did the
(10:17):
fried potatoes, and they just call them fries.
Speaker 1 (10:20):
We did we not know that they were did we
not know that they were speaking.
Speaker 2 (10:27):
The difference, just heard French and were like they must
be French man, come on right, And so French French
people are like what and Belgian people are like, hey,
give us some credit. So it's all all the more ridiculous.
When we had the dispute with France and instead of
(10:48):
calling them French fries, people started calling them freedom fries
for a time, and it's like, just call them belgium Fries.
They're Belgian. There are Belgian anyway. So that's an example
of like an idea I'm trying to work through, and
I'll give it different iterations and try a few different
wordings until I decide either, yeah, there's something here, and
(11:08):
I kind of muddle my way until I find like,
that's it, that's the punchline I'm looking for, and then
I will kind of commit that to memory, either by
writing it down or by just doing it a bunch
until it's like, that's the feel I found it. That's
the joke.
Speaker 1 (11:23):
Are you recording it every time that you can go
back and hear those those beats and know the words
that you're doing? You know?
Speaker 2 (11:29):
I should I used to earlier, prior years, I would have.
I'm not so much anymore. A lot of the reason
I'm not recording as much is because i'm either hosting
the mic or i'm working on a show and I'm
either hosting that show or you know, I'm producing it,
and so there's just ten twenty other things going through
(11:51):
my head, as you well know. And I get up
and then I'm like, well, I don't need the added
pressure of recording myself. I'll just see what happened.
Speaker 1 (12:00):
So can I recommend something for you? Then? Yeah, how
about you take your phone on stage with you?
Speaker 3 (12:06):
Uh?
Speaker 2 (12:07):
Sometimes not always. Now, the show that I produce, we tape,
so I have I have video so I can go
back and watch those. But when I'm hosting open mic
coff and I don't have my phone up on me
or with me.
Speaker 1 (12:21):
Okay, I was gonna say, you had your phone if
you use otter dot aih and just set it down
and start a record, it'll one recorded audio, so you
have a audio file. But then it'll also transcribe it
so you have it written the text so you're texting,
you go back and it and mess with it.
Speaker 2 (12:36):
Interesting, Well, I have to give that a look, and
and uh, I think there are some of these bits
I need to be more purposeful about, you know, compiling
as quickly as I can. A lot more work happens
when I have time to record, go back, listen, and rewrite,
think through, like, oh, what would be a better turn,
a better you know, a better reveal, a better beat here?
(12:58):
You know, how can I trim the f in this area?
Speaker 1 (13:02):
That's a good one what I'm working on because I
have two shows this week when this drafts. Two shows
Tuesday in a Gora and then Thursday in Santa Barbara.
Tuesday show it's at Candy Club. I have a lot
of people coming out, so I'm gonna do my tight set.
I'm gonna go out there and kill it, just because
I want them to see the best version. In Santa Barbara.
(13:23):
It's kind of a play fun show. I have a
new bit about my mom going viral on TikTok. This
really did happen. My mom recently went viral on TikTok.
I don't have just so everyone knows, I don't have
a relationship with her. The thing she went viral for
is not a good thing. You could go You could
probably find it on Reddit or all over the internet
(13:44):
very quickly.
Speaker 2 (13:46):
Now that people got it out.
Speaker 1 (13:48):
We do not have the same last name, just so
you know. But she went viral for stuff I don't
agree with. Her, by the way, on any of the
things that she says, just.
Speaker 2 (14:00):
Doing viral on support of the Democrats, is that what happened?
Speaker 1 (14:02):
No, she uh, she went viral for being kind of
me a mean conservative and then crying on the news
because uh pepe. Then they got flooded out, so she
went viral and the and like it would. I didn't
even know it was a thing until I got on
Reddit and I was like, I think it's my mom. No,
(14:24):
w yeah, I went I read it and it was
like trending on Reddit, and I was like, oh, that
is my mom. And then I like got a message
from my brother, my half brother, and he goes, hey,
just so you know this is happening. And then it
just became this weird thing. And so I'm trying to
figure out how to make that into a good bit,
because I mean, my mom going viral before me, I'm
(14:45):
a comedian who tries to go viral, you know, saying
like and she all she did was be mean and cry.
Maybe I'm doing something wrong.
Speaker 2 (14:53):
Yeah, I mean, here's the thing I think about going
You know, if you want to go viral, there are
a couple of ways to do it. One this is
a clean comedy podcast. You know a lot of those
viral ways are not clean.
Speaker 1 (15:06):
Yeah, exactly right.
Speaker 2 (15:07):
Yeah, yeah, but I think viral people go viral because
now in particular, they're controversial. Usually they're doing something anti
woke or whatever, right and exactly right. And it's so like,
it's harder, I think within the parameters in which you
want to go viral for what you want to go
viral for, and that's very difficult. You could go viral
(15:29):
for almost anything, but you probably don't want to go
viral for all of those things.
Speaker 1 (15:34):
Yeah, yeah, exactly right. Yeah. So it was really interesting
just to see this happen. And here's the weird part.
The first part of me was jealous, like, oh, sure,
she'ss going viral. I'm trying, I'm trying to go viral
and she's going viral. And then the second part of
me was ooh, like you like a I don't want
to go viral for that reason. That seems like the
worst reason over the world to go viral. And then
(15:55):
you know, and then people were like, hey, is that
your mob? And I was like, oh, manikes. You know
also what it's like, you know, she's getting canceled by
TikTok and she's like sixty something, you know what I'm saying, Like,
that's that's the worst.
Speaker 2 (16:10):
I mean, I'm surprised she's even on TikTok. Why is
she even on TikTok?
Speaker 1 (16:14):
Yeah? Why is she on TikTok? I have no idea.
I have no idea, you know, but you know, and
I haven't talked to my mom in like ten years,
so it was really interesting to see her her outlook
on immigrants and vaccines and apparently floods, I guess. So,
you know, it was nice. It was nice to learn
what kind of person she's And here's the true she
(16:34):
hasn't changed hissel as a child. So there you go,
like fascinating. Yeah, it was. So I'm trying to figure
out what to do with that. I feel like there's
something there, but I'm like, it was a weird. It
was a weird. Yeah, moment in time of a pain
of jealousy for a moment moving viral And I was like,
I said to why, I've been like, how's she going viral?
(16:55):
She's like, you want to go viral for that? I'm like, yeah,
not really.
Speaker 2 (16:58):
Yeah, oh never mind, never mind.
Speaker 1 (17:01):
I know.
Speaker 2 (17:02):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (17:03):
So that's so that's the thing. So I'm gonna work
I know, shows where I can work on bits and
try to practice things out and kind of like feel
it out, see what happens. And then the other shows.
You gotta be tight. You gotta be you point. You
can't make a mistake. You know, you got I mean,
not make a mistake, but you can't play around as much.
You gotta be you know, all with those things. So
(17:24):
that's what I have coming up. And then when I
was zaying, I can try out one joke usually per show,
no more than that. I've tried. One time I tried
to do too it was not good. Like, if you
have one, just stick to the one that you're trying
to figure out, play with it a little bit, and
then go yeah.
Speaker 2 (17:40):
I mean that's one of those things where it's like
if the joke that you're working on goes well and
they're like, all right, maybe i'll throw another one in here.
But if the first one goes not great, then you're like, yeah,
I gotta go back to try it and true material.
Speaker 1 (17:53):
Yeah, well even if you kind of go like did okay,
trying it back to back is not a great idea.
You should like put another joke that you know works
in between the two. The problem is, I'd written two
jokes that were similar in ideas and kind of try
to dingy chain them together, and it didn't really work
out the way I wanted it to. So I was like, sure,
so that I had to go back, And what I
ended up doing was taking both of those jokes and
(18:15):
rewriting it as one joke, and it became a much
better It became the joke it was supposed to be.
But I needed to see it crash and burn before
I could.
Speaker 3 (18:26):
Laugh.
Speaker 2 (18:27):
It is funny how you kind of knew you do
need to see whether it lives or dies, and the
only way to figure that out is to plant it.
You know, you got to put it out in the
real world and see what happens.
Speaker 1 (18:38):
Yeah, because if when you do that, I mean, that's
the That's the problem I have with open mics. Not
that I hate open mics. They feel like the level
of feedback you get on a joke doesn't really show
you how good that joke is or isn't, you know.
Speaker 2 (18:55):
Yeah, I mean, I think just like there are shows
of different caliber, there are mics of different caliberies are Yeah, agreed,
And so if you are out there, I guess the
way i'd put it is, you know, there are ways
to have positive experiences at mics, and then there's ways
to get work done right. And if you can do both,
(19:17):
that's great. But I think a lot of comics make
a very conscious choice to have fun at open mics
rather than to get actual work done right. And you know,
depending on the mic, you're gonna find that just in general,
I think even regardless, just in general, mics are very cynical, depressing,
(19:39):
depressing rooms.
Speaker 1 (19:41):
Yeah, yeah, Like so let's let's let's kind of define that,
because there's there are different levels of mics. So like
let's say you go to the Flappers open mic, bar
mic or whatever, or the you who were mike that
they usually have. Those are where you test stuff, that's
where you do things. It's where you can mess around us,
where you could do whatever right, doesn't matter if you
get that you're name pulled for the improv mic. At
(20:02):
the lab, You're not messing around there, You're doing You're
doing your best material. Same thing if you put at
a comedy store at their mic, you're not trying new
material there, you're doing the things that you know work,
so that you could grab the attention of the booker
or whoever's in that room.
Speaker 2 (20:17):
Right yeah, And I don't even count the improv and
the comedy store is open.
Speaker 1 (20:22):
Mics, right well, I mean they call them open mics.
Speaker 2 (20:25):
They do call them that, But in my mind, there
are audition mics and then there are open mics. Open
mics is where you could you should bomb. You should
go up and bomb, you know, figure out what jokes
don't work. You shouldn't be doing at a strict open mic.
You should not be doing jokes that you know work
(20:47):
right that you're wasting your time or or you know,
uh anyhow, maybe maybe you need like an ego boost. Sure,
go to an open mic, blow people away. Great. But
the improv and the comedy store, flappers, the laugh Factory,
they all have an audition process that they call an
(21:07):
open mic. I think that's inaccurate, and I don't think
they should call it the open mic because it's a
different thing that you're doing. You're trying to get booked,
you know. Then there are actual open mics where you
go and you do material, try to figure it out,
you know, and you can use open mics differently. One
(21:30):
is to bomb, find what jokes don't work. Maybe some
do and that's great, but kind of going in with
the expectation that you're going to bomb, you're finding out
what is what does not work, so that you don't
waste those at a show. The other is to hone up,
tighten your material, and that's really just for you. You know,
(21:50):
you're going in you're doing a tight five or whatever
it is, and making sure that you've got the wording down,
the beats down, the how you want to present it.
They act out whatever it is that. You know, open
mic is a time for practice as well. So those
are the two ways to do a traditional open mic. Yeah,
(22:12):
those others are our audition mics. I would put those
at a tier above that's a show. You know, you
should be doing your show material at those audition mics.
Speaker 1 (22:21):
And I hate that they call them open mics because
I agree with you they should call them something else
because it because the first one I ever did that
was like that that I thought was a real open
I didn't know because they called it open mic. I
didn't know it was the audition mic, and it went
badly because I was trying new material, not realizing it
was there. It was there to audition, So I felt
like kind of dumb afterwards, you know, I.
Speaker 2 (22:42):
Know, and they I don't know why they do it.
I think it's just out of habit, tradition, whatever. But
you know, boo boo on them for doing that.
Speaker 1 (22:51):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (22:52):
What I meant by open mics, like there are different
calibers of open mics, is you have open mics. Like
in LA there are these fourth all open mics. It's
a it's a venue, kind of a chain. There's a
few locations, but in general they're attended by kind of
the same type of people depending on the time of
day you go. So if you go at four in
(23:13):
the afternoon, you're gonna get people who are maybe a
little bit more purposeful because they have shows later in
the nighttime. If you go on a Friday at like
eight o'clock, which is prime show, these people are not
on shows generally, and they're almost always in LA. It
skews older, excus male, and they are angry, cynical, depressed people.
(23:40):
So you go in there and you talk about dead babies,
you talk about suicide, you talk about all this dark,
edgy stuff, and they love it. They'll they'll congratulate you
after the mic that was awesome. If you say, if
you say some cancelable words, they'll be so pleased. It's
so fun. You know, you try that at a show,
good luck. Yeah, people are going to be like, oh,
(24:01):
you're troubled. This is scary. Actually, so I've seen that.
I've seen that happen.
Speaker 1 (24:07):
I didn't know that the variation between times was such
a big thing. I've never even thought about that, but
that's such so interesting, you know.
Speaker 2 (24:13):
Time location theme of mic. There are some like women's
only mics that you know, I obviously cannot attend, but
I imagine they are very supportive, both in good and
bad ways. You know, so in the same way that
these like male centric fourth Wall mics can be positive
(24:34):
and both you know, supportive in both good and bad ways. Right.
So my suggestion is, if you're getting ready for a
show and you want to know if your stuff works,
travel it around, Go to different venues, go at different times.
If your only way is to test it at open mics,
look up a few different ones and try it. Try
(24:57):
that same material at a few different open mics. I
don't just go to the same spot, because even if
it's a good mic. You'll go, you'll get regular, you know,
you like, get to know everybody, and suddenly things kind
of become inside jokes, and that's not helpful if you're
trying to build a set that you're carrying to Montana
(25:17):
or you know, auditioning at the open at the comedy
store or the improv that inside jokes don't carry unless
you're able to set the scene properly. And you can't
do that in two three minutes, you know, so you've
got to test them around, go to different venues, try
different times, you know, but do it, do it repeatedly
(25:38):
to different groups of people as best you can do.
Speaker 1 (25:42):
You find that it takes you a certain amount of
time to build a new set. So say you say
someone said, hey, set, I want you to come in
and record a new dry bar and it has to
be all new material. You are you gonna do thirty
minutes or whatever? How long do you know how long
it would take you to build something like that? Or
you have an idea like have you done it enough
that you can kind of figure that out or not? Really?
Speaker 2 (26:05):
I mean, I think that's such a variable question. You know,
it depends on how excited are you about the material?
As you build the material, you get more excited about
certain aspects of it than others, and that can ebb
and flow, and sometimes certain aspects just come. You know,
certain jokes might just flow and you're like, hey, that
(26:25):
five came super easy when I'm talking about like, I
don't know what, when I'm talking about camping, I've got
a good five ten minutes on camping almost no problem,
because I'm just speaking from the heart and I've got
the beats. I've tried it out a couple of times,
and that came so easy. That's that's fascinating. But then
(26:45):
you're like, all right, how can I joke about my
mom or my dad? Well that might take a much
longer time because you're actually sorting through things. You know,
you might be dealing with some stuff along with those jokes,
and it might not come as readily. Might be certain
aspects You're like, whoah, well, that's kind of mean to
my mom. Do I really want to put that out there?
I don't know if she saw it, she'd be upset.
(27:08):
Do I want to deal with that backlash? Like? What
do I want to do? These are all questions that
every comic has to face because you know, we don't
have unlimited material. We're dealing with our own life and
that involves other people. So I would say, on average,
you know, I maybe come up with a solid if
(27:30):
I'm really working, maybe a solid five minutes every few weeks.
When I'm really purposeful about coming up with you know, you'll,
you'll you can come up with stuff that's fine. You know,
you can come up with stuff that's fine fairly quickly.
I think after you've been doing it five six years,
you can probably muddle your way through a five minute
(27:51):
set at a at a low stake show without even
thinking about it. Yeah, but if you're gonna if you're
gonna be like filming a dry bar or getting ready
for a special with Amazon Prime or Crackle or whatever
is out there, you know that's going to take more time.
And un fortunately, I don't know, some people might think
(28:12):
that joke is done. I could never tell it any better.
Sometimes I'm not sure, you know, I think there's always
a way to improve. You just kind of have to
go with what is your best in that moment, right,
you know, And if you wonder about that, like just
go back watchn A Bergatzi. He now has enough specials
out that spend enough time. He is a very different comic.
(28:37):
The feel is the same, right, but the timing, the punchiness,
like the relatability much different now than before, you know,
than fifteen twenty years ago. And he's been on the
scene for a long long time. You know. Yeah, I
(28:57):
don't know, you know, I that's a tough one to answer.
But the best dancer I can give is if I'm
really if I'm really knuckling down and trying to get
good stuff done, like I can get a good five
minutes I think every three four weeks.
Speaker 1 (29:10):
Yeah, I was gonna saying about five five minutes a
month is the standard that I've heard, where like, you
should be able to build five solid minutes of material
every month. So if you did that for the year,
there's your hour special, which is exactly what why most
comedians to are for like two years before they do
a special, and then two years and do a special
because they're working out the new stuff and then they're
refining it over that last year. Maybe they're finding more punchlines, tags, whatever,
(29:34):
and then they're just and the way that the set
goes and building it in the place that makes the
most sense, you know.
Speaker 2 (29:41):
Yeah, so yeah, yeah, I think I think that. Yeah,
that tracks with what I've seen and heard as well. Yeah,
I mean Lui Cyk did it. You know, not the
cleanest comic and not the nicest guy maybe, but that
his method. I mean he did an hour a year
(30:03):
for five or six years.
Speaker 1 (30:05):
Yeah, that's amazing to me. I mean, so crazy and
just and good. And even if you don't like him
as a person, and you don't not his style, that
style comedy doesn't resonate to you. Still a very smart,
very well done, very well written median like he just
definitely has the skills and the choce to be able
to do that.
Speaker 2 (30:25):
Yeah, and you know, there's different. I think a lot
of people now feel like there's too many specials. People
are coming out too quickly with new specials. Yeah, I
feel like there's some truth to that. I think there's
some validity to that problem currently because not everybody special
is really that great. You know, there are a handful
of comics out there that when it comes out, it's
(30:46):
like I got to see that, I feel like it's
going to be really good.
Speaker 1 (30:49):
Yeah, did you have a do you have any secrets
that you use when it comes to creating new material,
when it comes to refining your set, any of those
kind of things you have, like anything that you figured
out that works for you, that's kind of a you thing.
I mean, my.
Speaker 2 (31:06):
Whole thing when I'm trying to work out new material,
and it's a little bit of a cycle, but it's
got to be fun. Oh yeah, it's got to be
something that I find fun. You know. Sometimes I feel like,
in a ten minute set on a low stakes show,
absolutely tell one or two jokes that are just for you,
(31:27):
you know, just just keep it so that you're having fun.
And I found that with new material or with just
material in general, you go through a cycle where it's
fun to tell this joke. You want to see how
it's going to land, what's going to happen, And then
you get this to this point where it's like, I
know this works, and it kind of loses it's fun.
(31:50):
And then you notice that it's not as good and
you're like, wait, why didn't that joke work as well?
And you kind of tell it a few more times
and it's like worse every time. Yeah, but it was
up here now it's down here. What is going on,
and so you put it on the back burner for
a while, right, You're like, I don't know, maybe this
joke isn't as funny as I thought. And then you
come back to it sometime later, and by the time
(32:13):
you come back to it, at least for me, it's like, oh, yeah,
well this work. Can I make this work? I don't know,
And then it's fun again, And I've realized that's my
at least for me, that's my secret is if it's
fun for me to tell, if I'm excited, if I
want to see how the audience is going to react,
Oh man, it's a different show. That's a lot more
(32:34):
fun than just like here's what it is. And that
was the challenge with Drybar and I think any taped special.
These are all jokes that comics have told hundreds, if
not thousands of times. Now. Having it taped gives it
a certain like urgency, you know, a certain uniqueness to
(32:54):
it where it's got to work, and so there is
some pressure there to keep it. But you have to
make the pressure positive. So it's got to be exciting
and not daunting, you know. So that that was my secret.
Try to find a way to be fun, keep it,
keep it fun so that you're having fun. If you're
having fun, the audience will pick up on that, and
(33:16):
they also want to have fun. You know, a lot
of comics look at the audience as an adversary, someone
you're trying to impress, and I don't try to look
at the audience that way. They are there to have fun.
Now at the audition mics, most of those are comics
in the audience, and they at the improv in particular,
(33:39):
if you're picked in halfway through the open mic alloted
time you're picked, have they hate you, it doesn't matter.
They are your adversary, and now you have to ignore
them because you're not performing for them. You're performing for
the booker in the back of the room. So you
got to keep in mind, like, who is my audience?
Am I trying to impress? The comics? Don't care. They're
(34:01):
not going to pay me. These comics are not paying me.
They are not you know, whatever I need the booker
and so you know, and for most clubs, the people
who book you only care about the audience.
Speaker 1 (34:13):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (34:14):
So if you're having fun, the audience is having fun,
the booker is like that was great. Yeah, they don't
care if they flubbed up a joke or if you know,
something crazy, Like the audience had a good time, if
the audience paid their bills, if the audience ordered drinks,
they're happy.
Speaker 1 (34:30):
Yeah, I mean that's exactly right. That's that's the thing
is I think they're having fun. Is such a big
one because I noticed there was a time when I
was on the road where I was like, ah, I'm
not having fun with this and I could feel it,
and I feel like the audience could feel it, and
I was like, what am I doing wrong? And I
think it was I had just been on the road
for too long. It was like during my long month
time where like those last couple of shows, I was
(34:50):
like ough. But then when I knew I was about
to get ready to go home, I was excited to
go home. So I was like, hey, if I get
this when I shoes, I get this show done, I'm
one day closer, you know, So I get this s
and I was excited and you could feel that excitement
and energy. But there was like a week or so,
maybe two weeks where we're doing shows where iister's like,
I don't care.
Speaker 2 (35:12):
Type you know, I mean it is funny because most people,
I don't know how many people listen to this podcast.
You are not comics. But if you're not a comic,
just interested and you're listening, this becomes a job. It
becomes our eight to five. And just like you're bored
at your work, we get bored. If we're doing the
same jokes day in day out to basically the same reaction,
(35:35):
we get bored. And then suddenly the reaction changes and
it's not as fun. It's just work, and you can
get really bogged down in that. So one suggestion I
have used on myself is what's a fun joke I
can throw here in the middle? Shake things up? What's
gonna happen?
Speaker 1 (35:53):
You know? Yeah, that's a good one. That's a good one.
That's the thing is, you got to keep it interesting.
You gotta keep it fun, you gotta keep it exciting,
because the energy you give to a joke is the
energy that the audience takes from that joke. And then
you can really feel what it's supposed to be when
you just deliver the joke down the pipe because you
know it's worked a million times, you kind of don't
really care. The audience can feel that they can feel
(36:15):
that you're like just phoned it in, just like yeah, yeah,
just doing the joke. I know it works, whatever, but
you're gonna get last You're not gonna get the laughs
you want. You know, you're not gonna get the laugh
or the laugh that joke even deserves, which you realize,
you know, and that's that's the worst. When you don't
get the laugh for a joke that you know it deserves.
You're like, oh, well, especially if you really do try
(36:35):
to dial it and do the joke well and it
doesn't get the laughter it deserves, You're like, what is
happening right now? This is terrible? You know.
Speaker 2 (36:42):
So yeah, well, you know, the audience, like they pay,
they want to be there, they want to have fun, yeah,
and so they want to come with you on the journey.
But if they start feeling this isn't for me, then
it's not as fun.
Speaker 1 (36:56):
Yeah, you know, and they get distracted and they're kind
of out, you know.
Speaker 2 (37:01):
Yeah, just like you're out. You're sort of like whatever,
I'm just going to tell you this thing about dolphins,
because I've told everybody else about this thing with dolphins.
Speaker 1 (37:10):
Yeah, no, that's exactly right. I Uh, it was the
thing I should write a joke about kissing kissing stingrays
and like now I have a long distance girlfriend in
the Cayman Islands.
Speaker 2 (37:20):
Yeah, there you go. Yeah, absolutely, yeah. But that's the
best advice I've I've I've found, at least for myself,
is to keep it, keep every set fun, find a
way to make it fun for yourself. And some shows
are just awful, you know, some shows are tough, and
so you've really got to figure out how can I
make it fun for myself because otherwise I'm just wasting time.
(37:43):
And if you're getting paid on those shows, at least
there's that, but a lot of them sometimes there is
no pay. Yeah, you're just you're just doing it because
it might lead to another opportunity.
Speaker 1 (37:53):
And exactly right, exactly you got you got to get
that time and you gotta you gotta put in the work. Yeah, perfect, Well,
thank you, Seth. Where can people find you.
Speaker 2 (38:01):
At Hey find me on my website Seth Lawrencecomedy dot com.
You can also find my drive bar special on Drybarcomedy
dot com or on the app it's called Ready or
Not and then all my socials Seth T. Lawrence very easy.
Speaker 1 (38:16):
Perfect you can find me a JD. Creviston on Instagram.
You can go to the Queen Comedy Podcast anywhere and
then go check out Clean Comedian pro Tips the newsletter
there if you want that. I'm working on some projects
right now, trying to get more stuff dialed in, and
I'm really excited. I go back on the road officially
in August. So July is just prepping stuff and practicing
(38:38):
and writing and getting things done, and go back on
the road in August and it'll just be I think
that one is I think the first one's like southern California,
and then we kind of head out after that to
like Reno, Tahoe, Kentucky, like all over the place after that.
So go check out Zane Lamprey dot com where you
can see where we'll be at if you want to
come out and see me do shows. People have bought
(39:00):
think it's to come see me, not seasane, but see me.
I was very very I was very awesome. I was
very grateful. So I got to keep it up, and
like I said, I have people coming out. The people
that play pickleball with are coming out to see me
do stand up on Tomorrow night on Tuesday Night, so
I'm very excited, very excited. Uh if you if you
didn't see the pictures on my Instagram, I had pictures
(39:21):
of me with older ladies that I play pickleball with,
that are that are the inspiration of a joke that
I tell. So it's very it's very good and I'm
very excited for it. So thank you everybody for listening.
Have a good one. We'll talk to you soon.
Hey, real quick, if you're a clean comedian or trying
to be one, you've got to get on my Clean
Comedian Pro Tips newsletter. Every week I send out one
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so stop guessing, start growing, go out there, be clean,
(00:21):
get some green. Everybody. Welcome to Queen County Podcast. It's
Jad and I'm here with my co host, the amazing
and talented mister Seth Lawrence Seth. How's it going?
Speaker 2 (00:29):
Hey, Hey, hey, pretty good. I was just telling you
that I got back from a camping trip. We did
an overnight camping trip and I am just barely recovering.
Speaker 1 (00:39):
Oh man, I'm barely recovering from Grant Cayman, So I
feel you.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
Yeah, how was it?
Speaker 1 (00:45):
So? The whole trip was great, except for the flight home.
So the flight home got delayed. Then we were on
the tarmac for three hours in Grank Cayman. Then we
landed in Dallas, and because we were delayed by three hours,
we missed our flights home. So they gave us the hotel,
they gave us a food stipend, but they tried to
(01:06):
book us on like a late flight. And my daughter
for her birthday, my youngest daughter, for her birthday, we
bought our tickets to a concert in Hollywood at the
Hollywood Palladium on Friday, so if we took that late flight,
she would not get to go to a concert. So
we finally got it, got the right flight that we wanted,
(01:26):
but that flight was delayed an hour and a half.
Oh no, So we didn't get home until like basically
four o'clock, and we had to drive from Lax to
Agora Hills, where kind of where I lived. Then we
had to get her ready for the concert and then
drive her back to la Luckily, the friend that she
(01:47):
went with, their parents heard about all of our stuff
and they're like, look, we'll drive, like you don't have
to worry about it. We'll we'll do all this stuff.
So they were amazing. They saved us. And then once
I knew she was good to go, she was with friends,
she was going to go to the show, everything was happening.
I literally went and crashed. I was so tired, I
was so exhausted from all the traveling. It was like,
(02:08):
because I didn't sleep well in the in the hotel
because I was already nervous not making a flight. So
but besides that, Grant came himself, very beautiful, amazing. We
picked up starfish, we played with stingrays. I kissed two stingrays.
It was pretty awesome. Yeah, so you know, we snorkeled
(02:29):
in reefs and it was just it was a great time.
It was amazing.
Speaker 2 (02:33):
So that's awesome. Oh that's great, very very cool.
Speaker 1 (02:36):
Where where did you go camping at?
Speaker 2 (02:40):
So I spot up the Los Angeles Crest Forest at
a campground called Lake Campground, right next to Jackson Lake
up the Los Angeles Crest Forest area. It was fun.
So it's about an hour outside of l a hour
and a half it took us to get there and back,
so not bad.
Speaker 1 (03:00):
Not bad. And what'd you guys do up there?
Speaker 2 (03:01):
Yeah, honestly, we just went for the overnight camp out.
So we just left, made food, you know, and then
kind of hiked around a little bit, saw the lake,
and then came back today. So very quick trip.
Speaker 1 (03:17):
Yeah yeah, yeah, wow, that sounds man, that's a lot
to pack in in a small amount of time. Honestly,
I know.
Speaker 2 (03:23):
Well, it's just like camping. You basically have to pack
your house and then to go for one night is
maybe silly, but it's good. We only booked one night
because this morning, as we were finishing up cooking breakfast,
they had some camp people showing up, I guess forest
agents coming around telling everybody that they were shutting down
(03:45):
a few campsites because they'd had a water pipe burst
a couple days ago and they were out of water.
They were going to be shutting off the water today
at twelve o'clock. We had only booked for the night,
so we were going to be out by eleven anyway.
But you know, they let you kind of hold over
if you want, if there's availability, and they were like
there is, you know, oh, so.
Speaker 3 (04:08):
Getting so emotional about anyway.
Speaker 2 (04:13):
So it's good we only planned on being there one
night because otherwise who would have been kicked out? Anyway?
Speaker 1 (04:17):
So right, yeah, so I want to talk to you.
I I changed my mind about what I want to
talk about today because I think because I think I
don't know. Well, first of all, I don't know if
you've if you watched TV lately, have you seen this.
Shane gillis doing the SB So did you see that
any of those clips.
Speaker 2 (04:35):
I did see? I mean the yeah, yeah, the ESPN
Awards he did like a monologue, Yeah, I mean the
clips that I saw. It was pretty crazy that he
got away with it. It was televised and live, and
there were some of those jokes where I was like,
that's wild that he was able to make some of
those jokes.
Speaker 1 (04:53):
One of the things that I so, I watched it
again recently. I just watched the whole thing and one
of the things he said is that joke didn't work
all week, which means he's been practicing these jokes all week.
Speaker 2 (05:04):
Sure.
Speaker 1 (05:04):
So one of the things I want to talk about
is how do you practice a new joke. How do
you take a new idea, a new joke that you
want to work on and practice it so that you
can use Because you get to do your show, you
get to go do your like you kind of like
open mic show or whatever, you know, pretty often I
don't get to do open mics very often. Yeah, I'm
(05:25):
on shows. So then it's like, when I want to
do a bit, I have to write it, take it
to stage, try it that night. See what happens, if
it works or doesn't work, or what does what doesn't work,
review it and do it. But what is your process
like when you want to try a new joke? You
have this maybe you just have an idea for a joke.
Do you stud to write it out to you like
(05:45):
to take it on stage? What's your process for new jokes?
Because I thought it was really funny that he that
he kept the joke that he knew didn't work all week.
I would never I don't think i'd ever do that.
Speaker 2 (05:56):
Yeah, well is there I mean, I think there's a
couple of things going on. You know, when you're on
a televised deal, or you're prepping for a bigger set,
whatever it is. Sometimes you know, I have to operate
within these confines and you have a limited amount of
(06:16):
time in which to prep the required amount of material.
And sometimes you're like, well, I have essentially two jokes
that don't really work very often, but I'm getting down
to the wire and I need one of these to work.
I'm going to go with the one that I want
to tell, right. So that might have been his calculus there.
(06:38):
You know, there are a couple thoughts. I have one
is to answer your question. The other is a little
maybe self aggrandizing anecdote. But to answer your question, I
do not. I'm not the type of comic to write
out word for word what I'm going to say on stage.
About the only time I write anything down is before
a corporate gig to send it to HR for approval.
(07:06):
So I usually get on stage, even if it's at
a show. I mean, you know, we're always working out material,
and it depends on the caliber of show whether or
not you're really gonna try something you're working on or not.
You know, maybe Shane Gillis is probably at the level where,
(07:28):
even at the SP's he can be like, yeah, I'm
gonna try this out and see how it goes, right.
But I think for most of us anyway, the way
I work is I have an idea, either a premise
or a punchline that I want to get to, so
a premise that i'd like to play with or a
punchline that I want to to try to hit. And so,
(07:52):
for example, there's a joke I'm currently trying to flesh
out and it's essentially just a premise. The premise is
is I feel pretty strongly that if it's categorized. If
white people have come in and categorized it, there's some
form of racism at play. So like with dance, right,
(08:15):
like people just go out and dance, but it doesn't
feel like it was untel white colonialists that it was like, well,
that's salsa, that's R and B, that's jazz, that's tap,
and you know, most of the dances we're categorizing are
like ethnic African American dances or Hispanic dances. You know,
(08:35):
there's West coast and East coast swing.
Speaker 1 (08:38):
Okay, what about ballet? Do you count ballet well?
Speaker 2 (08:43):
And ballet? Right? But like yes, but you know what
I mean, Like there's pop and lock, there's we get
so specific when it's like that's we can't do that, Yeah,
so we got to give it a name somehow. So
I'm trying to play with that. So there's a premise
that I feel like, but I don't know quite where
the punchline is. So I'll get up on stage and
(09:05):
I'll you know, right now, it's kind of just in
the dance format. I've got to believe there's like other
ways that we can categorize it. The other avenue I've
taken with this joke is essentially using that.
Speaker 3 (09:21):
As one small bit, but then going to well, white
people actually just name a lot of stuff, and we
as Americans in particular, do it when it's wrong, like,
for instance, when it's inaccurate.
Speaker 2 (09:35):
Okay, So French fries. You know how French fries got
their name.
Speaker 1 (09:39):
No, I have no idea.
Speaker 2 (09:40):
So here's the history of French fries, and I think
it dates back to World War One. We're fighting in
World War One and we come across, you know, we're
fighting in Europe, as all world wars are is in Europe.
Speaker 1 (09:53):
Still would yeah, yeah, yeah, we got to visit.
Speaker 2 (09:56):
We gotta visit. So World War One, we're fighting, some
American troops, you know, start trying these fried potatoes and
they're like, oh, they're delicious, and they received them from
people who spoke French. Therefore they're French fries when really
they're Belgium. It was it was Belgium that did the
(10:17):
fried potatoes, and they just call them fries.
Speaker 1 (10:20):
We did we not know that they were did we
not know that they were speaking.
Speaker 2 (10:27):
The difference, just heard French and were like they must
be French man, come on right, And so French French
people are like what and Belgian people are like, hey,
give us some credit. So it's all all the more ridiculous.
When we had the dispute with France and instead of
(10:48):
calling them French fries, people started calling them freedom fries
for a time, and it's like, just call them belgium Fries.
They're Belgian. There are Belgian anyway. So that's an example
of like an idea I'm trying to work through, and
I'll give it different iterations and try a few different
wordings until I decide either, yeah, there's something here, and
(11:08):
I kind of muddle my way until I find like,
that's it, that's the punchline I'm looking for, and then
I will kind of commit that to memory, either by
writing it down or by just doing it a bunch
until it's like, that's the feel I found it. That's
the joke.
Speaker 1 (11:23):
Are you recording it every time that you can go
back and hear those those beats and know the words
that you're doing? You know?
Speaker 2 (11:29):
I should I used to earlier, prior years, I would have.
I'm not so much anymore. A lot of the reason
I'm not recording as much is because i'm either hosting
the mic or i'm working on a show and I'm
either hosting that show or you know, I'm producing it,
and so there's just ten twenty other things going through
(11:51):
my head, as you well know. And I get up
and then I'm like, well, I don't need the added
pressure of recording myself. I'll just see what happened.
Speaker 1 (12:00):
So can I recommend something for you? Then? Yeah, how
about you take your phone on stage with you?
Speaker 3 (12:06):
Uh?
Speaker 2 (12:07):
Sometimes not always. Now, the show that I produce, we tape,
so I have I have video so I can go
back and watch those. But when I'm hosting open mic
coff and I don't have my phone up on me
or with me.
Speaker 1 (12:21):
Okay, I was gonna say, you had your phone if
you use otter dot aih and just set it down
and start a record, it'll one recorded audio, so you
have a audio file. But then it'll also transcribe it
so you have it written the text so you're texting,
you go back and it and mess with it.
Speaker 2 (12:36):
Interesting, Well, I have to give that a look, and
and uh, I think there are some of these bits
I need to be more purposeful about, you know, compiling
as quickly as I can. A lot more work happens
when I have time to record, go back, listen, and rewrite,
think through, like, oh, what would be a better turn,
a better you know, a better reveal, a better beat here?
(12:58):
You know, how can I trim the f in this area?
Speaker 1 (13:02):
That's a good one what I'm working on because I
have two shows this week when this drafts. Two shows
Tuesday in a Gora and then Thursday in Santa Barbara.
Tuesday show it's at Candy Club. I have a lot
of people coming out, so I'm gonna do my tight set.
I'm gonna go out there and kill it, just because
I want them to see the best version. In Santa Barbara.
(13:23):
It's kind of a play fun show. I have a
new bit about my mom going viral on TikTok. This
really did happen. My mom recently went viral on TikTok.
I don't have just so everyone knows, I don't have
a relationship with her. The thing she went viral for
is not a good thing. You could go You could
probably find it on Reddit or all over the internet
(13:44):
very quickly.
Speaker 2 (13:46):
Now that people got it out.
Speaker 1 (13:48):
We do not have the same last name, just so
you know. But she went viral for stuff I don't
agree with. Her, by the way, on any of the
things that she says, just.
Speaker 2 (14:00):
Doing viral on support of the Democrats, is that what happened?
Speaker 1 (14:02):
No, she uh, she went viral for being kind of
me a mean conservative and then crying on the news
because uh pepe. Then they got flooded out, so she
went viral and the and like it would. I didn't
even know it was a thing until I got on
Reddit and I was like, I think it's my mom. No,
(14:24):
w yeah, I went I read it and it was
like trending on Reddit, and I was like, oh, that
is my mom. And then I like got a message
from my brother, my half brother, and he goes, hey,
just so you know this is happening. And then it
just became this weird thing. And so I'm trying to
figure out how to make that into a good bit,
because I mean, my mom going viral before me, I'm
(14:45):
a comedian who tries to go viral, you know, saying
like and she all she did was be mean and cry.
Maybe I'm doing something wrong.
Speaker 2 (14:53):
Yeah, I mean, here's the thing I think about going
You know, if you want to go viral, there are
a couple of ways to do it. One this is
a clean comedy podcast. You know a lot of those
viral ways are not clean.
Speaker 1 (15:06):
Yeah, exactly right.
Speaker 2 (15:07):
Yeah, yeah, but I think viral people go viral because
now in particular, they're controversial. Usually they're doing something anti
woke or whatever, right and exactly right. And it's so like,
it's harder, I think within the parameters in which you
want to go viral for what you want to go
viral for, and that's very difficult. You could go viral
(15:29):
for almost anything, but you probably don't want to go
viral for all of those things.
Speaker 1 (15:34):
Yeah, yeah, exactly right. Yeah. So it was really interesting
just to see this happen. And here's the weird part.
The first part of me was jealous, like, oh, sure,
she'ss going viral. I'm trying, I'm trying to go viral
and she's going viral. And then the second part of
me was ooh, like you like a I don't want
to go viral for that reason. That seems like the
worst reason over the world to go viral. And then
(15:55):
you know, and then people were like, hey, is that
your mob? And I was like, oh, manikes. You know
also what it's like, you know, she's getting canceled by
TikTok and she's like sixty something, you know what I'm saying, Like,
that's that's the worst.
Speaker 2 (16:10):
I mean, I'm surprised she's even on TikTok. Why is
she even on TikTok?
Speaker 1 (16:14):
Yeah? Why is she on TikTok? I have no idea.
I have no idea, you know, but you know, and
I haven't talked to my mom in like ten years,
so it was really interesting to see her her outlook
on immigrants and vaccines and apparently floods, I guess. So,
you know, it was nice. It was nice to learn
what kind of person she's And here's the true she
(16:34):
hasn't changed hissel as a child. So there you go,
like fascinating. Yeah, it was. So I'm trying to figure
out what to do with that. I feel like there's
something there, but I'm like, it was a weird. It
was a weird. Yeah, moment in time of a pain
of jealousy for a moment moving viral And I was like,
I said to why, I've been like, how's she going viral?
(16:55):
She's like, you want to go viral for that? I'm like, yeah,
not really.
Speaker 2 (16:58):
Yeah, oh never mind, never mind.
Speaker 1 (17:01):
I know.
Speaker 2 (17:02):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (17:03):
So that's so that's the thing. So I'm gonna work
I know, shows where I can work on bits and
try to practice things out and kind of like feel
it out, see what happens. And then the other shows.
You gotta be tight. You gotta be you point. You
can't make a mistake. You know, you got I mean,
not make a mistake, but you can't play around as much.
You gotta be you know, all with those things. So
(17:24):
that's what I have coming up. And then when I
was zaying, I can try out one joke usually per show,
no more than that. I've tried. One time I tried
to do too it was not good. Like, if you
have one, just stick to the one that you're trying
to figure out, play with it a little bit, and
then go yeah.
Speaker 2 (17:40):
I mean that's one of those things where it's like
if the joke that you're working on goes well and
they're like, all right, maybe i'll throw another one in here.
But if the first one goes not great, then you're like, yeah,
I gotta go back to try it and true material.
Speaker 1 (17:53):
Yeah, well even if you kind of go like did okay,
trying it back to back is not a great idea.
You should like put another joke that you know works
in between the two. The problem is, I'd written two
jokes that were similar in ideas and kind of try
to dingy chain them together, and it didn't really work
out the way I wanted it to. So I was like, sure,
so that I had to go back, And what I
ended up doing was taking both of those jokes and
(18:15):
rewriting it as one joke, and it became a much
better It became the joke it was supposed to be.
But I needed to see it crash and burn before
I could.
Speaker 3 (18:26):
Laugh.
Speaker 2 (18:27):
It is funny how you kind of knew you do
need to see whether it lives or dies, and the
only way to figure that out is to plant it.
You know, you got to put it out in the
real world and see what happens.
Speaker 1 (18:38):
Yeah, because if when you do that, I mean, that's
the That's the problem I have with open mics. Not
that I hate open mics. They feel like the level
of feedback you get on a joke doesn't really show
you how good that joke is or isn't, you know.
Speaker 2 (18:55):
Yeah, I mean, I think just like there are shows
of different caliber, there are mics of different caliberies are Yeah, agreed,
And so if you are out there, I guess the
way i'd put it is, you know, there are ways
to have positive experiences at mics, and then there's ways
to get work done right. And if you can do both,
(19:17):
that's great. But I think a lot of comics make
a very conscious choice to have fun at open mics
rather than to get actual work done right. And you know,
depending on the mic, you're gonna find that just in general,
I think even regardless, just in general, mics are very cynical, depressing,
(19:39):
depressing rooms.
Speaker 1 (19:41):
Yeah, yeah, Like so let's let's let's kind of define that,
because there's there are different levels of mics. So like
let's say you go to the Flappers open mic, bar
mic or whatever, or the you who were mike that
they usually have. Those are where you test stuff, that's
where you do things. It's where you can mess around us,
where you could do whatever right, doesn't matter if you
get that you're name pulled for the improv mic. At
(20:02):
the lab, You're not messing around there, You're doing You're
doing your best material. Same thing if you put at
a comedy store at their mic, you're not trying new
material there, you're doing the things that you know work,
so that you could grab the attention of the booker
or whoever's in that room.
Speaker 2 (20:17):
Right yeah, And I don't even count the improv and
the comedy store is open.
Speaker 1 (20:22):
Mics, right well, I mean they call them open mics.
Speaker 2 (20:25):
They do call them that, But in my mind, there
are audition mics and then there are open mics. Open
mics is where you could you should bomb. You should
go up and bomb, you know, figure out what jokes
don't work. You shouldn't be doing at a strict open mic.
You should not be doing jokes that you know work
(20:47):
right that you're wasting your time or or you know,
uh anyhow, maybe maybe you need like an ego boost. Sure,
go to an open mic, blow people away. Great. But
the improv and the comedy store, flappers, the laugh Factory,
they all have an audition process that they call an
(21:07):
open mic. I think that's inaccurate, and I don't think
they should call it the open mic because it's a
different thing that you're doing. You're trying to get booked,
you know. Then there are actual open mics where you
go and you do material, try to figure it out,
you know, and you can use open mics differently. One
(21:30):
is to bomb, find what jokes don't work. Maybe some
do and that's great, but kind of going in with
the expectation that you're going to bomb, you're finding out
what is what does not work, so that you don't
waste those at a show. The other is to hone up,
tighten your material, and that's really just for you. You know,
(21:50):
you're going in you're doing a tight five or whatever
it is, and making sure that you've got the wording down,
the beats down, the how you want to present it.
They act out whatever it is that. You know, open
mic is a time for practice as well. So those
are the two ways to do a traditional open mic. Yeah,
(22:12):
those others are our audition mics. I would put those
at a tier above that's a show. You know, you
should be doing your show material at those audition mics.
Speaker 1 (22:21):
And I hate that they call them open mics because
I agree with you they should call them something else
because it because the first one I ever did that
was like that that I thought was a real open
I didn't know because they called it open mic. I
didn't know it was the audition mic, and it went
badly because I was trying new material, not realizing it
was there. It was there to audition, So I felt
like kind of dumb afterwards, you know, I.
Speaker 2 (22:42):
Know, and they I don't know why they do it.
I think it's just out of habit, tradition, whatever. But
you know, boo boo on them for doing that.
Speaker 1 (22:51):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (22:52):
What I meant by open mics, like there are different
calibers of open mics, is you have open mics. Like
in LA there are these fourth all open mics. It's
a it's a venue, kind of a chain. There's a
few locations, but in general they're attended by kind of
the same type of people depending on the time of
day you go. So if you go at four in
(23:13):
the afternoon, you're gonna get people who are maybe a
little bit more purposeful because they have shows later in
the nighttime. If you go on a Friday at like
eight o'clock, which is prime show, these people are not
on shows generally, and they're almost always in LA. It
skews older, excus male, and they are angry, cynical, depressed people.
(23:40):
So you go in there and you talk about dead babies,
you talk about suicide, you talk about all this dark,
edgy stuff, and they love it. They'll they'll congratulate you
after the mic that was awesome. If you say, if
you say some cancelable words, they'll be so pleased. It's
so fun. You know, you try that at a show,
good luck. Yeah, people are going to be like, oh,
(24:01):
you're troubled. This is scary. Actually, so I've seen that.
I've seen that happen.
Speaker 1 (24:07):
I didn't know that the variation between times was such
a big thing. I've never even thought about that, but
that's such so interesting, you know.
Speaker 2 (24:13):
Time location theme of mic. There are some like women's
only mics that you know, I obviously cannot attend, but
I imagine they are very supportive, both in good and
bad ways. You know, so in the same way that
these like male centric fourth Wall mics can be positive
(24:34):
and both you know, supportive in both good and bad ways. Right.
So my suggestion is, if you're getting ready for a
show and you want to know if your stuff works,
travel it around, Go to different venues, go at different times.
If your only way is to test it at open mics,
look up a few different ones and try it. Try
(24:57):
that same material at a few different open mics. I
don't just go to the same spot, because even if
it's a good mic. You'll go, you'll get regular, you know,
you like, get to know everybody, and suddenly things kind
of become inside jokes, and that's not helpful if you're
trying to build a set that you're carrying to Montana
(25:17):
or you know, auditioning at the open at the comedy
store or the improv that inside jokes don't carry unless
you're able to set the scene properly. And you can't
do that in two three minutes, you know, so you've
got to test them around, go to different venues, try
different times, you know, but do it, do it repeatedly
(25:38):
to different groups of people as best you can do.
Speaker 1 (25:42):
You find that it takes you a certain amount of
time to build a new set. So say you say
someone said, hey, set, I want you to come in
and record a new dry bar and it has to
be all new material. You are you gonna do thirty
minutes or whatever? How long do you know how long
it would take you to build something like that? Or
you have an idea like have you done it enough
that you can kind of figure that out or not? Really?
Speaker 2 (26:05):
I mean, I think that's such a variable question. You know,
it depends on how excited are you about the material?
As you build the material, you get more excited about
certain aspects of it than others, and that can ebb
and flow, and sometimes certain aspects just come. You know,
certain jokes might just flow and you're like, hey, that
(26:25):
five came super easy when I'm talking about like, I
don't know what, when I'm talking about camping, I've got
a good five ten minutes on camping almost no problem,
because I'm just speaking from the heart and I've got
the beats. I've tried it out a couple of times,
and that came so easy. That's that's fascinating. But then
(26:45):
you're like, all right, how can I joke about my
mom or my dad? Well that might take a much
longer time because you're actually sorting through things. You know,
you might be dealing with some stuff along with those jokes,
and it might not come as readily. Might be certain
aspects You're like, whoah, well, that's kind of mean to
my mom. Do I really want to put that out there?
I don't know if she saw it, she'd be upset.
(27:08):
Do I want to deal with that backlash? Like? What
do I want to do? These are all questions that
every comic has to face because you know, we don't
have unlimited material. We're dealing with our own life and
that involves other people. So I would say, on average,
you know, I maybe come up with a solid if
(27:30):
I'm really working, maybe a solid five minutes every few weeks.
When I'm really purposeful about coming up with you know, you'll,
you'll you can come up with stuff that's fine. You know,
you can come up with stuff that's fine fairly quickly.
I think after you've been doing it five six years,
you can probably muddle your way through a five minute
(27:51):
set at a at a low stake show without even
thinking about it. Yeah, but if you're gonna if you're
gonna be like filming a dry bar or getting ready
for a special with Amazon Prime or Crackle or whatever
is out there, you know that's going to take more time.
And un fortunately, I don't know, some people might think
(28:12):
that joke is done. I could never tell it any better.
Sometimes I'm not sure, you know, I think there's always
a way to improve. You just kind of have to
go with what is your best in that moment, right,
you know, And if you wonder about that, like just
go back watchn A Bergatzi. He now has enough specials
out that spend enough time. He is a very different comic.
(28:37):
The feel is the same, right, but the timing, the punchiness,
like the relatability much different now than before, you know,
than fifteen twenty years ago. And he's been on the
scene for a long long time. You know. Yeah, I
(28:57):
don't know, you know, I that's a tough one to answer.
But the best dancer I can give is if I'm
really if I'm really knuckling down and trying to get
good stuff done, like I can get a good five
minutes I think every three four weeks.
Speaker 1 (29:10):
Yeah, I was gonna saying about five five minutes a
month is the standard that I've heard, where like, you
should be able to build five solid minutes of material
every month. So if you did that for the year,
there's your hour special, which is exactly what why most
comedians to are for like two years before they do
a special, and then two years and do a special
because they're working out the new stuff and then they're
refining it over that last year. Maybe they're finding more punchlines, tags, whatever,
(29:34):
and then they're just and the way that the set
goes and building it in the place that makes the
most sense, you know.
Speaker 2 (29:41):
Yeah, so yeah, yeah, I think I think that. Yeah,
that tracks with what I've seen and heard as well. Yeah,
I mean Lui Cyk did it. You know, not the
cleanest comic and not the nicest guy maybe, but that
his method. I mean he did an hour a year
(30:03):
for five or six years.
Speaker 1 (30:05):
Yeah, that's amazing to me. I mean, so crazy and
just and good. And even if you don't like him
as a person, and you don't not his style, that
style comedy doesn't resonate to you. Still a very smart,
very well done, very well written median like he just
definitely has the skills and the choce to be able
to do that.
Speaker 2 (30:25):
Yeah, and you know, there's different. I think a lot
of people now feel like there's too many specials. People
are coming out too quickly with new specials. Yeah, I
feel like there's some truth to that. I think there's
some validity to that problem currently because not everybody special
is really that great. You know, there are a handful
of comics out there that when it comes out, it's
(30:46):
like I got to see that, I feel like it's
going to be really good.
Speaker 1 (30:49):
Yeah, did you have a do you have any secrets
that you use when it comes to creating new material,
when it comes to refining your set, any of those
kind of things you have, like anything that you figured
out that works for you, that's kind of a you thing.
I mean, my.
Speaker 2 (31:06):
Whole thing when I'm trying to work out new material,
and it's a little bit of a cycle, but it's
got to be fun. Oh yeah, it's got to be
something that I find fun. You know. Sometimes I feel like,
in a ten minute set on a low stakes show,
absolutely tell one or two jokes that are just for you,
(31:27):
you know, just just keep it so that you're having fun.
And I found that with new material or with just
material in general, you go through a cycle where it's
fun to tell this joke. You want to see how
it's going to land, what's going to happen, And then
you get this to this point where it's like, I
know this works, and it kind of loses it's fun.
(31:50):
And then you notice that it's not as good and
you're like, wait, why didn't that joke work as well?
And you kind of tell it a few more times
and it's like worse every time. Yeah, but it was
up here now it's down here. What is going on,
and so you put it on the back burner for
a while, right, You're like, I don't know, maybe this
joke isn't as funny as I thought. And then you
come back to it sometime later, and by the time
(32:13):
you come back to it, at least for me, it's like, oh, yeah,
well this work. Can I make this work? I don't know,
And then it's fun again, And I've realized that's my
at least for me, that's my secret is if it's
fun for me to tell, if I'm excited, if I
want to see how the audience is going to react,
Oh man, it's a different show. That's a lot more
(32:34):
fun than just like here's what it is. And that
was the challenge with Drybar and I think any taped special.
These are all jokes that comics have told hundreds, if
not thousands of times. Now. Having it taped gives it
a certain like urgency, you know, a certain uniqueness to
(32:54):
it where it's got to work, and so there is
some pressure there to keep it. But you have to
make the pressure positive. So it's got to be exciting
and not daunting, you know. So that that was my secret.
Try to find a way to be fun, keep it,
keep it fun so that you're having fun. If you're
having fun, the audience will pick up on that, and
(33:16):
they also want to have fun. You know, a lot
of comics look at the audience as an adversary, someone
you're trying to impress, and I don't try to look
at the audience that way. They are there to have fun.
Now at the audition mics, most of those are comics
in the audience, and they at the improv in particular,
(33:39):
if you're picked in halfway through the open mic alloted
time you're picked, have they hate you, it doesn't matter.
They are your adversary, and now you have to ignore
them because you're not performing for them. You're performing for
the booker in the back of the room. So you
got to keep in mind, like, who is my audience?
Am I trying to impress? The comics? Don't care. They're
(34:01):
not going to pay me. These comics are not paying me.
They are not you know, whatever I need the booker
and so you know, and for most clubs, the people
who book you only care about the audience.
Speaker 1 (34:13):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (34:14):
So if you're having fun, the audience is having fun,
the booker is like that was great. Yeah, they don't
care if they flubbed up a joke or if you know,
something crazy, Like the audience had a good time, if
the audience paid their bills, if the audience ordered drinks,
they're happy.
Speaker 1 (34:30):
Yeah, I mean that's exactly right. That's that's the thing
is I think they're having fun. Is such a big
one because I noticed there was a time when I
was on the road where I was like, ah, I'm
not having fun with this and I could feel it,
and I feel like the audience could feel it, and
I was like, what am I doing wrong? And I
think it was I had just been on the road
for too long. It was like during my long month
time where like those last couple of shows, I was
(34:50):
like ough. But then when I knew I was about
to get ready to go home, I was excited to
go home. So I was like, hey, if I get
this when I shoes, I get this show done, I'm
one day closer, you know, So I get this s
and I was excited and you could feel that excitement
and energy. But there was like a week or so,
maybe two weeks where we're doing shows where iister's like,
I don't care.
Speaker 2 (35:12):
Type you know, I mean it is funny because most people,
I don't know how many people listen to this podcast.
You are not comics. But if you're not a comic,
just interested and you're listening, this becomes a job. It
becomes our eight to five. And just like you're bored
at your work, we get bored. If we're doing the
same jokes day in day out to basically the same reaction,
(35:35):
we get bored. And then suddenly the reaction changes and
it's not as fun. It's just work, and you can
get really bogged down in that. So one suggestion I
have used on myself is what's a fun joke I
can throw here in the middle? Shake things up? What's
gonna happen?
Speaker 1 (35:53):
You know? Yeah, that's a good one. That's a good one.
That's the thing is, you got to keep it interesting.
You gotta keep it fun, you gotta keep it exciting,
because the energy you give to a joke is the
energy that the audience takes from that joke. And then
you can really feel what it's supposed to be when
you just deliver the joke down the pipe because you
know it's worked a million times, you kind of don't
really care. The audience can feel that they can feel
(36:15):
that you're like just phoned it in, just like yeah, yeah,
just doing the joke. I know it works, whatever, but
you're gonna get last You're not gonna get the laughs
you want. You know, you're not gonna get the laugh
or the laugh that joke even deserves, which you realize,
you know, and that's that's the worst. When you don't
get the laugh for a joke that you know it deserves.
You're like, oh, well, especially if you really do try
(36:35):
to dial it and do the joke well and it
doesn't get the laughter it deserves, You're like, what is
happening right now? This is terrible? You know.
Speaker 2 (36:42):
So yeah, well, you know, the audience, like they pay,
they want to be there, they want to have fun, yeah,
and so they want to come with you on the journey.
But if they start feeling this isn't for me, then
it's not as fun.
Speaker 1 (36:56):
Yeah, you know, and they get distracted and they're kind
of out, you know.
Speaker 2 (37:01):
Yeah, just like you're out. You're sort of like whatever,
I'm just going to tell you this thing about dolphins,
because I've told everybody else about this thing with dolphins.
Speaker 1 (37:10):
Yeah, no, that's exactly right. I Uh, it was the
thing I should write a joke about kissing kissing stingrays
and like now I have a long distance girlfriend in
the Cayman Islands.
Speaker 2 (37:20):
Yeah, there you go. Yeah, absolutely, yeah. But that's the
best advice I've I've I've found, at least for myself,
is to keep it, keep every set fun, find a
way to make it fun for yourself. And some shows
are just awful, you know, some shows are tough, and
so you've really got to figure out how can I
make it fun for myself because otherwise I'm just wasting time.
(37:43):
And if you're getting paid on those shows, at least
there's that, but a lot of them sometimes there is
no pay. Yeah, you're just you're just doing it because
it might lead to another opportunity.
Speaker 1 (37:53):
And exactly right, exactly you got you got to get
that time and you gotta you gotta put in the work. Yeah, perfect, Well,
thank you, Seth. Where can people find you.
Speaker 2 (38:01):
At Hey find me on my website Seth Lawrencecomedy dot com.
You can also find my drive bar special on Drybarcomedy
dot com or on the app it's called Ready or
Not and then all my socials Seth T. Lawrence very easy.
Speaker 1 (38:16):
Perfect you can find me a JD. Creviston on Instagram.
You can go to the Queen Comedy Podcast anywhere and
then go check out Clean Comedian pro Tips the newsletter
there if you want that. I'm working on some projects
right now, trying to get more stuff dialed in, and
I'm really excited. I go back on the road officially
in August. So July is just prepping stuff and practicing
(38:38):
and writing and getting things done, and go back on
the road in August and it'll just be I think
that one is I think the first one's like southern California,
and then we kind of head out after that to
like Reno, Tahoe, Kentucky, like all over the place after that.
So go check out Zane Lamprey dot com where you
can see where we'll be at if you want to
come out and see me do shows. People have bought
(39:00):
think it's to come see me, not seasane, but see me.
I was very very I was very awesome. I was
very grateful. So I got to keep it up, and
like I said, I have people coming out. The people
that play pickleball with are coming out to see me
do stand up on Tomorrow night on Tuesday Night, so
I'm very excited, very excited. Uh if you if you
didn't see the pictures on my Instagram, I had pictures
(39:21):
of me with older ladies that I play pickleball with,
that are that are the inspiration of a joke that
I tell. So it's very it's very good and I'm
very excited for it. So thank you everybody for listening.
Have a good one. We'll talk to you soon.
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