Stand Up Weekend: Nick Kroll, Sheng Wang & Chelsea Aperetti

Dear People,

This weekend there were three new comic offerings on television (at least on basic cable). Two Comedy Central Presents: Chelsea Aperetti and Sheng Wang, and one full comedy special of Nick Kroll. I have to be honest I taped the Nick Kroll special, but I was pretty drunk on 11pm Friday night for the presents specials. In the future I'll probably learn to use my VCR's timer (DVR is just a fad anyway). You may be asking what does this have to do with the Sean Iacono's journey into stand up? Well as a general rule of thumb watching as much stand up as possible and analyzing it is a good way to understand what works and doesn't. Of course not bearing to my own persona or act, but just a rule of thumb.

I remember Chelsea Aperetti being fairly funny. I've always found it more difficult for female comedians to be as funny as male ones, but she did make me laugh. Of course specific memory is hazy. Sheng Wang I was less impressed. I found his material humorous, but his performance really did not make me laugh.

Nick Kroll: Thank You Very Cool. This was an hour long special on Saturday night. It was not an average special where there was a performance and that was it. Nick Kroll invented several characters and played them out in a story, and even had a few of them on stage. This would of been interesting if it had been funny. It actually was the worst part of the special. I'm not some stand up critic God, but I can tell what's funny and what isn't. And all of his characters: Guido security gaurd, gay fashion designer, Mexican broadcaster, and two very weird old white people almost made me gag from how flat they fell. Which is shame because I really enjoy Kroll's role of Ruxen on The League. As for his stand up, I can't say it was too great. It wasn't terrible, but a lot of his jokes have been done. Such as Michael Jackson material and X restaurant gives me diarrhea. It was decently funny yet unoriginal.

I understand most of these recaps were negative, and for a second article it looks like that I'm getting fairly pretentious fairly fast. However that's not the case. These just were indeed, with the exception of Chelsea Aperetti, poor performances. Now to turn the table's on myself. What hard copy work have I done to be closer to getting on stage? None yet. But I do have a cell phone draft box full of joke ideas that hopefully I will take to paper in the coming days.

Sincerely
Iacono

Journey To Talking To People With A Microphone

Dear People,

My name is Sean Iacono (just go with it). I'm creating this blog to document my experiences in becoming a comic. I have performed stand up before, but gave up quickly. The purpose of this blog is to continually remind me of my goal. That goal is to be doing open mics regularly by the end of my spring semester. This blog will serve as a gateway for: material I've written, documentary like video clips, and discussion about news in the stand up world. As time goes on I'll post more about venues I've scoped out, feedback from others, and hopefully a time line for getting on stage regularly.

Iacono