Why Standup

I’ve always been fascinated with standup comedy. It’s always seemed so amazing to me, that someone could get on stage and talk to a random group of people for an hour. One of my oldest family friends, Danny, used to be a standup comedian. He was never very good. He only did low paying gigs (rarely), and open mics, but he was the funniest man I knew by far. He always said that standup was more impressive than sketch comedy, because all you have to rely on are the words you’ve written (or in Bo Burnhams case, the songs). I think that maybe I also don’t really understand standup. I don’t think I could do it. In this project, I’ve been trying to analyze everything that Louis CK does to be funny, but that’s not how it works for people like him. He just feels it. It just makes sense in his mind. Maybe that’s something you need if you want to be successful. Maybe Louis has that gut feeling the most, and then everyone else kind of just watches on. Most people’s jokes are probably just a rehashing of a joke they’ve heard before. The amount of jokes I’ve heard comedians tell about being fat, for instance, is astronomical. There are only so many jokes that can be made about being overweight, and then, like it or not, you’re going to start repeating other people’s. Is it a comedians fault if he subconsciously steals someone else’s joke? They all listen to each other, it must happen all the time. Maybe that’s another reason Louis is so successful. No one else ever talks about Huckleberry Finn, or being afraid of bats, or any number of the random things that Louis comes up with. Maybe people are partially drawn to him subconsciously, because we like the thought that someone came up with something new. Do jokes ever become public domain? What happens when Louis dies? Can someone else talk about not giving up their seat to a soldier on a plane? Or are jokes more personal than songs? Or less recognizable? Maybe the fact that because not everyone can pin a joke to a specific comedian is why they can’t be reused in good conscious.