‘Satired’ was my secret identity for the internet until my 12 yr old niece broke through the ingenious word play (SA-tired/Satire-d). I blame peer pressure for this embarrassment as I was quite happy with the name ‘Koduvayoor Ramachandran Subramanian Aravind Balakrishnan’ until I was introduced to twitter. Apparently 140 characters are for what YOU had to say and not your lineage. But long names have it’s advantages. My relatives would have passed out while typing my entire name to find me on Facebook or Twitter.
The reason I need a secret identity is simple. I have a hobby. It’s called Stand Up Comedy. They have a hobby. It’s called Making-your-life-miserable-24/7. Both are the same but I still prefer to keep mine as I get paid for it.
I want to keep my family far away from my Stand Up ventures because frankly, I don’t believe they are capable of comprehending my stage persona. I use the F-word, drink the A-word instead of being at R-word. F-Word is Fuck and A-word is Hayward the beer. I added R-Word to the glossary as I consider ‘Harvard’ a bad word too. I’m as surprised as my family about dabbling with Stand Up Comedy. Many reasons I can think of, starting with inability to remember lines. Only reason I remember our National Anthem is because it’s parody version taught by mum is tremendously funny. Adding to this was the stage fear I developed in school after a Sanskrit play where I was Sudhama who didn’t know about the KitKat wrapper stuck to his dhoti. Failing in front stage is what led me to take backstage for a living (film making) and nobody could convince me otherwise.
Ranting is something I indulge in often. My best friends have been an audience to several exaggerated stories of the world conspiring against me and that usual cute girl giving me the looks. While I thought I was saving up thousands by moaning to my friends instead of a shrink, they were having a ball soaking up my miseries. Weekends were a delight for me.
One fine Saturday evening, I was called to my best friend’s office to hang out. I went there hoping to resume my tale from last weekend but I was in for the shock of my life. The office was filled with some familiar faces from the theatre circuit in Chennai. Walking up and down. Murmuring something from a script in their hand. If being reminded of my board exams wasn’t scary enough, my friend welcomes me with the words – “Welcome to the audition for Stand Up Comedians. You are going next, good luck.”
I was stunned. It was a sly, sick and smart move. I knew very well why he did what he did but I didn’t know what was going to happen next. I asked him what the hell do I go joke about as I have not manufactured any like others in the room. He said – “Be yourself. That’s the joke.”
I had no choice to take that insult quite seriously. I had been avoiding the auditions for ages. There was no turning back now. I imagined the room to be filled with psychiatrists who wanted to listen and help me out. I had a dramatic story from my first stint as an Assistant Director in the Tamil Film Industry (coming soon in a blogpost near you). It was about how I signed up to orchestrate pigeon movements in Varnasi while managing retarded Sadhus who look like Bob Marley visiting Sabrimalai. I narrated that with my eyes expressing the angst and my tone expressing the woes. The more the self deprecation the more they laughed. I found this logic baffling but gratifying. The ultimate purpose was to extract laughs and if it was at my expense, so be it. I found tremendous pleasure in being able to laugh at myself through others. My nervous energy turned into excitement during the performance and everyone believed that I came prepared with such a frantic style and empathetic content. But I didn’t and somehow I got the most applause that night. And a spot selection.
Now I’m nearing 50 shows and I don’t know how I ever thought bad of this idea. Of course, my debut show was a disaster but hey, there was no turning back. Improvement is inevitable if you do something you like and you do it often. Sometimes, you just need that push from somewhere outside to believe that. My friend gave me just that. He put me in a position to Stand Up and be counted. It’s great because I get to be myself, I get to laugh at myself, I get to laugh at the world and most importantly, I get to tell stories. But the best part is, if ever I am stuck on stage with a KitKat wrapper inadvertently stuck on me, I need not freak out, it’s all part of the act 😉
Satired Rants 