Giving stand up a go for the second time in May at a charity event I'm organising. It'll basically me and four mates doing our best to make people laugh (with us or at us remains to be seen!)

We're selling tickets to friends and family to raise money for five charities (Cancer Research, Macmillan, East Lancs Hospice, NCPCC and CALM) and it's been remarkably easy to sell tickets as this is something way out of our comfort zones and I think people can't wait to see that!

This has got me thinking of making it a regular event but I'm not sure I'd find willing volunteers as easily as I did this time. I did think I'd struggle this time but trying stand up comedy seems to be on quite a few bucket lists.

So, ahead of a potential second event... would you give it a go?

nice idea and all the best, mate. need big cajones to do stand up. personally i'd leave the stand-up comedy to the horse botherers down't road. maybe just show a video of any of their games?

a friend from school won a free place on this course - she was really good on stage at the end of it. Not sure I would want to do it though.

https://lemon-squeeze.lpages.co/titter-comedy-course/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

No way but interested as to where/what date you are on.

sounds fantastic fretters, very brave, and for a worthy cause, best of luck.

Just read half the posts on here. You'd have everyone laughing.

I don't think I'd take the heckling well... Or the resulting prison sentence!!!

I do it every time I have a stand up wash.

This is something that I have recently thought about doing. I'd like to give it a go if at all possible and it's for a fantastic cause.

Here's one for you to use for which you can thank Les Dawson

I went to the Doctor's today and he told me I had to lose 10 stone of ugly fat.

So I divorced the wife

Fretters wrote:Giving stand up a go for the second time in May at a charity event I'm organising. It'll basically me and four mates doing our best to make people laugh (with us or at us remains to be seen!)

We're selling tickets to friends and family to raise money for five charities (Cancer Research, Macmillan, East Lancs Hospice, NCPCC and CALM) and it's been remarkably easy to sell tickets as this is something way out of our comfort zones and I think people can't wait to see that!

This has got me thinking of making it a regular event but I'm not sure I'd find willing volunteers as easily as I did this time. I did think I'd struggle this time but trying stand up comedy seems to be on quite a few bucket lists.

So, ahead of a potential second event... would you give it a go?

Satanical Mustard (off the old board) went into stand up..... don't know if he's on here but might have some pointers if he/ anyone can get you two in touch. He might even take a slot.

Can't be easy, what with all the snowflakes about these days. Are there any subjects left that can be poked fun at?

Good luck with it, great causes.

Have a friend who looks a bit like peter Kay,and sounds like him...well we northerners do. 'what's all that about'? He gave it a go in a club and died a thousand deaths.hes never recovered!

bobinho wrote:Are there any subjects left that can be poked fun at?

Yes...Any White English Hetrosexually rampant right wing brexit voting meat eating male.

I know a few people who have done it - a couple of them quite successfully. I think it takes more than just balls to do it well, and a lot of that will be experience (and learning from it).

As someone with pretensions to comedy myself (in the written format for me), I'd break it down into two elements (assuming you already have decided on your genre, style, stage persona, etc): The material, and the delivery. The reason I would do this is it allows you to be creatively humorous as freely as possible to begin with. Don't consider style or genre or anything like that in coming up with the raw material. You just want to create a pool of humorous stuff. Once you have this start sorting it out into deliverable content. It's a matter of taking this funny material, and finding a way to give it voice through your persona and style.

Have fun!

bobinho wrote:Can't be easy, what with all the snowflakes about these days. Are there any subjects left that can be poked fun at?

Good luck with it, great causes.

In a stand up comedy event, everything is fair game because nothing is personal, no agendas, no political motive. At least that's how it should be. I don't know if it still is, but Jimmy Carr and Frankie Boyle, whether your taste or not, don't seem to give too much of a **** about touching nerves.

If you fancy a proper go, you'll need to write your own stuff, give the Comedy Balloon a go in Manchester. It's alumni is like a who's who of northern comedy.

https://www.facebook.com/ComedyBalloonMCR/

Best of look wouldn’t fancy that at all.Remember David Baddiel recounting some of his experiences doing love comedy !! Horrendous

duncandisorderly wrote:In a stand up comedy event, everything is fair game because nothing is personal, no agendas, no political motive. At least that's how it should be. I don't know if it still is, but Jimmy Carr and Frankie Boyle, whether your taste or not, don't seem to give too much of a **** about touching nerves.

Anything can be joked about, IF it's funny enough. No hack subjects, just hack gags

Westyd wrote:Best of look wouldn’t fancy that at all.Remember David Baddiel recounting some of his experiences doing love comedy !! Horrendous

Holy ****, I'm glad I missed that!

bobinho wrote:Can't be easy, what with all the snowflakes about these days. Are there any subjects left that can be poked fun at?

Good luck with it, great causes.

I actually didn't mean to like, but to quote. If you can find that line between funny and offensive, you've got yourself a kind of holy grail. Lot's of people ere on either side, but I generally remember only those who made me laugh.

This was on a week or so ago:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09pb7jq" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I used to organise comedy nights in Leeds and booked most of the big names. Some huge talents out there. The amount of hours they have devoted to building their acts must be huge.

I’ve also seen the guy who thinks he is the pub comedian when out with his mates, die a complete death as his mind goes blank in front of 600 people.

Do you have an e mail fretters so I can contact you for more information?

Westyd wrote:Best of look wouldn’t fancy that at all.Remember David Baddiel recounting some of his experiences doing love comedy !! Horrendous

Hope he's improved, I'm going to see him next week!

ZizkovClaret wrote:If you fancy a proper go, you'll need to write your own stuff, give the Comedy Balloon a go in Manchester. It's alumni is like a who's who of northern comedy.

https://www.facebook.com/ComedyBalloonMCR/

I have heard that Satanical Mustard fella was quite good

JohnMac wrote:I have heard that Satanical Mustard fella was quite good

I heard he had terrible stage fright so concentrated on writing

Someone once described me as a budding stand up comedian (a third rate one I assume). Not giving any names away but check out the OP.

I did one stand up gig in the mid 2000s, when I was also in a band. I got asked to do it by a mate for a charity event he was doing, and by and large the crowd were people I knew, or were mates of mates.

I was quite comfortable doing it, and had fun, but other than one occasion when I was working with a promoter I haven't really considered doing it again.

I have seen some properly crap comedians, including one lad who'd apparently won some decent awards but was really just a bad Pub Landlord tribute. He got booed off midset, and almost got lynched because he started threatening women as he was being dragged off.

Anyway, go for it.

Inchysince93 wrote:Do you have an e mail fretters so I can contact you for more information?

marc_fretwell@hotmail.com, looking forward to hearing from you.

Tony, I have you down for a 10 minute slot, I assume that's okay?

Thanks to everyone else for their replies. I'll reply properly when I'm on a computer.

Don't know if I'd have the balls to do it (and if I did it would just be Tim Vine style one-liners I'd stolen off the internet) but I'd happily help your charities through buying of tickets!

Fretters wrote:Tony, I have you down for a 10 minute slot, I assume that's okay?

I'm fine with that However, I would suggest that is around 9 minutes 59 seconds too long.

mkmel wrote:Here's one for you to use for which you can thank Les Dawson

I went to the Doctor's today and he told me I had to lose 10 stone of ugly fat.

So I divorced the wife

Or another of his classics:
I went to the doctor and said 'Can I have some sleeping pills for the mother-in-law?'
'Why/' he asked.
'Because she's woke up'.

Well, it's our charity night tonight and, as the host 'comedian', I'm bricking it to say the least.

For those who showed an interest in coming, we sold all the tickets in no time to friends and family. Had I known the level of interest, I'd have considered a larger venue. Saying that, the football club (Chris Gibson in particular) have been fantastic with us and have let us have the room for free.

Any tips?

Good luck, let us know how you get on.

I’ve completed countless comedy presentations to mass audiences and ‘tickled’ stand-up a bit.

I’m sure you’ll do great and won’t need my advice but a couple of tips I’d recommend. Start off with a strong gag / routine that you know works really well, it’s important to have a good start as it will boost your confidence and the audience as well, believe it or not they might be a bit nervous as well as the audience will want you to do well!

You’ll have your script but if you can improvise and get a bit of audience participation that always goes down well as it engages the punters, gives you confidence and brings out your natural ‘funniness’, go with the flow and love it, it’s incredibly addictive and if you continue you’ll build a structure and approach that gets easier every time.

You might be nervous but you’ll thrive once you are off so really enjoy it. Best of luck!!

I think the best way to experiment is to get a role as an MC at some small show or do. That way you don't HAVE to be funny but if you are you win. I did an unscripted speech at my daughters wedding about 18 months ago (people said I was mad but I just feel a dick reading from a script) and I found I got people laughing. Maybe I just got lucky or it could have been the drugs I put in their drinks.

ClaretTony wrote:I'm fine with that However, I would suggest that is around 9 minutes 59 seconds too long.

So your expecting that the second you walk out people will just start laughing?

harpers_perm wrote:I’ve completed countless comedy presentations to mass audiences and ‘tickled’ stand-up a bit.

I’m sure you’ll do great and won’t need my advice but a couple of tips I’d recommend. Start off with a strong gag / routine that you know works really well, it’s important to have a good start as it will boost your confidence and the audience as well, believe it or not they might be a bit nervous as well as the audience will want you to do well!

You’ll have your script but if you can improvise and get a bit of audience participation that always goes down well as it engages the punters, gives you confidence and brings out your natural ‘funniness’, go with the flow and love it, it’s incredibly addictive and if you continue you’ll build a structure and approach that gets easier every time.

You might be nervous but you’ll thrive once you are off so really enjoy it. Best of luck!!

Only problem I can envisage with starting off with one of your best gags, is if it goes down like a pork pie in a synagogue, it could be a long old night.

Well, it was a blinding success. We raised around £1700 which we'll be splitting between Cancer Research, Macmillan, NSPCC, East Lancs Hospice and CALM. The acts seemed to go down well. Personally, I forgot a couple of bits - it's amazing how your mind can go blank on stage despite knowing your act like the back of your hand - but generally people laughed in most of the right places.

Thanks for all the advice on this thread

well done Fretters, very brave, and a worthy cause.

The headliner for the event HAS TO BE ablueclaret!

I used to be a dancer. My partner and I, tried comedy dancing (like slapstick) It was hardest thing I have ever done. I know its different to what you are doing, but the desired effect is the same. Very best of luck with this, I think you will appreciate just how good the stand up comediens are

Owen Coyle's post match/post sackings press conferences always had me in years of laughter.

Owen Coyle's post match defeats/ sackings press conferences always had me in tears of laughter.