By Matt Wayne
When you’re a stand-up comic, people often ask you, “Have you ever tried out for that Last Comic Standing show?” I would usually just say “no,” and say that “I have never really been a fan because they never end up picking the funniest person.
Then, I realized that it’s easy to sit back and have these opinions without ever really seeing it for yourself. A comic sitting on the couch is a comic accomplishing nothing. So when they announced the locations for auditions for sixth season, I checked it out and still ignored it. However, my fellow comics in Buffalo, NY convinced me that at the very least it would be fun hanging out and seeing what we could do with no expectations in mind.
So Toronto it was. Yuk Yuk’s was the venue. Sure it was Valentine’s Day, but my girlfriend understood the possible opportunity at hand. Well, there was none to be found. I could go a bit further with exposition leading up to things, but my frustration and confusion with the whole experience are telling me to get to the point.
When you watch the show, you see hopeful comics walk onto a stage and try their best 1-2 minutes in front of impatient judges. That’s what I was expecting. You do your thing, and just maybe you get invited back for a showcase later that evening. I would have been fine with that. However, this is not how they are doing things anymore.
The whole thing is a set up. It’s just ridiculous how naively it all made me feel. I knew it was going to be tough for the most part due to other comics with call times, but what happened, two days later I still cannot fathom. The excitement of performing in front of Dave Foley of Kids in the Hall, and possibly getting to showcase was quickly thwarted by a reality show casting call circus.
We stood in the cold for five hours in blistering Toronto to basically get humored by some producer who had more interest in checking his text messages than listening to comedians. First off, doors at nine? Horse hockey, I tell you. Before we could get inside, we had to be encouraged to look “into it” for the cameras while they could get 36 takes of Bill Bellamy riding a horse down the line of comics.
It’s hard to be enthusiastic when you can’t feel your toes. We filled out our paperwork, and they took Polaroids of each of us. We watched each photo develop before our eyes into an expressionless comic wondering what was next, and if in fact we were ever going to make it indoors.
Finally I was next, or I thought I was next. All six of the next comics were next. What was this? All six of us were next? How is that going to work? Is this Last Comic Standing? I started to wonder if this was all for a pyramid scheme. Are the six of us going to walk in and be asked what we know about timeshares? Even worse, they bring us upstairs in front of a doorway, not a stage. It’s a circus in there. I see a girl with a big purple wig, and a gentleman in a wrestling leotard with a mini trampoline walk by. What is happening?
A young guy wearing a headset comes over and tells the me and the others that he will point at us and we tell one of our jokes. We are told this is the audition. We were to go around three times.While we tell our jokes in this ridiculous format, people are moving boxes and bumping into us, and this guy is checking text messages. As I try to reduce the boil of my blood, I spit out the three shortest jokes I have as to avoid being interrupted by this guy’s much more important day. It’s all over in a matter of minutes.
I walked outside of Yuk Yuk’s wondering what the hell just took place. As I waited in the Tim Horton’s across the street, I couldn’t wait to hear what my friends had just gone through. They were not part of my six.
It was all the same for all of us, but for some they were asked to get into the “funny booth.” This being a booth where comics are told that all too familiar “say something funny.” Fortunately I missed out on the booth, which I am sure is for the sole purpose of stock footage of zany comics acting out of control.
Getting a finger pointed at us and delivering one joke at a time was asked of all if us. This doesn’t even showcase a comic’s ability whatsoever. We were told we would get a call by two o’ clock, and not much to our surprise none of us received a call. Where was Dave Foley and Richard Kind? What did we just audition for? Was it even an audition? These questions were getting tossed around.
We stood in the cold for five hours for nothing. They humored us with a producer who seemed to have never even been on stage or written a joke. We served a purpose though. We were the suckers who offered a nice exterior shot for them. “Look at all these comics!”
I don’t regret going to the audition; but it proved without a doubt that this show isn’t really looking for talent. The people in line were not getting in front of anybody, not unless they were wearing a Viking helmet and shooting footballs out their butt. I know people who have auditioned in past seasons, and it was nothing like this. I don’t know what prompted them to change things, but I feel fooled. I was basically cast as an extra in a reality show.
I am sure there are funny people who were shuffled just like I did, and never got the chance after enduring the cold. It goes to show you that there is not just a lack of talent, but also a lack of opportunity.
