Rules and Guidelines for Performing

Thanks, Rules, and Guidelines 

First, I’d like to thank the Experimental College for this opportunity to “experiment” with stand-up comedy at an academic level. I’ve always been a fan of stand-up and it has been a dream of mine to prepare and teach a course that looks at it critically.

Thanks to Beky Stiles, program assistant for the Ex College, who made all of the arrangements for this evening’s performance. This would not have happened if not for Beky’s help!

Why we’re here

Simple premise: What would happen if we took stand-up seriously? What would happen if we treated stand-up like, say, Shakespeare? Furthermore, since stand-up is a spoken performance—a kind of public speaking—what would happen if we thought about stand-up as rhetoric—stand-up comedians at persuasive orators?

So this class has spent all semester analyzing stand-up comedy in terms of rhetorical and cultural theory. We have tried valiantly to answer these questions. We’ve also talked about the “big” issues that stand-up often mines for material—race, gender, class, sexuality, language and idiom, cultural and biological quirks.

And while we never really came up with any solid answers—such is the life of the mind—we did come to understand that the one thing that always matters, always comes in to play, is the relationship between comedian and audience. There’s me. Here on the stage. And there’s you in the audience.

So what better way to understand stand-up than to do it. That’s why we’re here tonight. We are here to see what happens when the critics become the performers—and everyone who performs tonight will reflect on this experience and write about it (the critic becomes the performer becomes the meta-critic).

Guidelines and Ground Rules

1. Everyone who performs this evening will be graded, yes, but not on the amount of laughter he or she receives from the audience.
2. Each performer has been tasked to perform a three to five minute set.
3. Some of the work has been work-shopped, but for the most part, what happens here tonight is fresh, new, and as such, tentative and questionable. I don’t know what will be said, how it will be said, and how well it will go over. So…
4. Feel free to laugh out of charity and pity. But please don’t heckle (too aggressively).
5. While this event is “sponsored” by the Experimental College and me, the instructor, neither the Ex College nor I are fully responsible for what is said. This is my warning: My hope is that the careful, critical work our class has done this semester has resulted in progressive, vibrant, and informed social commentary. My fear is that masturbation and fart jokes are just too funny for us transcend.
6. Like the disclaimers at the beginnings of DVD commentaries, the views expressed here tonight are those of the authors themselves and do not represent the beliefs of this instructor or the Ex College. We are not liable for any offense incurred.
7. Having said that, let me warn you that this will not be a G-rated show. Bambi will not only get shot but eaten. And while I would love for no one to be offended, while I would love for any polemic comedy presented here tonight to serve as a springboard into excited and informed discussion about social convention and dominant ideology, the best I can hope and ask for is that you will understand that this is, first and foremost, an experiment—and as such, any offense should be taken in the spirit of the experiment. What does not kill us makes us stronger. And identifying offense is the first step to dismantling it.
8. In the spirit of engaged intellectual community, please have fun and don't hurt anyone.