ain't i funny

Following the links from a piece of mail in my inbox, I came upon a post on Gawker - a trying to be snarky/relevant response to a response to a response to Christopher Hitchens’ article entitled "Why Women Aren't Funny”. First of all, who is Christopher Hitchens, why are people still reading Vanity Fair and why is anyone dignifying his article with any type of response? Who cares how men, in general, supposedly feel about female comics? Personally, I can’t say that it has any affect on me and what I am doing, nor should anyone allow it to affect what they are doing in the business.

I have been performing stand up in one capacity or another for about five years in New York City. It has been a long slow road but I feel that things are beginning to pay off. I have managed to graduate from doing bringers, to getting booked and have even gotten to produce and MC some great shows. I feel I am earning the respect of my peers and treating my material and audiences right. So far, I have gotten out of comedy what I have put into it and I don’t think growing a pair would have gotten me any further. On the contrary, I think it might have hurt my performance as I tried to squeeze by on the fact that most of the audience were like me- this is assuming I was both male and white – and just get up there sans punch line or originality and do what many others are doing namely being white and male and complaining.

What I think actually hurts women starting out in comedy is the fact that female and female friendly audiences are scared away by what can be seen in most clubs on any given night. Why would a woman or anyone who likes women want to pay upwards of $15 (not including the required drink minimum) to sit through an hour and half of “my nonexistent girlfriend is a bitch”, “all women are bitches (because none of them will sleep with me), “I can’t get a bitch”, “can you bitches tell how deep in the closet I am, bitch?” and the ever popular “bitches bitch bitching bitch” from a man who more often than not looks like he habitually sleeps in his clothing?

I once left a show at Caroline’s when the headliner started complaining about how his girlfriend wanted to spend too much time with him AND even have conversations with him. At first it was somewhat funny and then it became clear that he was just another misogynist and that there was probably no girlfriend; he just wanted to complain about women for the few cheap laughs he got. Why would a female comic want to go on stage after that kind of crap? Why should she have to? We should set up a dating service for these guys just so they can get some new premises. If you can’t understand how this creates and uncomfortable situation just replace the word bitch with “nigger’ or “faggot” the word women with African-Americans or homosexuals. It’s a hostile environment, not really what I am looking for when I go to see a comedy show. When I first started doing bringers I had plenty of girlfriends come to shows – ONCE. I got them back when I started doing all female shows. A lot of club owners and bookers assume that female comics won’t bring in a crowd. Maybe a single female comic won’t pack the , because of the phenomenon cited earlier, but a bunch will.

Another obstacle for female comedy fans is the club atmosphere. Remember, women have higher expectations for going out. We tend not to like bathrooms that resemble outhouses and bars that resemble frat houses. I once worked at a club whose women’s facilities were missing both a floor and a toilet seat and you had to share your drink with a water bug. This does not inspire repeat business. If you clean it, they will come. And when they do come they will order mixed drinks and eat if you can offer an option that does not look like it belongs at a street food vendor’s cart (can you hear the sound of the cash register). But, by all means if you don’t want the scratch keep it a boy’s club.

Another interesting aspect of this “women aren’t funny thing” is race. I would love Mr. Hitchen’s to put his views in Essence and see how far that got. I think the majority of the responses would begin with “who”. I have never gotten the feeling from the white male comics that I have worked with that we, black female comics, were not funny. Maybe it’s because they see us as no competition because we are supposedly going for a different audience or maybe we don’t look like all those girls in high school who wouldn’t sleep with them or because they think saying it would be somehow racist. But, I hope this is due to the way black female comics take a no holds barred approach to their audiences and assume coming on stage that there is a commonality- being that we are all human despite how we behave. We believe, no, we know we are funny – just like we know we are cute - and no one else is going to tell us different.