Presenting The Most Important And Perfectly Written Essay/Polemic On Philippine Standup Comedy: How To Be A Great Standup Comic, by Chuckie Manio, The Absolute Greatest Standup Comic In The Universe Ever (Or: Hey Chuckie, Why Not Write Five Thousand Words On Something That Only Interests Fourteen People, Most Of Whom Are Incredibly Stupid And Wouldn’t Understand It?)

There’s a new kind of comedy in town.

That’s right. A new kind of comedy! And no; there are no male homosexuals involved! (Insert much exaggerated homophobic laughter here.) Imagine that!

Well, I’m here to tell you that you don’t have to― no! Because it’s here! And it’s standup comedy! American Style, to be exact! In this style, there are no cheap tricks involved as in the ‘traditional’ comedy we have in this country. Yes, say goodbye to all that and throw away the trash! Not to mention that this new style is much funnier and way more filling intellectually as well!

Now look. It must be said that I― Chuckie Manio― am not just one of the beacons, but the brightest and most wonderful beacon of standup comedy anywhere in this world, even much more so in this country.  Anyone worth anything knows that. And you know what; I’m not a selfish god. I know that there are millions of kids who want to be like me. It delights me to serve as inspiration for the aspiring Great Standup Comics out there. But being not just the Greatest Standup Comic Ever but a good and decent person as well, inspiring from afar is not enough. I want to share my secrets and strategies learned from my one year (yes, count it guys: one year!) career, so you can be kind of like me but always a little worse! Not because I’m nice― it’s just that my talent is just too damned much that I can give scraps of it away without diminishing my genius! Yes! I am that good! The very reason why I am the Absolute Greatest Standup Comic Ever!

How exciting is this? (Answer: ve-ree! See? I told you I was fun-nee!)

Okay guys: I know you’re all pretty much wet all over about this whole Learning-From-Me thing. And really, you damn well should be! But first let’s check out the things in store for you― the amazing things that only being a Great Standup Comic can give!

One day, you might be able to do corporate shows! Yes, friend! Corporate shows where you can earn (take a deep breath now) 10,000 pesos just for speaking what passes in your body as a mind! (Note: no profanity, nothing about religion or sex or politics except through the softest and most obvious angles possible, no absurdity, nothing polarizing, etc.― basically nothing to further artistry) Imagine that! Corporate fucking shows! Be honest now: aren’t you just bubbling over and frothing in the mouth with excitement? Of course you are! What kind of person would you be if you didn’t find this kind of thing amazing? A person with a healthy sense of self-worth and real knowledge of art? I know you aren’t that stupid, aspiring Great Standup Comic. I know you’re excited to learn from me about the Holy Grail of Great Standup Comedy, i.e. Corporate Shows! And you should be! Nothing― absolutely nothing― spells a rollicking good comedic time like stupid call-center employees who think they’re smart, wearing cheap suits and ties! Plus get this: maybe, if you do well enough, a talent scout might feature you in a cute little segment in some stupid and talent-diluted show no un-poor or un-stupid person will ever watch! Isn’t that breathtaking? Imagine― real people on the street actually walking up to you at inopportune moments and tell you that aren’t you, like, that guy I saw from somewhere, or something this one time? Feel the hair on your neck rise up! That’s how it feels!

Let me guess what you’re thinking right this moment, Dear Reader. (Because not only am I a hilarious motherfucker, I am also a smart and perceptive guy who watches Dr. Phil and Boy Abunda, believing it gives me the right to say I know ‘a little bit’ about psychology!) This is what you’re thinking: Oh my frickin’ God, Chuckie Manio! (That’s sweet of you, calling me by my full name. But really, you can just call me ‘Chuckie Manio.’ I’m such a nice and approachable guy!’) That all sounds so wonderful! I want to be just like you! I want to be a Great Standup Comic! But I have no idea how! Will you be so kind as to tell me everything you know so I can be like you, the Absolute Greatest Standup Comic ever?

I thought you’d never ask, you dumb fuck! Let’s do this!

Tip Number One: Never Use Any Dirty Words

Because God knows no one ever says them in real life!

And honestly, guys― being a ‘dirty’ and/or ‘insulting’ comic presents absolutely no challenge. Trust me on this one. You can jump up on any stage on any night and just unleash a torrential stream of ‘bad’ words/phrases, (especially in Filipino) e.g. puta, suso, titi, puke, and get monstrous laughs every time! It’s just too easy. It doesn’t even matter anymore if, for example, you were to find a fresh and unexpected angle to hit that same old spot; it’s still a big (ahem) ‘no-no.’ Now you might say to yourself, aspiring Great Standup Comic, ‘But any definition of the ‘dirty’ or ‘obscene’ will inevitably be defined (arbitrarily of course) by those with the least developed moral sensors, i.e. self-righteous (usually pseudo-religious) morons who want to ban the very words that no doubt have been used against them since forever (which they deserve fully); in the end, being ‘dirty’ is fine, as long as a clean ray of intelligence permeates all throughout and is never compromised.’

It’s a good thing I’m here to tell you this: stop being so goddamned stupid with all this tolerance! It’s totally obvious and fucking unambiguous that it’s so much harder to talk about the Holy Trinity of Comedy (deep breath first!): Family, Work, Relationships. Talk about them― a lot! Because surely we must all know that constructing jokes from what we experience every day is incredibly difficult, and that the Great Artist who toils in such tortuous hardships to glean slightly amusing insights obviously deserves tons and tons of respect!

Not to mention the fact that telling ‘dirty’ jokes brings our honorable and dignified comedic revolution closer to the traditional comedy we have in this country. And we sure as Hell wouldn’t want that now, would we, guys? You have to see this clearly, aspiring Great Standup Comic: the problem with those dumb and physically and spiritually repulsive peasant homosexuals (and the odd woman who somehow speaks like one of them) is not at all that their so-called ‘jokes’ are soul-crushingly banal and unfunny with not one miniscule trace discernible of any original thought, oh no, it’s not that; the real problem with them is that they use ‘dirty’ words! Let us not follow their squalid paths to readymade minor ‘stardom!’ Let us be high-minded and follow the path of the righteous towards the very same thing! For that is the path every Great Standup Comic must trod through! Come now, Brave Soul! Take my hand and follow me further into the deep! Together― so very together that it’s fucking unbelievable― we shall trudge forth courageously, blazing forward to a new path to Comedic Greatness!

Tip Number Two: Never Ever Respect The Audience

Allow me to drop some knowledge here. The Audience is nothing but a faceless swirl, dejected clumps of something that quite closely resembles humanity in a weird and inchoate manner. You― an aspiring Great Standup Comic― might have encountered such names as Lenny Bruce, Mitch Hedberg, Bill Hicks, Patton Oswalt, etc. and really do think you can pull off being edgy and ironic and talk about stuff that shoots past the Mark Of Normal And Comfortable Entertainment. But you’re obviously stupid, if not totally delusional! The Audience so does not want that! What they want is Happy Comedy: regulation ‘sure-hit’ vaudeville-era lines and pre-approved tangents and/or riffs from the clear and well-defined lines of Real Life, delivered by smiling non-threatening faces! What they want are mundane and everyday topics, candy-unicorn-rainbow type premises with marshmallow punchlines! (Mmmm… Soft and sweet!) The Audience wants you, their intrepid performer, to slacken the death-grip of Life Itself even just for five minutes. This, undoubtedly, is the admirable task every Great Standup Comic must take seriously. Abandon all notion of individuality and pander to their middling tastes! Yes! Like a clown, but better: you can actually call your engineered attempts to cater to The Audience’s basest instincts artistry without even cringing! That’s the kind of gall one finds in only the Greatest Standup Comics!

Never aim for any sort of comedy that shakes the foundations of souls! Stray from anything that probes the unconscious deeper than a pinprick (which is another mainstay of the Great Standup Comic’s physiology, which comes with a psychological bonus of Overcompensation by means of superfluous pontifications re: artistry!)! Reject anything that makes anyone think! Seriously― fuck The Audience! Fuck ‘em! Keep the chattering masses complacent and sedative-level happy with cute little bits or set-pieces about how they might also have noticed this cuddly little thing you noticed ‘earlier’ and isn’t what you had just said sooooo true and automatically (it logically follows) sooooo funny as well, ha ha ha! Never commit the rookie mistake of talking about anything weightier than a wisp of cotton-candy. In doing so, remember that you treat The Audience with respect, since you honestly expect them to follow your mental-processes; you are actually treating them as equals, which is really stupid given that the morons will inevitably feel offended― the last thing in the world a Great Standup Comic wants (next to I don’t know, a life?). Offending the small-minded and self-loathing mediocrities in this world should very well be the last thing on your trusty Comedic Checklist For World Domination (or some other archaic joke-type phrase like it). Instead of raising the collective consciousness up to your level, stoop down and cater to their every disgusting proletarian inclination! Make them think their lives really matter and feel the oncoming rush of Doing Well In This Thriving Industry!

Tip Number Three: Never Offend The Audience

There’s this thing that goes: ‘you can’t please everybody.’ And it’s true! But a Great Standup Comic must try, nonetheless!

How the fuck is this humanly possible, you might ask. Well, for one: never talk about anything ‘taboo’ or is anathema to basic human decency. What those ambiguously-defined words mean: don’t talk about anything that people really do and say and think everyday. Keep everything you say vague. And if you were to make fun of someone in the context of a joke, always make sure to keep the target as far away as possible from The Audience in terms of empathic feeling. The absolute best way to do this sort of surefire laugh-inducer is by insincerely making fun of yourself. In the very same words of another Great Standup Comic who likes to dress up sometimes as a Genuine Artist (painted Chuck Taylors, oh my God!): ‘be self-depreciating.’ (So ironic and meta and apt!) Regale The Audience with cheap, pandering tales about how your family has these funny things that they do that they might relate to; about how your Visayan maids are dumb as fuck and have ridiculous lilting accents; how amusing it all was when you mistook this one thing for another thing and got caught up in a bunch of hee-larious debacles that you will now recount, point for point in comically excruciating detail to give The Audience of Really Being There!

But what if you don’t have the supreme arrogance necessary for such trite self-deprecation? What other lofty, avant-garde fodder can a Great Standup Comic employ for his Humorous Musings? A suggestion is making fun of The Others. Who are these people? They morph periodically; basically, they are The People Who Are Not In The Audience Tonight. Perplexed? Wondering what perplexed even means? (Of course! You want to be a Great Standup Comic!) Let me help you all out.

Salient truth: the goal of the Great Standup Comic is to soothe the jangled wiring of The Audience’s ego, to psychologically and spiritually fellate their collective genitals while taking great care to free one hand to stroke/pinch/mash other erogenous zones. See, when we make jokes about someone or something, we have to let The Audience know that of course they aren’t the ones we are laughing at. A great example would be the Filipino Family-Favorite school of drollery: mistakes in English grammar/pronunciation. Every Filipino thinks that they speak/write in decent English and will laugh uproariously at anything that reinforces that unwarranted belief. The varieties of Filipino malapropisms, e.g. the Visayan predilection for confusing the letter ‘P’ for the sound ‘F,’ adding an ‘S’ to the end of singular nouns (more so on names ending in consonants), utilizing an accent that unequivocally establishes poverty or kabaduyan, etc., etc. These omnipresent ingredients for any socially relevant joke are personally guaranteed to make most given Audiences laugh their fucking heads off if not shit bloody chunks of vomit outright, all the while providing cathartic relief. How great is this: the Audience has fun while having embedded in their souls that The Others are stupid while They aren’t! It’s a warm and comforting feeling. Totally untrue― but comforting! And isn’t that what truly matters in life?

Never ever make the mistake of letting The Audience know just how stupid and despicable they all are compared to you, my dear aspiring Great Standup Comic, no matter how obvious it may be. That cannot be classified as Being Nice― and don’t we all know deep in our hearts that Being Nice is unquestionably essential for someone to be a Great Standup Comic? Of course we do!

Now here are other common errors we must keep vigilant watch for: writing jokes that require some semblance of an effort to be met halfway and thus gotten correct; delivering said jokes in a low-key manner that eschews jumping around, ‘funny’ faces and voices; an inability to spoon-feed punchlines; and the unwillingness to be laughed at. These are some of the death-traps that litter your sterling path towards glittering Comedy Superstardom. Remember this, my friend: the worth of a Great Standup Comic is solely determined by The Audience’s perceptions. If they do not laugh at you or react in a positive manner (especially if they call you ‘not nice’), then you are, by definition, not Great! This is all that matters! Nothing else!

When The Audience laughs immediately following your punchlines, you― a budding Great Standup Comic― are without a doubt finally Great! Never be content with what you really are! That’s the hallmark of a healthy consciousness! Don’t say to yourself, Yeah well, I’m a completely unfunny moron but at least stupid people find me amusing! No! No! No! Always believe that you are not simply a high-grade moron with whorelike tendencies disguised as Giving Them What They Want, a popular hack― but that you are a critical darling as well, a Comedy God! Believe!

If, for example, you might contend at this juncture that you are simply trying to push the boundaries of what is Funny, such as, say, leading The Audience to cringe awkwardly towards laughter, stop being such a fucking stupid-head! Don’t you know that gay comedians already do that? It doesn’t even matter now that their insults/offensive material are rehashed tripe served deathly cold and never hit the mark completely, e.g. ang haba ng baba mo sister, ang panget ng t-shirt mo, etc. Oh no, that doesn’t matter at all. What matters is that we take the High Road and refuse to be offensive like them, and nothing else!

Tip Number Four: Gay Standup Comics Are Never Great, But It’s Always Funny When A Great Standup Comic Is Gay

Okay. So we all know that gay standup comics suck. And their jokes are bad too. (Ziiiiiing!)

Not because they rely on ridiculously outrageous outfits, stupid enunciations and voices, or their ineffable gay-ness, but because they talk ‘dirty’ and ‘offend’ The Audience. However! When writing a joke that stumps you on the all-important (in our grand Comedic Theories, anyway) punchline ending and tempts you into throwing it away, reconsider! You can save the joke by simply inserting ex nihilo that you are gay! What a unique and unexpected twist! I know what you are about to ask next: how the fuck, Mr. Greatest Standup Comic Ever, can we mortals ever hope to achieve such a strange and wondrous and alchemical thing? Here’s how, you stupid motherfuckers!

First, take a very common premise for the background of the joke. Let’s use this one: ‘My girlfriend is the jealous type. She gets mad at me whenever she sees me holding hands with my friends.’ Now, any self-respecting and even just mildly original standup comic might protest at this time and say that this premise is dumb― mundane and obvious and boring. But see, the Great Standup Comic never gives up! What he would do here is stare down the inexorable dead-end and slap on an old punchline from his Old Bag Of Hackneyed Comedic Punchlines. The Middling Standup Comic would here say that this is a terrible piece of work and quit right then and there, but that is why he isn’t successful like we are! (We get 500-1000 pesos a week! Just as we deserve!) The Great Standup Comic will retool it the joke this way and use it in his next set: ‘My girlfriend is the jealous type. She gets mad at me whenever she sees me holding hands with my friends. What’s so bad about it? Bruno is, like, (pregnant pause) my best friend!’ Hooray! The Great Standup Comic has once again saved the joke and the day! He has implied― the very same way a heavy brick crashing through your window implies irritation― that he, in fact, is gay! Oh my God! What a stroke of genius! Someone should get a medal for that one! (And I did!)

* A Short Interpolation

If you are pressed for time with joke-writing processes, you can just wrap up any meandering testosterone-packed story with a ‘Pare, pa-kiss!’ and get that tired shit over and done with. Back to regular programming.

Tip Number Five: Fuck Punchlines (And Pretend You Never Knew Them)

Listen close, kids. This is one of the biggest and most important secret of every Great Standup Comic, the magic formula, if you will, of most, if not all, of our jokes: observe the shit out of everyday occurrences and reenact them wholesale onstage. That’s it! Some might think that premises are only the setting up of targets to be knocked down by the punchline. But they are stupid to think that― completely naïve as to the Great Standup Comedy Tradition. An ignorant bloke! (Doesn’t matter that neither you nor I aren’t at all British and that saying this sounds incredibly affected: ignorant bloke!) When a joke is written in the old classical ‘set-up, punchline’ scheme, it perturbs the mind of the Great Standup Comic; he, being supremely erudite, would rather spend more time surreptitiously watching scenes unfold from real life and paint them in clumsy and overly broad strokes onstage. To make you feel as if You Were Really There… my God… the acting ability involved! (It’s not a small wonder why Great Standup Comics don’t just go on directly to film!)

How can we you do this? Always try to set up the joke in an everyday situation as to ensure maximum ‘relatibility.’ Once the context is set, unleash a manic display of shiftless mimicry! Do your stereotypical Visayan maid voice! Jump around and pretend to really fall down! Shout words intermittently and without warning and to do stupid noises! Shimmy about the stage like the attention-hungry husk of an Artist you truly are, beneath all the frivolous posing! Do absolutely anything but give a punchline. You can call me on this one, my friend: by the time you, sweaty and short of breath, cease the gratuitous inanities, The Audience will be Rolling Down The Aisles with tears smeared on their cheeks from pure laughter and enjoyment, never once thinking that there was no punchline involved. But they laughed! The only important thing!

Are you getting confused? Okay. Since you’re probably not a paragon of abstract thinking, here are some clear and simple examples:

‘Have you ever noticed men and women are so different? It’s probably the reason why they were called different things in the first place, right? Like, when a women breaks the news that she’s engaged, her friends are like, ‘Whaaaat? You’re getting maaaaarried? (Mime a woman showing other women a ring) A-yeeeee-yeeeee! (Repeat said sound ad infinitum until laughter dies down.) And you know guys, right? They hear that their guy friend’s engaged, they go, ‘Is she pregnant?’ like it’s the only reason one should get married, right, right? Because men never propose! We surrender! Just as Chris Rock once said! But let’s say succumb! It’s such an original joke! Right, guys?

‘And how about shampoos, huh, guys? Have you ever noticed women use horse shampoos? Well, men like me, whose only dream in life was to have chest hair, use it on our chests! Have you ever tried that, guys? It’s great! But the hair that grew formed a horsetail! No idea why that happened or even if that is possible in any parallel universe, but it’s funny, isn’t it? Right, right? Please tell me it is! I exist only for your viewing pleasure, guys! (I also stole this premise from a private conversation and fumbled on the punchline!)’

‘Have you ever noticed how Chinese I am? It’s ridiculous. I recycle joke-premises like my forebears recycled meat and gristle to sell as luncheon meat! I will copy anything but make it a little different and pass it off as my own! Isn’t it funny how much of a stereotype I am?’

‘Have you ever noticed how anyone from the College of Saint Benilde is stupid? I can say that, because I’m from there! And I think of myself as an exception! Listen to my jokes! My maid is so stupid! My mother nags me a lot and compares me to my brother a lot! She thinks my brother is so much smarter than I am! Which he is! Which is sad because he’s still in the general vicinity of Stupid! Haha! I’m so funny I made myself cry! Right, guys, right? Oh God please tell me I’m funny! I may be old and ugly and a shiftless, irresponsible dick still living with my parents but at least I’m funny, right?’ Right? Please love me!’

I know what you’re thinking: those ‘jokes’ are moronic, simply gives a premise then proceeds to continually, mercilessly milk the shit right out of it without even bothering to offer anything original or remotely funny in itself. Do not fret! A Great Standup Comic’s jokes are never funny when set down on paper. (That’s the style of the Mediocre Standup Comic!) That’s corny. Our jokes must be experienced! Because we don’t use words in a funny way. We are funny whatever kind of words we choose to use! How do I know this? Because someone told me! Trust me! You may be way smarter than I am, but I am older than you and have been in this Thriving Industry longer than you have been! That’s where all my authority stems from!

Tip Number Six: Always Respect Your Elders

Remember this: elders got to be this good because they followed their elders also. And don’t we all want to get to be this good? Of course, you might be saying right now, wait the fuck up: weren’t all those Great Comedy Rules today formulated after someone ran through the previous rules and shredded them to bits? Well, yes. The rules were indeed gleaned from non-conformists who cut through their own individual paths. But now those products of courageous iconoclasm are The Law! And we must follow them to the very end! From the top of the gleaming red head to the shaft, down to the very last squiggle of crunchy animalistic hair!

Find this disheartening at any level? Fuck you, child. Quit being so goddamned cocky, thinking you’re All That when you’re totally Not. When older, more experienced Great Standup Comics give you advice, follow it blindly! Because you are certain to receive Good Advice at all times! Every single one of us Great Standup Comics wants you to succeed! We only want the best for you! It doesn’t even matter that we have absolutely no idea what the fuck we’re talking about! We want the best for you! Sop up all the miscellaneous tips and advice we throw your way, aspiring Great Standup Comic and do it with the utmost indiscretion; it’ll all work out for the best!

We will try to tweak your Comedic Styling to conform to the stupidity of the masses. Follow us unconditionally! We do not tell you this because we are emotionally needy and insecure of anyone who dares assert their originality― we do it because we care! We will not endlessly nitpick your way of doing Comedy because we’re just too dumb and (and as is usual) arrogant to understand― we do it because we care! We will not try to bring you down with trivial, small-scale politics because we’re self-important morons whose small-mindedness cannot grasp anything outside our own solipsistic stupidity― we do it because we fucking care! We will even tell you that it’s your choice whether to follow our advice or not. Do not fall for such obvious falsities! Follow our advice! Even the ones that contradict the other ones! Nothing more to be said! Because if you don’t, we’re going to be offended that you disregarded our well-meaning idiocy and will feel like the Ignorant Blokes that we truly are! Why? Because we care!

And then we can all be friends! All of us Great Standup Comics writing jokes together in gay-ass cafés, slurping foam from gay-ass lattes while Being Funny in conversation and acting like what we do is Very Important! Then our jokes will be virtually indistinguishable from each other’s― a Sloppy Amorphous Blob Of Pure Mediocrity! Then we can exchange jokes freely with other Great Standup Comics! And then― yes!― world fucking peace! Whooo!

Tenk yu, dats may taym ‘guys!’ My name is Chuckie Manio and I am the Absolute Greatest Standup Comic In The Universe Ever! I have now outlined to the best of my abilities the full extent of my vast knowledge re: the Sacred Art of Standup Comedy and How To Be A Great Standup Comic. Hopefully, the aspiring Great Standup Comic has learned some valuable and heartwarming lessons today. Now go forth and apply these gilded rules to your own Standup Comedy Set! I am all a-tingle with excitement for the day when I can watch you perform, and personally laugh at you. Until then, young one! Talk about The Art as if you know a fucking thing! Say bye-bye to anything vaguely original or surprising and say hi-hi to Mass Acceptance! Happy whoring, kiddies!