HYDERABAD:
What inspired you to become a comedian and how has been your journey so far?
I was working an IT job and got tired of it. Then it’s the usual stand-up comedian story. Only had a breakup and then started ranting about it. Then they were like, you’re good at ranting. So I just kept going on after that. That’s basically how I started off. The initial challenge was to get funny, I think for the first eight months, I was terrible at it. For a stand-up comedian, I think more than being funny, it’s about being able to take rejection. It is kind of basically the art form where you think of something, you think it’s a joke, you go tell people and they don’t laugh. And you do that on a nightly basis at open mics. So it’s about being able to take that, figuring that out.
But once that was figured out, I think it was a great journey. If you’re searching for a premise to talk about, you have to kind of dig deeper within yourself. So it led to me being able to introspect a lot. So that has kind of enriched my life, having a profession where it’s just about asking questions and trying to figure out a funny way of addressing whatever there is. Apart from that, I’ve started making money in the last year. So that is also good.
What exactly has been your technique to grapple with a situation where a joke doesn’t land well or it doesn’t go as well as you thought?
At that point, there are just two things that you can do. One is to try to salvage on stage. Which I do either way but that can work or not work. But the thing is that you make note of it, that this didn’t work today. So then you go back home, then you sit and think about that. You sit and write, okay, how do I make this better? How do I make this funnier? And then you go back on stage the next day and then you go try that. And in case that doesn’t work, then you have to try it again in a different way the next day. Sometimes what I do is I give up on the bit for a while. And then one month, two months later, that missing piece comes from somewhere and it just sits perfectly. It’s like software engineering only. You keep testing, it doesn’t work. Then you change the code. It’s kind of that process only, I think comics have figured it out much before.
What according to you is a successful comedy routine?
If it makes people laugh, it’s funny. For me, that is a successful comedy routine because as comics, including myself, we have different points to make. That’s based on who we are as people. So for every comic that is going to be different but as long as you make them laugh, then I think that is the success at that point.
Can you share some memorable experiences or one experience that has stayed with you throughout your journey?
There are a lot of them. I’ll give you one good and one bad. I’ll start with a bad one. I think this was at the beginning of my career. There was a show where they were four comics lined up to perform that day. Among all four, there was only one person who did not do well, and that was me. So post the show, all four of us are standing and the audience is leaving and all that stuff. There’s this foreign couple who had come to the show. They were like, okay, good job, good job, good job. And then they met me and they were like, you know, Thomas Alva Edison tried like a thousand times.
You know, he failed a thousand times before inventing the light bulb. So keep trying is what they said. And I was like, dude, you didn’t have to say anything. Like, you didn’t have to bring Thomas Alva Edison into this and that too in front of the other comics. I think that was pretty embarrassing.
The most recent high for me is a special called India Juice. It’s on YouTube right now. It’s a 40-45 minute video. But the actual special is one and a half hours long. That was the first show where I was able to pull in around 9,000 people to the show. Right now I am able to pull much more on a regular basis. That memory does stay with me at this point.
What has been your experience being a part of the industry? Has it become competitive over the years? Do you think jokes on sexuality or politics are important to make one a successful comic?
You can create collectives. You can be like we are this group and we do this. But on stage, you are alone and your audience is yours. You are directly speaking to the audience. It’s a B2C interaction if I have to put it that way. Jokes on sexuality and politics are part of an individual call. The whole point of this is that everything is allowed. There is nothing that you cannot talk about, you know? We all quit our jobs and we chose this because of that freedom, right? I mean everybody has their opinions also after that. Like, there are people who say that, oh, this guy’s comedy is bad, or Why is he doing these jokes? All that keeps going on. But everybody respects the other person’s freedom. And if they don’t, then the market decides in either case. At the end of the day, it’s based on the laugh only.
It’s not a competition. Whenever I see competitions with respect to stand up, like, this guy’s better, that guy’s better. I’m like, dude, we didn’t want this in life. That’s why we came here. Unless there’s someone exactly like me coming, there’s basically no competition. It’s about how you impress, how you write and how much you promote yourself. You can learn, you don’t have to compete.
Can you name a few of your favourite comics?
George Carlin was one of the first people I started watching. Dave Chappelle is also one of the comics I’m very inspired by. Neal Brennan is one comic that I really like. I love the way he tells stories and stuff. Richard Pryor is another comic that I keep following.