A problem with stand up

[MuteBanana]

If this gets moved to General I'll understand.

My problem is for about the past 10 years I've been unable to enjoy stand up and I don't know why. The whole idea of watching it now just bores me. I'm just unimpressed by any suggestion. I also used to watch stand up on TV and anything with that on puts me off. In fact, even comedy panel shows which I used to enjoy now fill me with cringe and dread.

Has anyone else completely gone off one form of comedy?

[Icehaven]

Weirdly I've had exactly the same thing happen to me. Admittedly it was never my absolute favourite form of comedy*, but I certainly liked it enough to go and see it live and buy a good number of DVDs etc. I bamlem my internet-ruined attention span. ''Sit and watch one person on a bare stage talking for upwards of an hour? You must be joking!!''



* Which ironically is probably sketch shows, which I'd still consume voraciously if only there were any to consume.

[Small Man Big Horse]

I love it to pieces, and it's my favourite thing to watch in general. Which doesn't help, I know. Could it be the type of stand up you're watching by any chance? As there's obviously a lot of crap out there but the good stuff is amazing imho.

[DrGreggles]

The best stand up certainly 'stands up' to repeated viewing.
This year alone I'll have watched Stewart Lee, Greg Davies and James Acaster multiple times.
Like music, the best stuff is timeless.

[Twit 2]

The best stand up certainly 'stands up' to repeated viewing.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

[thenoise]

I started avoiding panel shows a couple of years ago, just overwhelmed with a lot of mediocre ones and even the ones I used to love (QI and Would I Lie To You, and several radio ones) just weren't doing it for me any more.
There's a lot of stand up about at the moment, nothing wrong with giving it a break, maybe catch up with the best ones once it's a bit less oppressively ubiquitous.

[Ronalado]

for sure this is serious. start of motor neurone diseuse? IS POSSIBLE

[Twit 2]

[tag]Ronaldo visits the doctors[/tag]

[Small Man Big Horse]

I started avoiding panel shows a couple of years ago, just overwhelmed with a lot of mediocre ones and even the ones I used to love (QI and Would I Lie To You, and several radio ones) just weren't doing it for me any more.
There's a lot of stand up about at the moment, nothing wrong with giving it a break, maybe catch up with the best ones once it's a bit less oppressively ubiquitous.

I'm the same with panel shows, I still watch Would I Lie To You but it's becoming weaker and weaker, and it pissed me off this week when they claimed Lee Mack's story about getting an invite to the royal wedding was true, before then coming clean and saying it was a lie, I gasped initially at the reveal (as the build up had been entertaining) but then felt cheated by the truth.

[Sin Agog]

If this gets moved to General I'll understand.

My problem is for about the past 10 years I've been unable to enjoy stand up and I don't know why. The whole idea of watching it now just bores me. I'm just unimpressed by any suggestion. I also used to watch stand up on TV and anything with that on puts me off. In fact, even comedy panel shows which I used to enjoy now fill me with cringe and dread.

Has anyone else completely gone off one form of comedy?

I sort of get it.  It's the formal, crafted nature of it that can be a turn-off. That also applies to a lot of  sitcoms. I'm not sure how and when comedy became more conversational, it could be podcasts or the more improvisational mockumentary style that took over, but it sometimes makes stand-up sets seem more distant and removed, like a play, than they were before.  Conversation can elevate the most pat lines into the stratosphere, and it's hard to go back into a beat-by-beat, possibly even written version of that and laugh quite so hard.

[notjosh]

If this gets moved to General I'll understand.

My problem is for about the past 10 years I've been unable to enjoy stand up and I don't know why. The whole idea of watching it now just bores me. I'm just unimpressed by any suggestion. I also used to watch stand up on TV and anything with that on puts me off. In fact, even comedy panel shows which I used to enjoy now fill me with cringe and dread.

Has anyone else completely gone off one form of comedy?

I still love stand up at it's best, but I've started to get a sort of existential dread whenever I watch mediocre MCs doing crowd work. There's only so many times you can watch a 35-year-old man desperately fumbling to conjure up the appropriate national stereotype to rib a tourist on the front row, or hear that someone is a teacher or train driver and light up with glee as the 10 most obvious jokes immediately occur to them, or simply tell an out-of-towner that the city they're from is a shit-hole (to great applause!) - before you start to wonder: What are we doing here? Is this really the best way to spend our time as a species as we hurtle towards death?

The same goes for your Nish Kumars of this world making smug "Tories are bastards" jokes into a liberal echo chamber as if it's going to change a single person's opinion. What is point?

My advice to you would be to fuck off comedy clubs and panel shows altogether, sit in a dark room or candle-lit bath with a nice big cup of cocoa, and put on some lovely comfy classic records. Woody Allen, Steve Martin, Nichols & May, Bill Cosby, Rodney Dangerfield, Mitch Hedberg, Mike Birbiglia, Daniel Kitson etc etc. Can't fail to delight.

[Small Man Big Horse]

I still love stand up at it's best, but I've started to get a sort of existential dread whenever I watch mediocre MCs doing crowd work. There's only so many times you can watch a 35-year-old man desperately fumbling to conjure up the appropriate national stereotype to rib a tourist on the front row, or hear that someone is a teacher or train driver and light up with glee as the 10 most obvious jokes immediately occur to them, or simply tell an out-of-towner that the city they're from is a shit-hole (to great applause!) - before you start to wonder: What are we doing here? Is this really the best way to spend our time as a species as we hurtle towards death?

I really dislike that too, it's partially a reason I don't often go to club nights where there's 4 or 5 comics on the bill and mostly stick to full length shows by a comedian. There are a few great MC's around (Garrett Millerick really impressed me recently) but they seem to be few and far between.

[The Boston Crab]

for sure this is serious. start of motor neurone diseuse? IS POSSIBLE

Amazing

[Replies From View]

I'll go with people like Simon Munnery and Daniel Kitson who'll have a well-sculpted hour or so that makes me feel and think different things over the duration of the show.

I can't be arsed with much else stand-up.  Too much smugness, too much trite and obvious observation, and I don't need these people to show me the humour in the world as my brain is already wired that way.

Plus so much "so where are you from / what do you do for a living?" audience 'engagement' that is meant to show how well these stand-ups think on their feet but it just makes the room feel uncomfortable as nobody wants to be picked on for that stuff.

Plus heckling.  I can't be arsed with inevitably cringing at people who think heckling makes them a great bunch of lads.

[lankyguy95]

EDIT: Never mind.

[Twit 2]

for sure this is serious. start of motor neurone diseuse? IS POSSIBLE

Amazing

FFS, I was feeling proud of myself for the tag joke and missed that post, as I went straight to reply without reading the thread.

[The Boston Crab]

Fair play if you didn't see the reply. Yours is a great joke, in fact. Following the post it made you look thick as fuck. Redeemed mate. X

[CaledonianGonzo]

Does this also apply to seeing it live?

I'm a sucker for sitting in a tiny room watching a show but can rarely be arsed watching it on telly or listening to tapes.  It suffers more than most artforms in that to work best it often requires a sort of shared experiential quality, even if this is only passive.  Stuart Lee has probably written about this - the consensus that builds between crowd and performer in a shared space.  You genuinely do have to be there.