COMEDY & The Economy
By Rich Freedman
When it comes to starting the New Year, comics aren’t much different than everyone else suffering economic woes.
Will Durst is one of the most sought-after San Francisco Bay Area stand-ups. And he’s already been stood up.
“I’ve had two gigs for ’09 canceled already, one for family lawyers,” Durst said. “You’d think they’d be doing OK. Some of it is, they don’t have the money. Some of it is, they don’t want to present the perception of partying in a graveyard.”
Despite his experience and credits, Durst feels the pain.“Everybody’s hurting,” he said. “Sometimes, you wonder if the theaters just want to have somebody warm on stage whether the performer draws or not.”
Durst could tell that comedy fans were hurting as much as anyone simply by the reaction to his bits. “At first, when I was doing jokes about the bad economy, people were laughing. Now, two months later, they don’t seem to find the same material so funny,” Durst said.
A South Bay Area comedian, Dan St. Paul, saw the gun barrel pointed at his career last August “that we were heading into a slide. I am normally contacted by then for corporate events in the Fall and very few were coming in. Only repeat clients.”
St. Paul understood. “It’s preposterous for a company to hire entertainment when they’ve just slashed 20 percent of their workforce.”
Holiday events were half of what they were in 2007, St. Paul adds, with paychecks reduced. With stand-up offers evaporating faster than a blind man’s chances in a gun duel, comics grapple with other means of survival.
Durst pushes more periphery assignments such as writing, radio, Internet and TV projects.
“Whatever it takes,” he said. “If I have to become a waiter again, I will. ‘You want lids with these?’”
Durst, a Wisconsin native, refuses to wax nostalgia about starting over. “You can’t go all hypothetical,” he said. “The times might have changed and be more complex, so if I started out now, I would undeniably reflect that. Be forged in a different crucible, but I yam what I am and that’s all that I yam.”
“I have taken on more comedy club work than usual,” St. Paul said. “The days of sitting around and answering the phone are gone. I have to be more proactive. I am showcasing at speakers conferences, creating new corporate comedy vehicles (“Bogus motivational speaker,” he laughs), improving my Web site and so on so that when things pick up, I will be better positioned to compete in the marketplace.”
Comics aren’t in the bobbing rowboat alone. Producers are left scrambling to lure audiences into clubs and theaters. Not that all of them recognize a crisis. Geof Wills books some of the nation’s biggest acts for Live Nation from Larry the Cable Guy to Lisa Lampanelli, Joel McHale, and Cheech and Chong.
“All of these acts did incredibly well and connected with their respective audiences,” Wills said. “I think funny is funny, but given all of this dour economic news, I think audiences are having a better time at shows. A quality comedy show provides a bit of escapism in the best of times and it has always been my theory that comedy is better received when times of tough.”
Yes, adds Wills, there is a slow down for some acts “but it is not across the board. Many comics are doing as well or better than they’ve done in the past. Most noticeably, the economy has effected the shows we book in the way fans purchase tickets. We’re still seeing shows sell out or come close, but people are buying tickets later and later.”
The economy has forced Live Nation to become “more conservative with ticket prices” for some acts, says Wills. Admission for others remain level.
“If anything is different we’re watching the ticket prices a little closer than we’ve done in the past,” Wills said. “Comics, agents, and managers as a whole have been remarkably sensitive to the economy over the last couple of months. Some acts are cutting ticket prices or scaling back venue sizes in anticipation that fans have less discretionary income for the foreseeable future.”
Kathy Cima, general manager of the 200-seat Pepper Belly’s Comedy and Variety Theater about 45 minutes south of Sacramento, said that “the industry, as most of us, have their heads in the sand. When I spoke to our rep recently, I made it clear that our counts are down about 30 percent from last year at this time. He was so interested in all I had to say, and yet a week later, he sent me a contract on a comic for five shows and a $5,000 buyout for expenses,” meaning whatever the amount the comic walks with, “I have already paid $5,000 for him to just show up.”
Despite tough times, “there is no adjusting or negotiation,” Cima laments. “We’ll just go under and they’ll get their money elsewhere.”
Barry Katzman, who has produced weekly shows with his wife, Pat, at Spud’s Pizza in Berkeley for four years, said the gig is “up in the air” in the current state of financial chaos. If it helps, he adds, the $7 cover will be reduced to $5.
Jon Fox, who has produced the San Francisco International Stand-Up Comedy Competition since its inception in 1976 and continues a “Best of the San Francisco Comedy Competition” at various venues, said “our business has not been affected by the downturn in the economy,” though he sees “an increasing number of veteran comics who have fallen on hard times soliciting me for gigs based on their financial needs more than on their career developments.”
At least the fans, Fox says, “really seem to appreciate the chance to get away from their problems and laugh.”
Fox did have advice for any promoters starting out in the business: “Don’t rent. The landlord is just waiting there to increase your expenses if you do well. Work out a way to buy the building in which you’re putting on shows.”
Former stand-up Dave Pokorny has turned to producing three or four major comedy shows a year and realized some time ago he has to insert some other forms of entertainment to entice a worthy audience.
“I have found that I need to offer more than just a comedy show,” he says. “If I am going to get people off their couch, it can’t be just to come hear a couple of smart asses. They can stay home and watch Comedy Central. There needs to be something more. That’s why the concept for the series of shows I produce offers an ‘intimate evening’ with the performers. Why spend money to come out and hear the difference between L.A. and N.Y.?”
Pokorny said he originally retired from comedy clubs not because the audience was getting poorer, “but because they were getting dumber. Theater audiences, however, are willing to let you have a longer leash to do something different. And theater goers are a bit older and tend to have a little more cash even in hard times. So I have found my ‘job’ not easier or harder, but more fulfilling for me personally.”
Lisa Geduldig, producer of the Kung Pao Kosher comedy events (Henny Youngman, Shelly Berman, and David Brenner included on the list), said the struggling economy doesn’t put a dent in her bookings — but it does in ticket sales.
Still, she says, “people always need a laugh and an outlet and that just increases when something critical is happening. When the war started, when people need to have a group therapy experience over the politics of Bush or the economy.”
Geduldig understands that people will eat and pay rent before going out for a comedy show.
“The economy is tough right now and entertainment is the first thing that people cut back on,” she says. “Though someone’s going out. The opera doesn’t look like it’s hurting.”
Rich Freedman is a writer from California.