comedian-sarah-silvermanI was looking at a couple of the video teasers on Jordan Brady’s Facebook page for his new documentary I Am Comic. One of the clips was about the impact of the Internet on stand-up comedy, which provided some fantastic spot on commentary by comedian Sarah Silverman. (Update: The video clip was put on YouTube and you can see it below!)

For those of you who may not know of Sarah Silverman, she is a talented comedian from New Hampshire who started her stand-up comedy career in Boston at the ripe old age of 17. She was writing and performing on Saturday Night Live by the age of 22.

In the brief I Am Comic documentary video excerpt I reviewed, Sarah talks about how audience members take it upon themselves to get bootleg video clips at shows and then post them on YouTube, which can be problematic. Why? Probably not the reason you may think…

As Sarah so accurately states in the video clip, stand-up comedy is NOT really delivered “off the top of one’s head” as most audience members believe. New stand-up comedy material is a work in progress which is honed and refined over time through editing and audience testing.

But audience members don’t get that and will video a comedian’s act with their cell phones. Then, they will upload work-in-progress segments of a comedian’s act on YouTube that aren’t fully tightened, causing Internet surfers to wonder why they should go even go and see that comedian, much less buy their comedy DVD or CD.

Most comedians know that trying and testing new stand-up comedy material can be a hit or miss affair. That’s why new bits are purposefully injected between comedy material that has already been proven to generate laughs on a consistent basis.

Sarah Silverman is certainly an “edgy” comedian, but unlike many who attempt to perform” edgy” stand-up comedy material, Sarah is funny and can generate big laughs with her stand-up comedy performances.

Sarah Silverman was not one of the comedians that I was asked to evaluate with my Comedy Evaluator Pro Software for the documentary I Am Comic. But here’s a one minute YouTube video clip of comedian Sarah Silverman in action — her PAR Score is 39-40 in this particular clip (I did the evaluation twice and that’s what I got) which is a comedy star level performance for sure:

Once again I must point out that my Comedy Evaluator Pro software is a tool used to evaluate the actual results a comedian generates with their stand-up material (laughter, cheering or applause). It does NOT do anything with regard to evaluation of the subject matter which the comedian covers in their act.

I should also mention that my software will NOT measure all the “telepathic” laughter many new comedians believe they are getting when they perform. :-)

Needless to say I agree 100% with Sarah’s comments in the I Am Comic teaser video regarding some of the stand-up comedy pitfalls associated with the Internet!

I hope I get to meet Sarah Silverman at the world premiere of the stand-up comedy documentary I Am Comic, which happens at the Slamdance Film Festival on Jan 27, 2009 in Park City, UT.

Cheers,
Steve Roye
The Professor of Funny fro Money

About the Author/Founder of the SCP Blog


Steve Roye is the author of the Killer Stand-up Comedy System and is a globally recognized expert in the field of stand-up comedy material development and presentation strategies -- for entertainers as well as speaking professionals.

Please check out the Featured Articles page for direct links to articles on this blog for pro comedians, comedy entertainers, and speaking professionals.

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