So when show time came, there were about 10-12 people in the crowd. They delayed starting the show and by the time they started, the audience had doubled. Ok, I have performed for much fewer, and they weren't too bad before. Hopefully they came to laugh. Well, it turns out that they didn't. Traci Skene was the MC and did a good job even though the audience wasn't always with her. The audience blew. It just sucked. There were 8 new talent comics including yours truly. I was the last to go, and by the time I got up there, the crowd loosened up just enough to let out a few laughs. The headliner, Brian McKim, had a tough time with the audience as well. After my set, a woman who comes to these shows, tapes the comics and sells them copies of their performance on DVD came up to me and said she loved my act, which on a night like this is well appreciated. She said that when I first got on stage, my head is a bit out of frame, so she will give me a copy for free. Sweet! I have never seen myself perform... on stage. And this was a good show to see, simply for the reason that at one point I completely went blank on stage. Right in the middle of the joke. Right at the punch line... nothing. I couldn't remember any part of the punch line. I thought that it was pretty funny, especially when watching it back. Good times, good times.
From a shitty crowd, to the best one of my career, Saturday night was incredible. The room at Ruffini's was completely packed and the audience was ready to laugh. And they laughed hard. I had to wait after every punch line for the laughter to die down a bit. So that's what a real audience is like. Kind of nice.
The second show of the evening was at The Courtyard Inn. The headliner was Keith Purnell who did a great job at both shows. The crowd at the second gig sure as hell couldn't compete with the first, but they were still pretty good.
Then there was the Sunday night benefit show to help raise money for a woman with a lung disease. All 7 or 8 comics had volunteered their time to be there, and we outnumbered the audience. We had a good time joking around in the back of the room and making fun of audience members while on stage so it wasn't a complete waste of time. Hell we even helped to raise some money for the woman's family... even if it was only $17.
