Quotes & Jokes about Audience / page 7
The audience was swell. They were so polite they covered their mouths when they yawned.
The odd thing about comedy is that the more personal you are, the larger the audience.
25, 30 years ago, that meant something, they were making some money. And they were doing all sorts of comedy, screaming at the audience, basically crowd control. And then there was the whole urban comedy scene.
I've spent days in cinemas answering questions from the audience, in interviews, travelling abroad, and all they do is thank me nicely.
The last thing I'd learn, well into my career, was how to get on, how to say hello, how to get in with the audience.
I have something called the ‘Who Gives A Shit Test’ that I apply to the things I’m talking about onstage. Like, most of my personal stories, people wouldn’t. Richard Pryor used to tell personal stories, and the audience would be completely rapt, but it’s really rare to be able to do that.
I love talking to the audience, and I must be the luckiest performer in the world. I always land something or somebody that just takes off.
Hopefully the process is to spot things that would be grist for the funny mill. In some respects, the heavier subjects are the ones that are most loaded with opportunity because they have the most - you know, the difference between potential and kinetic energy? - they have the most potential energy, so to delve into that gives you the largest combustion, the most interest. I don't mean for the audience. I mean for us. Everyone here is working too hard to do stuff we don't care about.
Ratings experts say the best way to get people to watch during sweeps is to leave the audience with a question that won’t be answered until the next time the show is on. You know, like "Who shot J.R.?" I like to think I do this every night - the question is, "Is this show still on?"
When you have a great audience, you can just keep going and finding new things.
The shortest feedback loop I can think of is doing improvisation in front of an audience.
I think what I do in my acting world and what I do in my standup world is bring up a brand that I want to bring across. Once you figure out your brand and what you do, it's kind of easy at that. You end up getting your audience.
The first time I got up in front of an audience was terror, abject terror, which continued for another four or five years. There still is, a little bit.
When you're on stage performing stand-up, things only happen one time. I've done bits where I improv a joke, and people are dying. The next show, I try to repeat it, I can't do it. Because with the first audience that was our moment. It can't happen the same way again. We were all there: a certain type of people were at that show and we all got it.