" ...the Communist and I spent the day at Tombstone..."
Tombstone, Tucson and Pure Material, June 5, 2001
Quit pestering me for paragraphs, Reader. I just want to read. GirlComic.net went live with the June issue and here's my piece about my mom. (That's me in the middle). But now I'm all over the Red Secretary, a smart ass Belarussian with a withering opinion of Americans and a taste for the vodka. She's also a contributor to Hissyfit.
I am too spent to write. After a week of pure delite at Laffs in Tucson, the Communist and I spent the day at Tombstone and then Bisbee, Arizona. Our thirsty Big-City souls gulped down super-sized cups of mountain ranges, mesas, cactus and cicadas. Bisbee is an old Western copper town. When the mines closed down, creative types moved in and now it's a world class artist's colony. We wandered in and out of antique shops and galleries. I bought two pairs of cool-ass shoes.
In Tombstone, we ate at the OK Cafe and strolled down wooden sidewalks. The General Store was selling cow skulls for ten dollars and yes I was able to talk Gennady out of buying one. A couple of cowboys in leather dusters were barking on a corner, looking for an audience at the OK Corral's 2 PM show. Back in the day, Doc Holliday's girlfriend ran a bar which she named after herself and it still stands today. Like a Catholic Church's walls decorated with the twelve stations of the cross, Big Nose Kate's Saloon is decorated with panels and stained glass images detailing the evening before the shootout. Doc, Virgil, Morgan and Wyatt each took Communion before the big day.
On Monday of last week, I was bummed because I had an opportunity to have a great set and had just a good one instead. I wish I could have felt, for those seven minutes at this New York club, as confident and relaxed as I was all week at Tucson. Instead I decided that A) Greg Giraldo is a great comic and how can I follow him, B) the management at this club hates me, C) how come I'm doing seven mintes and everyone else is doing ten? A, B and C all manifested themselves into the following slef- defeating mantra, which I chanted to myself during my entire set: "These pants are too tight."
Every audience is yours as soon as you hit the stage. Just because they were someone else's a second ago doesn't mean you can't wrestle them away. My pants were just as tight in Tucson, but I barely even noticed it onstage and when I did, I got a good laugh out of it. I love this club, I told myself, and this club loves me. Hugs were given and I had been missed since last time. It's good to get out of New York.
I like to do crowdwork. It's fun to do a whole show like that. If I can do forty five minutes without telling a joke, that's a victory. Crowdwork is a skill and it counts but some club owners think you're killing time. For me, crowdwork makes the show unique and interesting. If I'm just going to repeat the same jokes over and over again, show after show, why don't I save people the time and trouble and just pass out jokes written on index cards? If I want to be on autopilot, I'll interview for another day job and at least get benefits.
But there are crowds that can't play and of course, career wise, crowdwork is a complete waste of time because you aren't working out new jokes. So I was happy that on the first show Saturday, except for a quick hi to the audience, I did a pure material set, AND it material I liked and it was 47 minutes. For the past year, I've been dropping old jokes as soon as I get new ones to replace them, but "pure material" sets were always coming in at 40.
All right, this hoax has gone on too long. I'm sunburnt, tired and flying to Portland tomorrow. I'm co-headlining at Harvey's and I want to pass the test and get the full bump to headliner.
