- I'd like to represent Max Hertan.
(audience cheers)
- How we doing? Woo.
This month, my challenge is to do stand up comedy.
And this is me, right at the end of the month.
So this month, I'm starting with no jokes,
no material, no experience on stage,
but by the end of the month, I'm hoping
to be able to perform stand up comedy confidently.
And I'm even gonna enter a comedy competition
called Raw Comedy to see how I go with my newfound jokes.
I'm very nervous for this challenge,
so let's dive into my story of me
learning stand up comedy in one month.
So to start things off,
I wanted to come up with a few ideas for jokes,
and then catch up with some comedians to test those ideas.
So, I ended up catching up with a comedian,
called Josh Glanc, who's a great comedian,
and won an award for best show at Fringe Festival,
to test some of my joke ideas to him.
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All right, let's get in to it.
(light music)
Nice to meet you!
- Nice to meet you!
- [Mark] So after introducing myself and hearing his story,
I started telling him some of my jokes.
And I don't think he was a big fan of my early jokes.
- So what's the gag bit?
The way you're saying it now, does it seem
as funny as when you first thought about it?
- No.
And eventually, he asked a very important question.
And it was a question that I wanted to answer
myself this month.
- Do you think you're funny?
- Growing up, people were like,
"you should do stand up "comedy", I was the funny kid.
So it was good to get some really brutal and honest
feedback, and to really drill down to the question on
what is actually funny about this joke?
So I took that advice, and I wrote down a bunch of ideas.
Then I started telling them to some friends,
and I got them to take some notes,
and then we brainstormed some ideas about,
is that a funny idea,
and how we can turn that into a little bit.
And that was really useful,
and it led me to booking my first little set
for my first gig.
So, I'm on my way to my first comedy open mic night.
It's safe to say that I'm pretty freaking nervous.
I think I've got about two good jokes.
So, I think if I get at least a couple laughs,
I'll consider that a win.
Performing stand up comedy today.
Oh boy, oh boy, oh boy.
- [Announcer] Our next act, can we start the party now?
(applause)
- Hey guys, how we doing?
(audience laughs)
So I just did my first ever open mic comedy gig.
I tried to have just some fun up on stage.
I definitely was a bit nervous,
I definitely spoke a bit fast,
I've definitely got a lot of things to improve.
But, it was pretty good.
I had my very supportive girlfriend come join me,
what'd you think of the show?
- It was hilarious.
- You heard it from my toughest critic.
That's my toughest critic, I've never made her laugh before.
So if she found it funny, then maybe I've got something.
Let's stick it out, and see how I go.
Joke, joke, joke.
(laughs)
- I got into comedy about three and a half years ago.
- [Mark] So I was back at it, and me working on my set.
And I was lucky enough to meet with a hilarious
comedian called Michael Shafer,
who has an award-winning show, and if you haven't seen him,
I highly recommend you check him out.
We had a lot of fun together riffing our
different jokes and ideas.
This one joke I had, was how a year ago,
Uber was really exciting, and I was just so stoked
to be there, and then a year later,
I'm so disappointed by everything,
and I get into my Uber, and I just want my minty.
And so this is our riffing on that joke
This ones for me?
Nah, I can't take this.
- Please, no.
This is an 80-cent Uber ride,
this is a $2 Uber ride, you are losing money on this.
I need to get to the 7-11 now.
All right, thanks for the water mate,
where the (expletive) is my minty?
- Yeah, that's funny.
So tonight is going to be my second gig,
and I'm nervous, as always,
but I'm excited to try out some new material.
- [Announcer] Please put your hands together,
a very warm welcome for Maxwell Hertan!
- Hey guys, how's it going?
I remember when I was single, dating can be pretty tough.
I went on this date, well, it was a date,
but it turns out it was a pyramid scheme.
(audience laughter)
I really should have got the hint when I was like,
"What do you like to do for fun?"
And she's like, "Tax-deductible income streams."
So after an okay second performance,
then I got to catch up with a hilarious comedian called
Aidan 'Taco' Jones who had some pearls of wisdom for me.
- Your first gig was very, like, it was good.
I really want you to bomb in Raw.
I really want it to be the opposite.
Normally sometime in your first ten, you bomb.
When you become a comedian isn't when you do your first set
but it's when you bomb for the first time.
And you know what that feels like,
because that is like an intrinsic part of doing comedy.
- I am on my way to perform for my third time,
stand up comedy, which is exciting,
it's nerve-wracking, it's just everything.
One thing that is really consistent is a boat.
Why is it when you're on a boat and you see someone
on a boat you're just so excited you start waving?
It's like the same, "We're usually on land!"
And the other person's like, "I know we're usually on land!"
I think part of the reason is because
when you're on a boat you don't have to ever stop and chat.
So I just finished my third gig for stand up comedy,
and holy moly, it went bad.
People find it tough to do stand up,
but I think it's good to go through this process
and get no laughs,
and still be kind of happy and excited to do the next gig.
So something crazy about comedy is,
a joke works one night, and then the next night it bombs,
and leaves you really confused thinking,
"Was that joke funny, or am I even funny?
What's going on here?"
I've had a lot of challenges within my monthly challenges,
I've had to do a back flip, which was really scary for me,
or drop into a ball on a skateboard,
but there's something different about
just going up and telling jokes and just hearing silence.
It's just a weird feeling.
But I know that this is my challenge,
so I need to get out there.
So I wanted to show you the process of
how an idea comes into a fully-fledged joke.
And so I wanted to just pick out one of my jokes.
So this one is the boat joke.
And I want to show you,
from when I first started performing it to my friends,
to when I started performing it to comedians,
and then brainstorming different ideas to them,
to finally performing it on stage and getting a good laugh.
And so you can see that journey.
Someone else on a boat,
they just start really excitingly waving to you,
and it's like they're saying, "We're usually on land."
And you're like, "Oh my God, we're usually on land."
And there's this excitement because you're not on land.
- So there is something funny about that.
As soon as you said that, I smiled and it resonated with me.
I don't think, again, the punch is not,
"We're usually on land."
The first thing I think of is,
"Why are we waving at each other?"
- For me, as I riff on that bit, it's like,
you walk past someone on land, in a car, nothing.
On a boat, you're like, "We're usually on land!"
And the other person's like,
"I know! We're usually on land!"
- Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's good.
You could even add a joke and be like,
"I can't afford a boat,
so I make up for it by just
waving to people as they pass down the street."
You could act out, "Hey John!"
You're on a boat, you don't have to engage in conversation,
you'll never see this person again in your life.
But if you pass them on the street, it's like,
it holds true.
- They're like, yes, and you're like ooh...
- I do not think that.
- And then you're just trying to glide off, you know.
- Why is it when there's people in a boat,
and they see another person on a boat,
they're so excited they just start waving?
It's like they're saying, "We're usually on land!"
And the other person's like, "I know!
We're usually on land!"
(audience laughter)
I think part of the reason you wave on a boat is because
you don't actually have to stop and chat to that person.
(audience laughter)
I want to replicate that experience of being on a boat
but I can't afford it,
so sometimes I'll just be on the street and start waving,
and they'll be like, "Hello?"
And I'll be like, "I don't know what to do now.
I'm usually on a boat."
So now I'm back to the challenge.
I go to catch up with another great comedian,
a guy called Ashley Fils-Aime,
who gave me some amazing advice
in the lead-up to my final show.
- I see where they're laughing,
and after I get a good idea or a good feel
of where they're laughing,
I'll cut out all the unnecessary parts.
Once you do that with a joke,
you can actually (expletive) with it more,
you know what I'm saying?
You can say more things, or you could not say anything.
You can actually write on stage because
you're so comfortable because you know they're gonna laugh,
but it's a process.
- I am on my way to my fifth performance now for the month,
I'm more or less performing the same jokes,
but I've got two things to focus on today,
which is to speak slowly
and actually pause a little bit when I'm on stage,
and oversell the jokes, really feel the joke and sell it.
So that's my goal tonight, let's see how I go.
Technology's moving pretty fast,
I saw this ad on TV for a Daikin air conditioner
where a husband walks into the room and the wife is like,
"Thanks for the coffee, hun."
The husband's like, "I didn't make you a coffee."
And then they stare at the air conditioner
like it's so smart it could make you coffee.
And I thought,
"Okay, these ads are promising a lot out of technology."
What are we going to see next?
A guy walks into a room and he's like,
"Who vacuumed my house? Toaster oven, is that you?"
(audience laughter)
Who paid off my mortgage? Washing machine!
(audience laughter)
How did I get custody back of the children? Toothbrush?
(audience laughter)
So after performing six times this month,
it all came down to my Raw Comedy performance
which was my comedy competition.
As soon as I entered I got some bad news,
and unfortunately, I wasn't allowed to film my set.
Hey guys, so I just finished my last gig,
my seventh gig for the month, and it went okay.
It wasn't my best gig, it wasn't my worst gig.
I think that I didn't perform the jokes
as well as I might have in some of the other gigs,
and I think the room was a little bit flat at the time,
but I'm still happy with the journey
that I've taken this month.
I didn't make it through to the next round
of my comedy competition,
but I'm trying to be cool with that
and I'm happy with my performance.
Really excited to move on to my next month's,
which is doing cinematography,
so that's all about filmmaking
and thinking about how to make beautiful films,
and hopefully you'll see that in the next video,
so it should be really interesting.
I'm going to be travelling to the heart of film
for that video,
so that should be interesting and fun for that.
So, thanks for watching,
leave a comment if you enjoyed the video.
And as always, happy learning!