Week 2-Developing a routine

Before I start writing my material, I think it's important to have a strong entrance. Most comedians start by welcoming their audience and then move straight into one-liners to warm the audience however as I comedian starting out, I think it's important to introduce myself and especially my ego.

-Hello, Hello. I'm kinda new here, so I'd like to introduce myself:
-I'm Danny Lambert and my friends often call me 'just abit rape-y'
-Now, it can't be that bad, I mean statistically 9 out of 10 people enjoy gang rape.
-and I know Dark humour isn't everyone's cup of liquidised dead baby...
-but if you expected me to tea, this performance certainly wont be PG.

-Talking of PG, I like to think me and that Monkey Puppet from the adverts are actually quite similar,
-I mean despite making fat, mentally challenged men tea
-It's actually rare we don't have some greasey 40 year old man's hand up our arse

-I try, I try so hard not to be rape-y! but I think it all started last year with my ex....
-we was trying abit of role-playing for the first time, I was positioned like this, and she wanted me to play my father
-I thought it was abit weird but I went with it
-The bitch wasn't happy when I left her for her six year old sister

-I'm so sad we broke up
-She was so good in bed for a six year old

-and you know it's a bad Valentine's Day when the lamppost at the end of the road gets more cards and flowers than I do.

-I actually got an accidental text Valentine's Day, it read:
-Hi honey, on my way home now, can't wait for a special dinner, Love you loads
-kiss, kiss, kiss, kiss, Kiss.
-Being Valentine's Day I thought I'd have a bit of fun so I text back
-Don't bother, I don't love you, you're a cunt and I've have been shagging your eldest daughter.

-You should have seen my Mum's face when she got home.

-About my sister, she always makes it really obvious when she's on her period

-my Dad's cock always tastes like blood.

I'm really proud of the material I have come up with so far, especially as it is original and I would like to think fresh. Next week I hope to perform it to the class finding out their reaction and criticisms. 

Week 2-Should I use Dark humour?

I'm contemplating using Dark Humour as I know I enjoy it and my friends enjoy it but I'm not sure what the reaction of strangers will be.
Here are some encouraging reactions from strangers on the BBC website in 2011 after the Tsunami :

When I was a pallbearer for my late brother, I joked about the tune to carry in his coffin into the funeral service. The tune I remembered? He Ain't Heavy He's My Brother. It helped to joke about the event as otherwise it would have been a nightmare of a day. The joke helped lighten a desperately sad day for myself and my family.

Paul G. Chapman, Mapperley, Nottingham

I served for 19 years in the UK military. I completly understand the dynamics of sick humour as it predominates in the armed forces and is, in fact, intrisnic to it. Life is complex, short, unpredictable, and really, quite pointless in many ways. Who wouldn't want to laugh about it?

Garry Harriman, Labrador, Canada

I grew up in an occupied country during World War II. I'm convinced that black humour was the one thing that kept most people going.

Renee Deutsch, The Hague, Netherlands

It's the ones who would censor humour that make me more determined to laugh about things like this. I have no intention to hurt anyone, but I'll be dammed if I'm going to be told what I can and can't joke about.

Big Bad Man, UK

These four justify dark humour however many of the other comments oppose this view, nether the less I think I will use dark humour, as well as a 'rape-y' ego, as I enjoy it and will make sure I perform away from Rainham and to strangers.

Source:"http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-12775389"

Week 2-Beliefs

To begin to develop a routine, I need to decide from the start, which sort of path I want to take and so what sort of beliefs and techniques I should focus on.

Here are the main techniques I shall use:

• Swearing- Swearing when performing can be comical when well timed and not over used; when over used, the audience may come to expect it which would take away its comedy aspect.
• The un-expectancy- I shall try to be unexpected however this can only come from trying to be witty in my one-liners and often mixing up the elements of the performance throughout.
• Physicality- I think I do this extremely well and so would like to try and be as physical as possible throughout the performance even if this just means, as Lee Evans does, moving around the stage giving the routine energy.
• Voice- Putting on voices can be very comical and can either be used well timed and occasionally, similar to swearing, or as the focus of the routine, as Andy Kaufman started his comedy career. I think I also do this well and saw it work effectively myself when I performed a comical monologue during Ali's lesson/lecture.
• Splatter- If I find something that the audience absolutely like, then I'll try to improvise around that area until it begins to get old because it is more or less guaranteed a good reaction and may warm the audience towards me more getting a better reaction to all my jokes. 

Here are techniques I'm debating on using:

• Dark humour-I love dark humour however I worry I'll only be able to get laughs from a routine if I'm a big name. It also depends on where I'm able to perform; if I'm performing as part of a gallery evening with my family, friends and their parents there (many of whom I know), I worry the effect it will have after the routine. However it could be very effective and could just be used on the side if I feel the audience will warm to it and so in this sense it could be used as part of the splatter effect.
• Ego- It has become very apparent to me that my friends, especially Drama class, think I'm 'rape-y' and so this could be a good ego to play on, especially if I want to use dark humour.

Week 2-Lee Evans

As the other two comedians have covered so many techniques, I would like to finalise my research with Lee Evans. I expect his style to be fast paced  relatable stories with an element of the splatter effect previously explained.

Immediately I notice, when searching on YouTube, Lee Evans has many clips of various lengths all based on his O2 performance which enforces my belief that Lee Evans uses the splatter effect within his routines. When I watch a few of these they are all fast paced relatable stories but I don't want to analyse just a ten minute video on just one story as, if I do perform in the the style, I want to see the transition between stories and what techniques are used in different circumstances.

Lee's entrance is big, and as he starts telling the jokes, he is also very physical in the way he does them; he moves around the stage alot bringing energy into the performance. I start to see that the way Lee transitions between one story to another is almost as if he's thinking about the subject, then is so enthusiastic about it he has to talk about it and goes off in a tangent. There is also an element of one-liners in the routine. He relates with the audience by using 'we' and 'us' pronouns to engage them into his stories. As well as being physical, his voice often changes which adds too the comedy. Lee also subtly swears in his routine which I wouldn't have noticed before, which too adds to the comedy.

To conclude, I realise that in this analysis I have focused completely on techniques rather than the joke's Lee is telling however this is because Lee's jokes are quite similar to many other comedians, what makes Lee successful, in my eyes, is the way he is able to tell them with so much enthusiasm through using his voice and physicality which is something I would definitely like to bring to my routine.

Week 1- Doc Brown

With the idea of timing, I'd like to look at a different type of comedy; music.
Doc Brown is a stand up comedian who uses his culture in rap to explore comedy.

Music allows many different elements to be added to a Stand up routine. The first is 

un-expectancy; the title 'My Proper Tea' has the phonology of 'My Property', this combined with the rap beginning with Doc inviting a friend into his home creates the idea that the rap could be about crime in his home and so when the idea of this extreme is crushed by an anger about the every day making of tea, it Doc gets a positive reaction.

The second element is of timing and physicality; towards the end of his rap, Doc, in time the the music, finishes stirring his tea, un-expectedly shoots his un-reliable friend, and drinks the tea (all done without props or another actor). This too is comical, I think a part of this is because Doc does it so well.

Another element, in my opinion, is Doc's ego and edge as a rapper similarly as Jeremy Lion has an edge as a child's entertainer. Doc Brown is Ben Baily Smith's stage name; Doc I believe is a reference is Doctor Dre, a successful rapper, which adds to the idea of culture within his ego. Brown may also add to the idea of culture as a reference to the colour of his skin with black culture being the roots of rap. Doc Brown is also the name of a character from 'Back to the Future' who is an old scientist which may represent the more delicate side of Doc which is better shown in his rap 'Slang 101' but shown by the fact that he in 'on the fence' in terms of politics, showing no truly strong beliefs in areas that most rap artists do, and that he is only truly angered by the wrong making of tea, something also associated with an old man.

Finally, Doc Brown's 'My Proper Tea' is funny because it's relatable; we make tea almost every day of our lives, for ourselfs, our friends, for some our parents and everybody likes their tea a different way which is why, to some extent, we can relate to Doc for being raged at his Tea not being made right. Me and my girlfriend laugh because we, like Doc says, put the milk in first and so in that aspect it's relatable to us.

To conclude, unlike Doc Brown I have no true culture elements that I think I could manipulate in a routine, except from possibly in my subject areas, and so music may not be an effective element to add to my routine however he does stress to me the idea that I could develop and exaggerate my ego to create a positive reaction.

Week 1-Frankie Boyle

I'm going to continue my research by analysing a video of Frankie Boyle to try and highlight some of his techniques and beliefs. From past experience I am already aware that one of Frankie's main beliefs is in black humour, a way of finding comedy in something that is serious or sad.

He starts with one liners including actors and locations, he also shows physicality to explain the one liner. He then goes on to add humour to the news referencing to devastating events such as Hiroshima. He focuses on certain groups such as Al Qaeda and then gingers however he often relates back to Scotland.

He talks about the London 2012 Olympics implying competition with Germany after the world wars; this too is a one liner. Already I'm starting to see a pattern of one liners and a type of 'splatter' effect where by the comedian focuses on one subject of his act depending on how many laughs they get, and for Frankie this also depends on his knowledge of it to keep to his theme of black humour and be as offensive as possible.

This pattern continues until, I notice once he has his audience 'warmed up', he brings in more offensive, sexual jokes including themes of incest.I once again see the splatter effect. Surprisingly Frankie doesn't swear as often as I previously thought he did which means he too, as Jeremy Lion, uses swearing, and timing of this, effectively. He continues to focus on groups, this time homosexuals.

In the final part of this video, which I thought would happen more often, Frankie explained events that had happened to him.

In conclusion, Frankie Boyle uses dark humour extremely yet effectively however I believe he is able to do this and get a positive reaction from the audience because of who he is and his reputation and so I wouldn't be able to do so in my routine however I think I would be able to swear effectively and well timed. I think it also helps that Frankie Boyle is Scottish and so has a very distinctive accent, I found this can be used comically on Tuesday when I bled humour in Ali's specific unit lecture by adding a voice into a monologue, as well as this I added swearing at certain points which also got a positive reaction.