15 random thoughts on standup comedy

It was nice when the act was the act, Luigi vs. comedy, writing advice, WSJ on Theo, and more.

💡 Comedians talk too much now. It was nice when the act was the act. Imagine if Steve Martin in ’78 had to do 60 hours of interviews explaining his "comedic voice". It’d lose all its mojo.

💡 The incessant chatter about Rogan may be the greatest example of people having extremely strong opinions about something they don’t actually consume since me seeing one ep of Game of Thrones and deciding my life now includes a “no dragons” policy.

💡 One of my fave things in standup is when the comic says something about their life ("I'm engaged" etc.) and the audience applauds and then the comedian chastises them for it and tells them they're wrong. "Um, we were just tryna be polite." "Oh yeah? Well, you're fools! FOOLS!"

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🃏 My new standup special “Bolo” is available to stream now for only $4. Don’t wanna pay? It’ll be coming to YouTube/MattRuby on January 9, 2025 at 7pm EST (sign up to get notified here). Here’s the 🆕 trailer:

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💡 Totally underrated screenplay writing advice: Write stuff you can actually shoot. Like, I'm sure your 27 diff location montage is killer and all, but it ain't ever gonna happen.

💡 This (in blue) explains a lot of the comedians who go viral too:

💡 Has anyone stopped to consider what will happen to an artform monetized largely by selling drinks as alcohol use drops precipitously in society? Just sayin’…

💡 Big Tech platforms can make or break performer careers now. Yet they make up arbitrary rules on the fly and ban people based on whether a robot's hunch is they're saying/doing something offensive. Sucks. It's like if they made the entire police department out of those robot dogs.

💡 The Wall Street Journal wrote about Theo Von and it’s giving a real "Jared Diamond studies a remote tribe in Papa New Guinea" vibe.

💡 The toughest decision as a standup is what to do when you have a heckler: Do you destroy or eviscerate him?