Not Exactly Comic Relief

I don't know how it happened, but somehow I was unaware of the concert last Thursday night to benefit the One Fund and featuring a host of Boston legends. It sounds like the kind of event which would normally be right in my wheelhouse but I didn't know it was going on until it was almost over - I assume because tickets sold out so quickly and they felt no need to promote it. Everyone from Aerosmith and James Taylor to New Kids on the Block and Godsmack were there and according to reports (which I had to read the next day) everyone there had a good time. It is too bad everyone watching at home could not say the same thing. Apparently, there were tons of glitches as people tried to stream the concert online, though you can't exactly say that is a surprise because even in 2013 half a million people trying to log into a site at the same time is going to cause a few issues. But, buffering wasn't the only reason screens were blank for a little while as Boston comedian Dane Cook prohibited both the website and the radio stations simulcasting the show from airing his set. Cook said he was performing fresh material and he didn't want the new stuff released to the masses just yet. As you can imagine, Cook was subsequently roasted on the internet and by many people in the Boston area who pointed out he got his start here and the event was for charity so he shouldn't have been so worried about himself. I have to say while I don't agree with how he went about making his case, I can understand Dane's thinking.

Any creative person will tell you that there is nothing more frustrating than when a person sees or hears something you are working on before you think it is ready. That is why you always hear about musicians suing websites which leak tracks for upcoming albums - yes, part of it is about money they will lose when people don't buy that song, but it can also be just as much about reputation because if people don't know the song is just a rough cut and think it is awful they may dismiss the entire album without hearing any of the finished product. And it is even worse for comedians, because jokes are really only good the first time you hear them, which means comedians have to spend a lot of time coming up with material, go through the process of having it bomb in front of a crowd to sharpen it up until it is finally as good as it can be and then as soon as they release it to a large audience it is gone forever like it never happened. If someone hears that joke in the interim you just wasted all that time and now have to come up with something else to fill that time. It is a lot of build-up for a small payoff and while the good ones make it look easy, if you have ever heard Jerry Seinfeld's new material you know it is hard for everyone. Unfortunately in this age of camera phones and instant posting working through stuff in front of an audience and expecting them to respect the creative process is harder than ever.

I always say the one time you wouldn't want to see a famous comedian is the week after their new comedy special just aired, because you are catching them just as they have to go back to the drawing board. They are not like musicians who can write one hit song and then milk that one song for 40 years and get away with it - comedians are expected to have fresh material every time you see them and it is not like these jokes grow on trees. I once heard Conan O'Brien explain that the reason he turns down so many speaking engagements is that he simply doesn't have the energy to come up with a new batch for every event he attends and that is what is expected of him. In fact even though both professions are in the same industry the standards for musicians versus comedians is totally different: when you go see a musician you get mad if they don't play your favorite song which you have already listened to a dozen times that week but no one goes to a comedy show and demands to hear their favorite jokes. Even guys like Jeff Foxworthy, who have a routine or a catch phrase, are expected to have fresh material around that premise every tour. Let's see a musical act try and perform under those guidelines. Considering the Rolling Stones have started every concert for the last 60 years with "Start Me Up" I think it would not be a very long show.

So, I really can't fault Dane Cook for wanting to protect his new material before he starts a new tour, it was just his execution which needed work. (I also think a lot of this criticism is based on the fact Dane was so popular that at some point it became cooler to hate him than laugh at his jokes. I would be fascinated to have seen the reaction if a guy like Louis CK (also from Boston) had pulled the same move.) A charity concert to benefit the victims of a terrorist attack is really the wrong time to worry about ticket sales for your next show because it makes it look the night is supposed to be about you. What Dane should have done to prevent this was spend the time leading up to the show coming up with a few Boston-specific jokes and used those for his set, even if it meant hiring a few joke writers. I mean, he lived here for 20 years, there has to be plenty of stuff in the memory banks he could have worked with. And because he would be using jokes which would only be funny to people who live inside of Rt 495 he wouldn't have to worry about burning through a new hour. Ironically for Dane if the saying that scandal plus time equals comedy is accurate, he'll be able to get plenty of jokes out of this little controversy. All I know is this - for all the aggravation he has been taking while trying to protect it, Cook's next hour had better be extremely funny.