Hell Gig

Well I just got back from what comics would refer to as a "Hell Gig". A hell gig is a gig where the cards are stacked against you and you pretty much expect to die on stage a terrible, miserable, lonely death.

So I will outline why this gig could be considered a hell gig.

1. It was a benefit show. This means that I have to do 30 minutes of clean material. When you're a club comic, this isn't so easy because you are used to being able to cuss and talk about sex and other naughty things, you know, really dirty stuff like my underwear. This was a benefit show for the Women's Cancer Initiative. "Women" pretty much means that I can't do sexist jokes either :(

2. It was an afternoon show. The show was not in a night club so you don't get that kind of feel that is needed to get people in a laughing mood. It's hard to do comedy in the middle of the afternoon, especially when your still hung over from the night before ;)

3. There were children there. This means that my already limited arsenol of material just got cut in half because now I can't do any adult humor. Cut to me performing trying to talk to children and be like Bill Cosby doing the "Kids say the funniest things" bit. Unfortunately, this bit failed horribly because the children were shy and didn't want to talk to me. I even made a baby cry, which may have been the highlight for me.

4. It's a cancer benefit. There's nothing better than following a cancer survivor talk about her fight with cancer and how her family deals with cancer. Here she is pouring her soul out and crying and then here I come out, "Hey everyone, who likes to masterbate? Yuka yuka yuka"

5. The audience is eating. I get to compete with people talking amongst their tables and the clanking of silverware. I'm using a podium sound system, so the back half of the room can't even hear me. I hit a punchline and look up to see people in the back posing for pictures with each other. Ouch.

6. Here's the big kicker. This is when I knew it would be a hell gig. Most of the audience speak Spanish as their first language. It's a Spanish benefit! I don't speak Spanish! What a great combination. I get to perform to blank stares from half the room. Originally they wanted Spanish speaking comedians, but they could only find one, and so they had to use me in the end. Therefore, most of the audience can only understand Spanish and limited English. It brought back flashbacks of me trying to talk to the workers at McDonalds in English, lots of blank stares.

So combine all of this and you get the gig I just got back from. Plus, the other comedian showed up after me, and he was suppose to be the opener and go first and warm up the crowd. So I had to perform for 30 minutes to a cold, non-English speaking crowd. Isn't show biz great!

It may have been a hell gig, but I learned alot from it. I learned that latinas look older than they actually are, so always ask their age before trying to pick them up. It's hard to play off talking to a 15 year old. I tried to apologize to her parents and explain to them that I thought she was 16 years old, I wouldn't have talked to a 15 year old, that's just inappropriate. HAHAHAHAHA.

But seriously, the people who did speak English and could hear me and paid attention did enjoy parts of my show, so that's good. The other comedian was a newer comedian and had never performed in Spanish before, so he was really nervous. But he kicked ass and actually got the entire room quiet so they could hear him. I have no idea what he said since I don't speak spanish, but people laughed so I assume he was funny.

The booker was also there and it was the first time I've ever worked for this booker. He was really cool and very supportive and positive. He is the kind of person who sees the glass as half full. This is rare in comedy, so it was great to meet a booker like that. I was expecting a 40 year old bitter white guy and he is this young latin guy, so that was a surprise. He's a good guy and I hope to work for him again, hopefully in front of some English speaking crowds.

So I did 25 minutes and the organizers kind of walked onto stage and told me that I could get off now because nobody was listening. So I walked off with my head down and grabbed a taco and left. (tears coming down) I thought I totally sucked (damn, i sound like a 15 year old white girl now, "totally sucked"), but people came up and said they really enjoyed my set. So that cheered me up. So Hell Gigs are horrible to go through but they are the best for learning from, building stage presence and a thick skin. If you can get through a hell gig successfully then the regular gigs aren't as hard. It's like having sex with an ugly fat chick. If you can get through it, then you'll be a lot better when you have sex with a pretty chick. HAHAHAHAAH

Can you hear me now...oh wait, wrong company

I'm on fire right now. I just shot another national commercial for SPRINT! That's right, Sprint Baby! And I'm a principle. I hit the jack pot there. I shot it this past Saturday. I even had to go to SF for a wardrobe fitting earlier this week for the first time ever. A wardrobe fitting is where I basically tell them I need a bigger size cuz I'm a fat bastard who got carried away at the Desert Bar at the Circus Circus Casino Buffet in Reno the weekend before.

So for those counting, that's 4 commercials in a row that I've gotten. Three national commercials and one industrial, and that's just for this summer. So I'll have some nice change in my pocket for when I move to LA. I'll be able to afford the real women hookers on Sunset, not the fake ones named Jerome.

Yesterday was a great day of shooting. Our call time was at 6:30 AM! So I had to wake up at 4:30 after getting a nice 5 hours of sleep. The shoot was at 3Com Park, which is where the 49ers attempt to play football at. The stadium is easy to get to and I even shot a Pepsi Print Ad there before, so it should be no problem to get there. I, on the other hand, have to make things more difficult so I exit before the right exit in order to look for a place to get some food because I was early. Well that took me on a long voyage into the mountains where I finally found a 7-11. As I tried to make my way back, I got caught up in road construction, detours, and Frogger and barely made it there in time. But I made it.

As I arrived I was directed to the talent trailer. The talent trailer! Finally I have a trailer, as opposed to the Pepsi Print Ad where I was an extra and you sat in your car for comfort. So The talent trailer has 5 individual rooms, one for each principle. Somehow I got stuck with the bitch room. All the other principles had nice rooms with their own bathroom and a couch. I on the other hand got a room with a chair and no bathroom. I think it was a converted make-up room. Great, I get the retarded room when I have to seriously unload the tuna sandwich I had just gobbled down. So I make my way to the bathroom trailer and handle my business hoping nobody walks in and dies. Not having a bathroom may sound like no big deal, but when your an actor, you want exactly if not more, than what the other actors get. I was pissed that I didn't have a bathroom or couch and acted like I was going to call my agent, but I didn't want to look like a diva. Maybe it was because I was the youngest principle that I got stuck with the retarded room, or at least that's what I'm telling myself.

So the first few hours I have to get into my wardrobe which consists of some shorts, a grey undershirt, a yellow t-shirt and a grey/black vest, spiffy I know. Then we had to go get hair and make-up. This was a big production because they had their own wardrobe people, a hair person, AND a make-up person, as opposed to one person who did it all. So that was nice. The crew were all really cool. They also had a breakfast bar for the crew and cast but I didn't want to risk it. After hair and make up, we went to the sound guy who put microphones on us.

Now I want to talk about the extras. I remember being an extra and I HATE being an extra. You feel like a scrub and envy the principles who get all the special treatment. So I made sure everyone saw me walk into my trailer, they didn't have to know it was a bitch room. These extras were different though. They knew that if they got on camera then they would get upgraded to principle. Therefore they crowded the principles and kept trying to stick their heads in front of us. It was very annoying. There were these two old asian ladies who kept crowding behind me trying to get in the shot, which would be impossible because me and the other guy were twice as big as them and covered them completely. I farted on them to try and get some space, but it didn't work, they were dedicated. Something that was funny was during lunch. If you are in the the union, then you got fed the catered meal which consisted of steak, shrimp, vegetable, avocado salad, lemon cake and some other stuff. The non-union extras got a sack lunch. HAHAHAHAHA. I would have felt sorry for them, but oh well, I went through the same thing, you have to work your way up. Plus they kept crowding me during the filming, so it's payback.

So the commercial is a football themed Sprint commercial. The Sprint Guy drives up and starts talking about how Sprint doesn't charge for overages anymore, etc. I should be in the commercial because I'm standing next to the Sprint Guy in the final shot which is suppose to be the funny line. We're standing around the grill and the Sprint guy tells the guy at the grill that he went over is bar b que minutes and the grill guy is holding this really burnt hot dog. We all look at the hot dog and start laughing. HAHAHAHHAHAHAHA, brilliant comedy... (sigh)
Well I'm standing between the Sprint Guy and the grill guy. So I should be in the commercial even if I don't say anything. The Sprint Guy was a pretty cool guy. He gets treated like a god, he had his own trailer and everything. And if I was a god, then that's what I would want, my own trailer. He has a good sense of humor. His real name is Brian, but lets face it, he's the Sprint Guy. I think he should fight the Verizon Guy at some point on pay per view, that would be exciting.

One last note about the director. Her name is Barbara Kopple and she's a big time Documentary filmmaker who has done such films such as "Harlan County, USA", "American Dream", and "Wild Man Blues". It was cool because I studied her in my documentary film class at Stanford. So before I left I went up to her and asked if she did documentaries and she said yes. I told her I studied her in my class and she asked which films. I began to awkwardly mumble while I acted like I was trying to remember the names. Luckily she volunteers the names of her biggest films, American Dream and Harlan County. I said yes, we watched American Dream in class and had to watch Harlan County on our own. Ooops. She says, "Oh you HAD to huh?" I say no, I don't mean it like that, please don't cut me out of the commercial, I love you." Well I don't know if she was pissed seriously or not, but I guess I'll see when the commercial comes out if I get cut out or not. Be on the look out for it.

The Star Wars Battlefront commercial is now playing. I don't know if I got cut out of it or not. I saw it once so far and it was a short commercial that only used clips from the videogame and none of the actors. So hopefully they play the other versions with the actors too so I can get paid.

Sorry this blog is so long, but I want to remember everything that happened for my own memories and I don't want to have to tell the story over and over to everyone who asks about it. I can just say read my blog. Oh, before I forget, the other principles were really cool. We got along really well and played football together and joked around. It made the day a lot easier to get through. One guy I had done a commercial with before for the Oakland A's and another guy named RJ, was a comedian magician who I had performed with before. He's very funny and very big and very bald, a sexy combination I must say.

Overall I had a great time, despite not having my own bathroom and couch...yes it bothers me that much. I have the bladder of a two year old, so it would have been nice.

Viva Las Vegas!

Great News! I'm going to be going to Vegas for free in October. I competed this past week in the Laugh Across America Competition. This competition goes around to 15 different cities nationwide and has four categories: Mainstream Stand Up, Youth, Variety/Parody, and Comedy Club Pick. The Comedy Club Pick is the professional category where the comedy club the auditions are being held at picks comedians to perform. The Variety/Parody is the different kind of comedy where people sing or use props, etc. Youth is for people under the age of 18. And finally there is Mainstream which is the main category for regular comedians. I won the Mainstream Category for San Francisco.

Now some of you hard to please people may be like, "Why didn't you do the Comedy Club Pick?" "You get paid to do comedy, are you scurred of competition?" And to these people I say, stop writing in my blogs and get out of my head, you damn evil voices. I wanted to do the Comedy Club Pick, but in order to do that the Comedy Club that is holding the auditions has to invite you. The auditions were held at Cobbs Comedy Club. I've only performed there once, so the people there don't know me and I don't know them. Therefore when we see each other on the street, we just stare at each other awkwardly.

But it's a good thing I didn't do the Comedy Pick because San Francisco was the only city to not have a Comedy Club Pick advance to the finals. How embarrassing. Even Cleveland had a Comedy Club Pick. Who in the hell does comedy in Cleveland professionally? Maybe Drew Carey returned.

So yeah, I'm stoked. They will pay for my trip and put me up in the Golden Nugget for 5 days, which means 5 days of gambling, which means 5 years of debt to pay off because I just can't say no to Roulette or strippers. I will be competing against the other winners in the Mainstream Category for a whopping $1000.00. So if I win the money, then that means 20 more minutes of gambling, a private lapdance and an extra seafood buffet.

Now to be honest, I don't really care too much about the comedy competition portion. I am excited about being able to perform in the Las Vegas Comedy Festival in front of industry people. Hopefully I perform in front of and impress the right person who can make things happen for me. And hopefully they'll be from the entertainment industry, because I'm tired of being recruited by Las Vegas Pimps. (They make me feel so good about myself, it's hard to tell them no, especially if they pimp slap me.)

So who knows, this Vegas thing could be huge and open new doors for me or it can turn out to be just a free trip to Vegas. Either way, it's a win win situation. If your in Vegas, come and check me out. I'll be the one dry humping Siegfriend and Roy. Actually I guess it'll just be Roy since the other one is in the hospital...or was that Siegfried? Oh well, Viva Las Vegas Baby!