Mic and me: It's a date
There are scarier things you can do than take the stage of a comedy club for the first time and try to make paying customers laugh. I just can't think of any right now.
Open Mic Night. Call it the longest three minutes in show business; an eternity for some, a breeze for the gifted few. All the great ones started this way somewhere. One-liners and stories running through their minds over and over or scribbled on notepads as they nervously await their turn.
Woody Allen said he used to throw up before every stand-up performance in his early days. Steve Martin used balloons and a fake arrow "through" his head to keep his audiences engaged even after he was a stand-up star.
Think of it. Just you, a microphone and perhaps a stool on stage facing a dark room littered with hopeful, skeptical and/or glumly silent strangers in what the late George Carlin called a violent battle. "I killed them," he would say. Or, "Aw man, I died out there tonight."
Thursday night (Jan. 9) it's my turn to go to word war at the Backdoor Comedy club in Richardson, Texas, a North Dallas suburb.
I've performed plenty of stand-up comedy as one presentation choice of my Movie Memories with Larry Ratliff public speaking business. I've taken the stage in Dallas, Austin, San Antonio and, most recently, Haltom City, Texas. But always in the environment I've created, supported with slides and film clips as a safety net of sorts.
Those were private parties, however. Many of my friends and colleagues have asked where they can see me perform in public. Well, here's your chance, everyone. Come on out Thursday night at 8 and have some fun. If you've never been to a comedy club, it's an experience that'll stay with you for some time, I bet.
When you pay your $7 cover charge (There's also a two-drink or food item minimum) just inside the Backdoor Comedy entrance (ironically, the front door) at 940 E. Belt Line Rd. (Richardson, Texas 75081 - 214.328.4444), you are likely to be told, "Remember, this is Open Mic Night. You'll hear the good, the bad and the ugly of comedy."
Once the MC sets the stage, you'll see somewhere between 15 and 20 comic hopefuls give it their all on stage in a succession of rapid-fire three-minute mostly "clean" sets.
Somewhere in that gaggle of serious "goof-offs" will be me.
Me and mic. It's a date.
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