Archive → March, 2010
Classic Allan Manalo
Al Manalo, one of the Godfathers of point of view comedy in the Philippines, performs his classic bit on fantasy role playing with his wife on this video. Allan, who started performing the comedy circuit in San Francisco and traveled the road extensively, has contributed greatly to the comedy scene in the Philippines. In my opinion, he is a comedian full of integrity. He lived in Manila for a few years before he returned to San Francisco and until now, his students and fans await his return. I hope you enjoy this classic Al Manalo bit.
Take Out Comedy in Hong Kong
take out comedy
There’s a comedy club in Hong Kong called Take Out Comedy in the Soho district that is run by comedian Jami Gong, who moved from New York to Hong Kong to start out this club. This room is a very intimate room with just a small stage and chairs arranged in a way that people have no choice but to pay attention to the comics. In fact, the place doesn’t even sell drinks or food. It just sells pure comedy. The comedians are of different races and they have English nights and Cantonese nights (and I think even Mandarin but you’ll have to check). The comics range from experienced headliners to newbies just starting out.
The owner and host Jami claims it’s the first comedy club in Asia, but there was actually another club in Manila called The Comfort Room, which opened in 2002 and closed after a couple of years that was actually the first real comedy club in Asia, if you don’t count the gay comedy clubs in Malate and Quezon City. The audience is usually composed of expats from different countries and some local Chinese people. They are very receptive and are hungry for laughs, which is always good for comedians with good material and a bag of chips. Some Filipino comedians that have performed there include Kevin Camia, Tim Tayag, Chris Musni, Noel Gascon and Marlon Olivan. If you’re an experienced comedian passing through town, just contact Jami and ask for a guest set. If you suck and are not that funny yet, then it might be better to just pay the entrance and just watch. Either way, you’ll have fun. Afterwards you can eat and drink in the Soho area.
Tips for Corporate Comedy Gigs
Here’s a useful set of tips for doing corporate gigs in the Philippines written by Filipino American stand up comedian Tim Tayag who is now based in the Philippines and does a lot of corporate gigs.
5 Quick Pointers for Corporate Comedy Gigs
GMA 7 Looking for Comedians
I heard that GMA Channel 7 is holding auditions for a new show that’s kinda like Last Comic Standing. If you’re a stand up comedian of any format and you’re interested, go to GMA7 Annex building 4th floor between 1pm to 5pm tomorrow, March 12, 2010. I was told that they’re looking for any type of comedian, so I don’t know what that really means especially since the word “stand up comedian” is used very loosely in the showbiz industry here. Either way, it won’t hurt to try out. Break a leg.
Beauty Pageants
March is Women’s Month, so in lieu of that let’s talk about something dear to the hearts of Women’s Rights advocates and Feminists: BEAUTY PAGEANTS.
Apart from Women’s Rights advocates and Feminists who view these events as exploitation and objectification of women, most people love watching beauty pageants: little girls who want to grow up to be beauty queens; lesbians looking for potential “converts”; dirty old men scouting for potential “secretaries”; and young, repressed, sexually frustrated perverts like me. It’s always fun and worthwhile watching these displays of feminine charm and sexuality (especially if the DSL is down, you can’t go to xvideos.com and spankwire.com, and you really need to do the-solo-activity-that-shall-not-be-named).
However, boobies, pseudo-nudity, and libido stimulating parts aside, beauty pageants nowadays are getting stale. Maybe it’s about time organizers did something to spice things up. How about making the contestants walk the ramp in their muslim attire? How about requiring candidates to showcase real talent during the talent portion like washing dishes, ironing clothes, and deepthroating vegetables? How about allowing trained female gorillas to join (since they’re more or less as intelligent as most beauty pageant contestants anyway)? Nah. How about making the questions a lot more interesting than the same old shitty questions that are often answerable by “WORLD PEACE.”? Yeah! That’s it! Here are some suggested questions that would induce entertaining answers from the candidates, leading to more fun for the entire family and lower brain cell mortality for the viewers:
- If you had to donate an organ to ensure that you will win this pageant, what would it be? how many?
- Who is your favorite superhero and explain how would he/she solve the global economic crisis?
- Who would you vote for in the coming presidential elections, and how do you think will he/she save the planet from the Decepticons?
- Bakit di na lang hinamon ng basketball ng mga alien sa avatar yung mga human? ilang points ang lamang nila if ever?
- Who is more caring? A caretaker or a caregiver?
- If you were to make your own unique version of the national anthem…can you sing it backwards?
- Kung nakaligo ka na ng walang heater at naglakad ka na dahil walang valet parking, kasinghirap mo na ba si Manny Villar?
- If you were stuck on a desert island…why is there a desert in the middle of the sea?
- If you became the Philippines’ ambassador of goodwill to the world, and had to visit different countries…which one would you illegally immigrate to as a TNT?
- Kung si Jesus nakakalakad sa dagat, at si many villar naliligo sa dagat ng basura…are they more powerful than aquaman?
- If you could have dinner with any historical figure, what would your ulam be?
- If Noynoy Aquino becomes president, will he put Boy Abunda’s face in one of our paper bills? Which one?
- As a peace loving citizen of our country, who is your favorite streetfighter and how would he/she beat up all your competitiors? Demonstrate.
- If you were to lose in this contest, who should win?
Happy Women’s Month! Feminists and Women’s Rights Advocates, no hate comments please! Death threats are perfectly fine though.
Filipino Stand Up Comedians and Black Comedians
Filipino audiences and black audiences are similar in one way, they care more about the performer than they do about the material. The second way is they both love chicken. So if you had a comedy show and served fried chicken or chicken adobo, you’d be making a killing (why haven’t I thought of that – chicken n comedy). So Filipino stand up comics and black stand up comics share the same challenge of winning over their crowd. I’ve performed in black rooms before. Some were nice and a couple were just downright dangerous and intimidating. In fact, in one show, the black host heckled me. In my introduction, she said, “This next comic… I love Jackie Chan…”. So I Karate chopped her boobs and left the stage. Then I heard the next week, somebody got shot right outside of that club. I hope it was that host.
Much like the Apollo crowd, Pinoy audiences will show you love if they really like you and you show them who you really are. If you’re just going to run through your lines like you’re just reading a script, they won’t give you much love. Your material is secondary. You can have really good punch lines, but if you don’t deliver it with that swagger, you won’t be getting the laughs. But if you have average jokes but give it attitude, then they will swallow it up, especially if there are Singaporeans in the house (because in Singapore it is illegal to spit). They like to see your personality and they like you to be animated. Facial expressions, classic funny face, and other tools your comedy coach taught you will work to your advantage. Don’t get me wrong, deadpan also works, but you have to pick your audience. Deadpan delivery mostly works on the younger hipper audience, the same kids who smoke pot and are familiar with Dimitri Martin.
I think this is reflective of the star-driven movie industry. In the Philippines, movie plots are almost unnecessary for a blockbuster. It’s the stars that drive the movie sale and not the brilliant writing. The parallelism exists in the comedy scene. Of course, this doesn’t mean that things won’t change, but for now I think that is the mindset of the people here. So if you’re planning on performing out here, keep those factors in mind. And remember to offer them chicken.
Joke Stealing
One thing I noticed about some of the comedians out here in the Philippines is the unbridled stealing of jokes from other comedians. I’m not singling out just the gay comics because I’ve seen straight comics do a “Filipinized” version of an American comedian’s joke. One guy actually just did a Tagalog translation of Dave Attell’s joke about the one-legged man, and when I called the comic out on it, he said he thought of it. Yeah, sure, you and Dave share the same thoughts – highly unlikely.
Stealing someone else’s joke is plagiarism. It’s disrespect for intellectual property, which is the hardest right to protect in the Philippines. Why do you think there are so many pirated DVDs, fake Rolex watches, and triple A class Louie Vuitton bags? Of course, China and other Asian countries are guilty as well.
One time I watched a gay comic do a bit about being a flight attendant (I know, hacky right). Then, a few months after, I went to another show and another gay comic was doing the exact joke with the same sound track and everything. I just couldn’t believe it. One local comic, whose name I will not mention, actually went up to me and said “that’s the beauty of us comedians, we can borrow each other’s jokes”. I just stabbed her right there and ran out of the bar.
Parallel thinking is one thing but to outright just copy someone else’s material is just wrong. I know I have made some jokes that sounded so much like Dave Attell’s (but who hasn’t?), but when I realized that, I stopped doing them. It’s a hard call because I listen and watch so many comedians that when I write a joke, sometimes I can’t tell if it’s something I thought on my own or was influenced by somebody else. But as much as possible, I try to correct any mistakes I make.
So the solution – be original. If someone has a routine that sounds a lot like yours, you could do three things: 1. confront the dude and tell him that your joke is older, 2. sell your joke to him, or 3. write a better and more unique joke. To me, that’s the challenge. If you have similar material, that means you have not fully explored the possibilities of that topic and you have not milked your talent and skills. That is why it is so important to keep writing punch lines. The more you write, the more you will carve out your unique point of view on things, and that can never be copied.
The Comedy Cartel Tonight at Spicy Fingers
A group called the Comedy Cartel will be performing tonight at Spicy Fingers in Greenbelt 2, Ayala Center, Makati. The show starts at 8:30PM. They perform straight point of view stand up comedy. The entrance is P150 with a free drink. That’s damn cheap if you ask me. Tonight’s line up includes:
- Kel the Magician
- GB “mustache” Labrador
- Eri “cosmo boy” Neeman
- Marlon “virgin” Olivan
- Ryan “he’s so mean” Puno
- Tim “matapobre” Tayag
I hope you can catch them as they are opening up the minds of the youth of the possibilities of comedy in the Philippines. In fact, there is a group from Singapore that’s eyeing them to perform abroad. Catch them before they become OFWs and enslaved by $$$.
Comedy Cartel: the Filipino Comedy Revolution
the core of the comedy cartel
If you haven’t noticed, there’s a revolution happening in the comedy scene and it’s being led by a group called the Comedy Cartel. The group was originally formed a couple of years ago when two Filipino American stand up comics named Tim Tayag and Allan Manalo were judging JackTV’s Lafapalooza and had all these new comic talents but had no direction. So one night, while Al and Tim were hosting a late night radio show for peanuts, they thought of creating an organization that would pool all the powers of these stand up comics – the newbies, the oldies, and the weirdos. And the name they thought of was the Comedy Cartel because they just liked the drug and mafia reference, even though these 2 guys’ only violent experience was when some Middle Eastern men danced with them in a club (actually that was just Al’s experience).
The group expanded and included comedians such as Alex Calleja, Marlon Olivan (consistent runner-up in comedy contests), Red Ollero, Ryan Puno, Noel Gascon (Lafapalooza 2 champion), Ryan Rems, Derf Hebrado, Victor Anastacio (Lafapalooza 1 champion), Richie Fernandez (Cool Center champion), Eri Neeman (MTV VJ), GB Labrador, Chino Liao, Eric Villarama, JB Dela Cruz, Trian Lauang, Marcelle Fabie, and others (sorry if I missed anyone but I think I got pretty much everyone covered). The groups is – as far as I know – the only gang in town that does point of view comedy. In a land dominated by gay comedy bars and insult comedy, Spicy Fingers in Greenbelt 2, Ayala Center, Makati serves as the home nest of these western style comics. In fact, Spicy Fingers has developed quite a reputation for its Monday night comedy that even comedian Jo Koy (who has his own show on Comedy Central) and other comedians from Hong Kong and Canada have dropped by to do guest sets. You can catch the Comedy Cartel every Monday night at around 8pm. You can make reservations by contacting Ecircle Entertainment at +63.2.5339316 or texting +63.922.8596144
Some nights are showcases wherein you will get to watch anywhere from 10 to 15 comedians performing short sets. Some nights are theme nights, wherein you get to see 5 comedians doing longer sets with a headliner. Check with eCircle Entertainment which nights are the ones with more English speaking comedians (in case you don’t understand Tagalog) and which nights are more Tagalog friendly.