Making people laugh is not an easy task. Even for people with a great sense of humor, performing in front of a live audience is always a difficult process. In stand-up, the comedian's originality and originality are most valued, and the only judge of the performance is the viewer.
Standup Comedy literally translates from English as "standing humor." That is, a stand-up is a speech in front of an audience by one person in a colloquial genre, the essence of which boils down to entertaining the audience with his stories on all sorts of topics.
Today, stand-up is a dynamically developing style of humorous show, where a comedian performs with a previously prepared text, but does not read it out, but tells it.
Basic concepts from the stand-up genre
- Stand-up club - a stand-up community, a get-together, an association of individual comedians. They organize comedy events in one place or in different places.
- The stand-up scene is a community of stand-up clubs, events, comedians of this genre and, in general, stand-up in a country, a separate region or city. The most famous largest stand-up scenes in the world are New York, Los Angeles, London. Among the Russian-language stand-up scenes, one can single out - Moscow, St. Petersburg, Minsk and Kiev. The popularity of stand-up scenes from Yekaterinburg, Voronezh, Samara (Togliatti), Kazan is also growing in popularity.
- Stand-up comedians are a comedian directly speaking to the public. Most Western comedy professionals (actors, directors, screenwriters, producers) are or have previously done stand-up.
Novice comedians are usually given 4-5 minutes to speak. As skill grows, the stand-up artist increases his time on stage. A solo full-length concert is considered the pinnacle of the comedian's development. Also, concerts of popular comedians or entire stand-up clubs are published on video or audio media, they are called stand-up specials.
The history of stand-up as a genre
The homeland of stand-up is Great Britain. The beginning of this genre can be traced back to the 18th-19th centuries, when the audience was entertained by musicians in the music halls. However, since the middle of the last century, the tradition of musical accompaniment has become obsolete, and a solo performance by a comedian has taken its place.
Television and radio helped promote stand-up as a genre. With viewer awareness, comedians had to constantly write new jokes, revealing new questions and concerns. The fastest and most active genre of stead-up comedy developed in the United States, where it gained great popularity with the viewer. The number of comedy clubs grew, and almost everyone who knew how to speak in public tried to practice stand-up, so this genre became the leading trend in the humor of the twentieth century.
It is in the manner that was laid down in the United States that comedians from all over the world perform to this day. It is known that many Hollywood stars began their careers with stand-up performances in clubs, in particular Eddie Murphy and Robin Williams - representatives of a new generation of stand-up comedians.
In Russia, this humorous genre has appeared quite recently, and the monopoly in the stand-up industry has been at the disposal of the TNT channel for several years. He gave way to life for most of the popular comedians on television today. Programs such as Comedy Club, ComedyWoman, Comedy Battle, Laughter without Rules, Slaughter League were the first stand-up projects.
Later, TNT also successfully launched and is actively developing a project under the simple name StandUp, whose comedians have become known throughout the country and are successfully touring with their performances.
Among the Russian stand-up artists, one can single out Pavel Volya, Ruslan Bely, Ivan Abramov, Nurlan Saburov, Viktor Komarov, Timur Karginov, Yulia Akhmedova, Slava Komisarenko and a number of other comedians.
Features of stand-up performance
This style is characterized by several features, without which stand-up cannot exist as a genre:
- There is one very important rule at the heart of stand-up comedy: there must be one comedian on stage.
- A comedian can do and use anything in his performance. There are no options for how to perform correctly, and there are no restrictions. Everything that can make the viewer laugh is used. Often, stand-ups use tools at hand, such as a whiteboard with a marker, to depict or write something. Amateurs and newcomers to stand-up are abusing on stage with simple antics, but this is not prohibited either. Since the only judge of the performance is the audience, if there is laughter, then the comedian succeeds in comedy.
- Traditionally, stand-up performances are held in small bars or chamber auditoriums. It happened historically, but the tradition is also supported by the fact that most stand-up comedians are novices or not very experienced comedians who find it difficult to interact with a large audience. Only a few of the world-famous stand-up artists can gather large concert halls for their performances.
- In a modern stand-up, the use of profanity in an artist's performance is not prohibited or prohibited. However, when broadcast on radio and television, such places are drowned out by a special sound, so the country's leading comedians practically do not use obscene words in their speeches.
- There are several popular and most frequently used options for presenting a joke. However, any comedian can offer his own individual version. This humor can be based on acting as well as on visual and sound effects.
How a stand-up performance can take place
Open microphone. This format assumes the performance of all comers who pre-registered. Participants are called to the stage one by one, and their time is usually limited to 3-5 minutes. However, if the audience does not react to humor and there is no laughter, the lights on the stage are turned off or music is turned on, which is a signal to change the speaker. This form of organizing a performance is perfect for viewing stand-up beginners who want to test themselves in this business, and for them to gain invaluable experience in public speaking.
Set-list - this option is not for beginners, but it is also more interesting: viewers ask the comedian a topic on which he should improvise right at this moment and it should be funny.
Solo concert. The best jokes of a famous comedian, served in a large amount of time.
One-man show - a comedian on stage is in character and presents a dramatic plot invented by a screenwriter. In the course of the speech, the conflict and the plot are clearly traced.
Spoken word (artistic recitation) - the performance of a comedian with any social or political criticism.
One man show is a cross between a solo performance and a creative meeting with the audience.
