- Every comic has started
with an open mic night,
taking your name out of a hat,
you're that anonymous person
that comes up on stage,
that nobody knows what you did.
It's like, yeah, Tommy Davidson next.
- Joey Canoli?
(audience laughs)
Is that right?
- You don't know anything.
You don't know any of the rules,
you don't know shit about the business,
all you want to do, you
have a clear objective,
you have something you wrote down,
and you want to make these people laugh.
That's all you wanna do.
- I told a girl I work with once
that she had pretty eyes,
and she filed a sexual
harassment complaint against me.
It's not like I went up to her and said,
"You have pretty eyes.
Can I have them?"
- You have to have a knack for it,
because it's so difficult.
- Um--
- And so gut-wrenching and ball-busting,
that if you don't have a knack for it,
it's not a good line of work,
because you know, you
have to suck to get good.
There's no way around it.
- I thought that whole thing up,
so I'm gonna just leave.
(audience laughs)
- With standup, you can't practice.
You have to learn the form
from having been exposed to it.
- I'm killin' it at the open mic.
- [Audience Member] Whoo!
- It's a lot of work, it's a lot.
And if you don't put the work in,
it's just not gonna happen.
There's no short cut.
You have to get on stage a lot.
(upbeat music)
- I crashed my car, it
was totally my fault.
I crashed my car 'cause
I was texting a boy,
which is the most basic white girl move.
I might as well have crashed my car
while I was smelling a candle.
It was so embarrassing.
'Cause you drive so much,
I was driving home from a show.
I don't think people realize
how much standups actually go up,
especially at my level, it
feels like weight lifting.
Just to get stronger, little by little,
and if you take time off from doing that,
that muscle just disappears.
I might spend more time in this vehicle
than I do in my own apartment.
- So how old were you when
you first did standup?
- I was 16.
I wasn't 18 yet, so I couldn't
go up in comedy clubs.
I mostly went up in churches,
for the first two years,
which is very weird.
But I did churches, schools, coffee shops,
things like that.
Very clean, very, I think
I had jokes about prom.
Tonight we are going to the
Hollywood Improv on Melrose,
and then we are going to
the Laugh Factory on Sunset.
Being a woman's fun,
until you want to go
for a walk by yourself,
and then you're like "Dang it,
but I got all these holes".
(audience laughs)
I can't just go strolling,
it's drafty out there.
(audience laughs)
Guys don't have to think about this.
Guys finish up a night out, they're like,
"Well, time to go home."
We finish up a night out, we're like
"Well, hope I make it."
