The curse that killed the comic

The process of writing and performing comedy can require extended periods of time in solitude. Whilst there are joke writing teams and comedy troops and double acts and countless other alternatives, the starting point of inception exists only in one mind.

Good comedy relies on a level of authenticity. The audience must believe that the emotions expressed on stage are true, even if the facts of the story are not. It is telling a lie in order to tell the truth. Three men from different nations might not have walked into the pub last Thursday after all.

I recently watched the film stan and Ollie, which I highly recommend, and although the characters are portrayed as very much inseparable, the film depicts in moments this fundamental idea, where Stan Laurel writes alone, and then shares his glorious new ideas witch his great friend.

There is a strange duality to writing comedy, where it is hoped thousands will chuckle and titter, but the environment in which the joke is born is still and silent.

There are many other art forms in which the creative process requires a person to act individually. A painter might do their best work in the serenity of their own visage, or more recently, video games are now developed not by teams, but by individuals.

Comedy though, interacts with its audience through the medium of the artist, not just the art, and in this, the silent creator is cast as the star. This is an almighty shift in both skillset and mindset, and it all hinges on one single individual.

The comedian can enjoy the success of a gig well done and soak up the adulation of the crowd, but there exists a problem. The person on stage wasn’t the person who wrote the jokes, and certainly isn’t the person who is going lie in bed wondering what it all meant.

I think this feed into the manic-depressive cycle that so many of the greatest comedians suffer. The high, and mania of being on stage, and the realisation that you haven’t really connected with others in a way that speaks of a greater truth of yourself.

Despite comedy’s reliance on sincerity in the message, it forgets that the messenger exists beyond the performance. Even though it makes perfect sense that Mads Mikkelsen doesn’t actually eat people, it takes a rational, cognitive moment to clarify that thought, as on first inspection… that’s the dude that eats people!

It is much easier to disassociate an actor from his role than it is a comedian from theirs. And this, I think, is the curse of comedy. That we as an audience believe we know the person we have just seen, but the comedian feels as though he has not been seen at all.