Here is a typical breakdown that could occur during any comedy show, anytime, anywhere:

Comedian: (tells particularly dirty joke)

Audience: (gasps, groans, boos, etc.)

Comedian:  “I was just trying to find the line.”

Every audience has a “line” where something crosses from funny to rude, or funny to gross.  Every performer has such a line as well, and sometimes those two arbitrary points don’t line up.  This can cause problems.  I’ve been thinking a lot about these invisible markers quite a bit this week with everyone talking about the incident that happened on Red Eye with a number of “pundits” last week.  If you haven’t seen it… this group of television personalities (and I use the word “personality” with more than a hint of sarcasm), mocked Canada’s involvement with the war in Afghanistan, our troops, and basically insulted every Canadian stereotype that you can imagine.

Canadians took offense in a big way.  Facebook groups, online petitions, and boycotts cropped up in only a matter of hours and are all getting some pretty good support.  And yet, this is not the first time that Canada has been made fun of.  South Park wants to “blame Canada” for everything that goes wrong in the US, Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert take frequent shots at us, and even a character on one of my favourite sitcoms two weeks ago asked, “Why do we let them be a country?”

None of those comments were received with such a backlash.  I guess the cast of Red Eye found this country’s “line”.  Granted, the timing of these comments could not have been worse – given the deaths of four brave Canadian soldiers in Afghanistan recently.  (And I can not stress enough my respect for the armed forces, especially the people, some of them my age, that have given their lives for our ideals.) While this may have been a big part of the issue, I think that the idea of “intention” and “attitude” are far more important than timing.

The cast of Red Eye intended to inflict harm.  Their ignorance created an attitude that turned what they perceived as commentary into abuse.

This creates a very interesting question for all stand-up comedians…  Every joke has a victim – a target.  Sometimes it is the performer him/herself, other times it is a person/country/idea that is attacked.  What makes such an attack acceptable?  The intention.  Most comedians that I know have the best of intentions. It is their goal to share a viewpoint with their audiences, or entertain, or educate, or even open minds.  So long as these jokes are not written from a place of ignorance the performer remains on the same side of the line as the audience.

If anything, the infamy of this clip should remind all comedians (and all pundits) that their intention and attitude may be more important than their punchlines.

—————————–

PS:  Happy Birthday, Dad!  (Sorry I couldn’t have a cheerier post on the big day!)

I have an agent that is on record as saying that he wants me to stop performing magic and focus only on comedy.  The truth is, that he has never seen any of my magic shows.  Surprisingly, this is not an uncommon thought/question from people whom I meet.  It has never occured to me that I would ever have to choose.

Both magic and comedy have a seperate draw and enjoyment for me.  The universality of magic and the freedom of comedy (the ability to talk about anything that I choose) both hold great appeal.  Most important is giving each of these performance arts the time that they deserve.  Either style of performing on it’s own constitutes a career to which many have dedicated their lives, so finding the time to work on both is sometimes quite difficult.  After performing and working on comedy for some time I find that my stand-up gets better than my magic, so I switch over to magic and work on it until it gets better than my comedy, and then I repeat the whole procedure.  Fortunately, while working on one I am also improving the other.  They are complimentary in their very nature.

A lot of my competitors call themselves “comedy magicians”, but I am always slightly shocked to find that they only have credits on the magic side of performing.  I think that using that title requires the bearer to have credits in both comedy and magic, and after years of doing both apart and together I confidently use this title and entertain my clients with both performance styles.

So, I am going to avoid choosing either magic or comedy for as long as possible.  Now you don’t have to ask.

Yesterday was the first Tuesday I have missed making a blog post since I started in September of last year.  Could it have something to do with St. Patrick’s Day?  Possibly.  Far more likely it is becuase I have a show to do this evening (show ends at about 10pm) and from there I drive all night to get to a 10am show the next morning in Hinton, AB.  The travel schedule has been stressing me out just a little.

So, I have decided to quite proudly take a week off from blog posts (with the exception of this post that is), and will return next week (hopefully on Tuesday) with something fresh and new.  In the meantime I wanted to share this video of the The Daily Show with Jon Stewart.  It is an interview he conducted with Jim Cramer last week and has been circling around the internet quite a bit.  With the clip people seem to be asking the question, “Why is it that a comedian is the one to so accurately hit the nail on the head and be the voice of reason?”  The truth is, that I have always felt that is the role of comedians… Jon Stewart is doing his job, and doing it VERY well.

Click here to visit The Daily Show website for Canadian viewing. (Damn copyright laws are a pain.) You’ll then have to hunt through the centre column for the three clips of the Jim Cramer interview – but it is well worth it.  Happy Hunting!

—————————

On a much more personal note: one of my best friends in the world has his Mother going in for surgery today (probably already there), and despite my crazy travel schedule both he, his Mom, and his family will be in my thoughts.  Good luck.

In last week’s blog post I made mention of an exciting new television project which I am working on and I can now share all the details… it’s a show that I co-created with my best friend, Steve Nagy, and is called Going My Way.  At it’s heart, it’s a travel show featuring both Steve and myself as we jet-set around the world and show you all the splendor that this planet has to offer.  “But that has been done to death!”  Sure has… that’s why we added a twist…

It is important to know that Steve and I travel VERY differently.  I take a nice plane to the nice hotel and the bill is covered by my clients.  Steve, on the other hand, has been known to travel to China on two weeks notice and camp on the sides of roads.  Going My Way will pick one destination and showcase each style of travel.

That’s just the basic idea.  We’re still working out the final details about what we’ll be doing while on the road.  Maybe it will be a competition between the two of us, or a race to do the most good for the local communities, or… actually – this is where you come in.

Yesterday we completed work on the Going My Way website.  On the site you will learn a little about each of us, read up on how we took this idea from the pitch to very early pre-production stage, watch a video of Steve and I telling some stories, and then be asked to pitch in your own ideas.  It’s difficult for us to sit back and guess at what you will find entertaining on television – so why not ask you directly.  You have the option to become a Virtual Producer for the show and share with us your stories, your ideas, your “notes” – anything that you think would be of value.

So, for all the details check out http://GoingMyWay.ca – read the blog posts, our bios, and watch the video.  Then, if you are so inclined, sign up for a Virtual Producer account and start sharing your stories with us.  We’ll read all the feedback that we get and see what we can incorporate into our final idea.

There are those that have asked if this website launch isn’t a little premature… the show isn’t produced yet after all.  While that is true, we think that, with your support, the show becomes all the more marketable to potential broadcasters.  If we can show them an interest in this idea by their audience, and use our future viewers to help refine the concept to make it all the better, I am confident that Going My Way will eventually be a reality.

I hope you can spend some time in the coming weeks and learn all about the show online:

GoingMyWay.ca

As you may know, this coming June 7 to 13 I will be appearing along side Richard Michelle-Pentelbury in a production of Tuesdays With Morrie by Mitch Albom and Jeffery Hatcher.  We’ve already started the rehearsal process and are both excited for the opportunity.  It’s an amazing script with a lot of value (and from the performance side: very challenging).  I’ll be hanging up my jokes and cards to become an actor for this run!

While we are still a couple of months out from the show (tickets go on sale April 7 – click here for more details) there is now an opportunity for a company or individual to sponsor the production.  In exchange for sponsorship dollars you will be:

• Supporting the ALS Society working to further research into this terrible disease and help families affected by it.
• Given recognition through all the show’s marketing efforts.
• Invited (with complimentary tickets) to the run of the show.
• Provided numerous promotional opportunities both on and offline.

While this is a very limited list of sponsorship benefits, a one-pager on the show with a more extensive list is available:

Tuesdays With Morrie Sponsorship One-Pager

Anyone interested in sponsorship can contact Fracture A Femur Productions via e-mail (great-events@fractureafemur.com) or toll-free phone (877-693-5181) to have a package created just for them.

And, if you just like to come and watch the show, you can do that too… visit this site for more information and sign-up for the Tuesdays With Morrie e-newsletter for updates on ticket sales.

——————–

I’m also VERY excited about next week’s post.  Next Tuesday you will learn all about a television project I am currently spending most of my time on… in fact, I spent most of yesterday working on filming an introduction video for the forthcoming website.