Could you be a comedian?
Imagine the mind of Robin Williams, Jim Carey or Sarah Silverman? (Or any of the hundreds of manic, amazing comedians of our time.)
I could never be a comedian, even close to their caliber. However, my mind is capable of understanding and instantly embracing what those folks relate through their stories and monologues.
How can this be? I can know exactly what Louis C.K is saying and how it relates to me and the world and why it’s funny — but I couldn’t possibly recreate his material? How can I know but not produce?
Now, this is not an art craft like painting, dancing or sculpting. Activities that would take me decades to master (if ever). No, all this is is the simple knowing of a thing. The information, available for the taking from the world around us and presented, matter-of-factly, to me, through animated presentation.
Obviously this view is malformed. Although the information that comprises a comedian’s material is right there — in front of me — the mixing, the timing, the delivery the sequence is all much, much more than just the information.
This is what I call comedic impedance mismatch. When you’re done enjoying a comedian’s routine, you’ve not really amassed any new respect for the skill-acquisition of the human race. The information used by the comedian came from everyday life, the news, books and media and movies and songs — stuff we’ve all already experienced. They didn’t learn a new way to be a human and absorb information differently.
But somehow, a comedian can blend these mundane features of our world in such a way that transcends our simplistic views of that same world. They see the world differently.
Painting you can learn. Dancing, visual and material arts can be practiced. But comedy? I’m not sure that that can ever be taught. We can enjoy those comedic moments as recipients of revelatory, recombinant info-bytes. But to create them? I’m not sure that is a learnable skill.
Anonymole - apocryphal agitators 
Perception. Ballet, music, painting to the point of art are innate, and perception based. True artists transcend their skill set. Baryshnikov once said, lifted from elsewhere, that art ahppens when technique becomes invisible. Billy Connolly’s riff on colonoscopy and those people? One of things everyone dreads, no one wants to talk about. Perception and presentation. Mozart by a poser is a waste of time. A visit to the proctologist is the same.
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> True artists transcend their skill set.
Great line.
And no doubt applicable to more than comedy, now that you point it out. That comedic gene though seems to be transcendental all on its own.
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Would be an entertaining show to take decidedly unfunny people and pair them up with hilarious professionals and “train” them to be comedians. Then we have them perform to a panel with viewers having the vote (Idol-style), no? Would certainly test your theory…
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Serendipitously, watched another episode of Comeidans in cars… and there was Steve Harvey and Jerry Seinfeld – and the topic was – can you teach comedy… The consensus? No. And the reasonings were strangely similar to this post.
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Perfect. Plus you got to use “serendipitously” in a sentence, and how often does that happen?? 😉
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One more checkbox filled in. Yeay!
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All oldies like me are natural comedians. All we have to do is quote Monty Python at length. Is this the right room for an argument?
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“It surely isn’t. And I don’t care what the sign on the door says.”
The parrot sketch and the “Woody words” sketch still tickle me.
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I’ve been watching “Comedians in cars getting coffee” on Netflix. Some great moments. Jerry Seinfeld is one of those comics I should have referenced above. Those that seem to live on another plane of existence. Aware of all the same stuff as the rest of us, but able to instantly analyze it in a way that spins a strange but identifiable extra-reality to it.
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Just enjoy it then…
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Oh, I tend to. It’s only rarely that I look at something through kaleidoscope eyes and question the externalities or internal machnications of the event or process. “What’s with all these questions? Just sit back and enjoy.”
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Thought of you when I found this link on my FB page. Create content, get paid through a STRIPE account. (Like Paypal). Let me know if you pursue. All FYI
https://create.mightynetworks.com/authors
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