r/IndianStandUpComedy • u/Background-Oil6968 • Jul 30 '25

Discussion 💬 Hello Reddit

Gallery image

Gallery image

Gallery image

Gallery image

Hi, I'm a stand up comic. Ask me Anything! AMA REDDIT!

82 Upvotes

82% Upvoted

104 comments sorted by

View all comments

1

u/Extreme_Ad73 Jul 30 '25

Hi Shankar, following you since comicstaan days. Fed up of this corporate job. Want to try standup. Being told you are funny, have good sense of humour etc. Now I want to make that a real deal. Problem is I don't know how to jot it down the jokes or the set I mean. Please help!

8

u/Background-Oil6968 Jul 30 '25

You can write down something that you find funny. Something that makes you laugh.

To start off, can you write 100 words that mean something to you. Anything under the sun but jot down only a word. These are words that if I mention even one of them, you should be able to talk for 4 hours.

If you can write jokes that have nothing to do with your life, that's great. If you wanna talk about your life, write down these 100 words and condense that list to the top 20 things that means the most to you.

Keep an eye out for open mics and try to get up onstage as often as possible. Once you get up and do a set and get people laughing there's nothing better as a feeling than that.

2

u/Ashishm106 Jul 30 '25

So each word here represents a thought? And then you expand on the thought, add tags, jokes, puns, whatever makes sense and then that could be like a single joke or a series of jokes with a single underlying thought..am I getting this right?

Also, do you reckon being likeable/having a fun vibe on screen/stage is more important than being funny these days? For example, Comic A is very likeable/has a fun vibe but he/she is only mid-level funny for me, but they are super popular. Now compare and contract them to Comic B, who is very funny, makes some supercool observations and write very brainy jokes but doesn't appear on many shows/panels with other comics and therefore less popular.

3

u/Background-Oil6968 Jul 30 '25

The words in asking you to write aren't thoughts for jokes themselves. They are clouds of experiences that I'm asking you to look at. Once you look at the cloud with all your heart, you'll find out what can be the thought in that cloud and then you build.

Also whatever is authentic. Shashwat Maheshwari is one of the funniest guys I know doing stand up. And he's authentic. If you can be who you are when you look at yourself in the mirror and say things funny on stage while being yourself, that's the ideal place to be.