Look Homeward, Comic... by John Wing
Crossing the Atlantic on a cruise ship wasn’t something I ever dreamed of doing, but I’ve now done it twice. Crossed most of the Pacific, too. From Fiji to Los Angeles. But today I fly home to L.A. from the island of Terceira, in the Azores.
I go eastward first, a thousand miles to Lisbon – two and a half hours – then west to Philadelphia – eight and a half hours – and finally five hours and change to L.A. Sixteen hours in the air and twenty-six hours from waking up to getting into my house. Roughly ten thousand miles through nine time zones. And it’s not my longest travel day of the year so far. It’s second.
I’ve been a professional comedian for 39 years. I grew up in Sarnia, Ontario, matriculating for a couple of years at the University of Windsor, then leaving because I was impatient to get my life started, though I had no real idea what I would be doing. Drifting to Toronto in the spring of 1980, I joined a band, but the band folded. I’d heard about this comedy club called Yuk Yuks, and went down a couple of evenings to check out the shows. Mondays were amateur night, so I signed up for one. I walked on a comedy stage for the first time aged twenty, on June 30th, 1980.
From left to right: John Wing, Boyd Banks, Steve Fromstein - Hamilton Yuk Yuks 1985
I went on fifteenth out of eighteen comedians. No one had been doing very well, other than the host, Simon Rakoff. But I destroyed. Every single shitty little joke I’d written got big laughs. I was supposed to do five minutes and I did eight because they were laughing so much. It was magical and utter dumb luck. A week later, riding the first of what would be many false showbiz waves, I did amateur night again, cockily assuming it would be the last time. The boss was there to see me and the buzz was that another set like the first one and I would be immediately promoted to – the golden phrase – regular nights. I went on fifth, a prime spot with a hot crowd, and they didn’t laugh at a single thing I said. It was as pathetic as pathetic gets.
I slunk off to bandage myself, defeated in one sense, and completely hooked in another. How do I get back to that first night? How do I get those laughs again? I began a long journey, close to four years, most of it spent at Yuk Yuks, watching, since I didn’t get off amateur night for almost three years. I missed fewer than twenty nights at Yuk Yuks in those three years.
We land in Lisbon on time. I have close to two hours to make my connection, but this is the unknown part of the trip. I’ve never flown into or out of this airport. My bag is being sent on, but I have to go out to the ticketing counters and recheck in for the final two flights. I get directions to the American Airlines counter from a porter at baggage claim. He tells me it’s number 100, whatever that means. I get upstairs to find that the airline counters are all numbered, so I trek to 100, which turns out to be Delta. They tell me American is number 88, which is KLM. They assure me the one I want is number 32, and they’re right. I get to the counter and the lady tickets me and says, “You should go now. The flight is boarding.” My watch says the flight doesn’t leave for ninety minutes yet. I never dawdle in airports anyway, so I head for security, which I sail through in an easy fifteen minutes. But before I can find the gates, I am forced to walk from security through a duty free store the size of an IKEA, a full ten minute walk, and the gate hallway isn’t even in sight until the last thirty seconds. I’m seething by the time I exit this giant booze-chocolate-and-perfume palace. Within a hundred meters of getting out is a passport control line, so that takes a few more minutes. Minutes are dwindling now. As I get to the gate, I’m pulled out of line for a random explosives check. I finally get on the plane in the last group. Whew. Bye bye Portugal.
Lisbon Airport, Portugal
In my third year as a standup, still working a square job, still staying up way too late every night watching every headliner do every show, three important things happened. One, I got promoted to regular nights and started working more shows and began, finally, to build a little bit of material. Second, a guy at the club had an early prototype video camera and he miked me up one night and filmed my show. When I watched it, I got a huge surprise. Onstage, my whole persona was an imitation of a guy I had known at University. I was doing an impression of what I thought a funny guy was. It staggered me, but it was the second most important step forward that year.
The most important thing was, at the end of the third year, I started emceeing shows. How did I start emceeing shows? Well, I smoked dope most afternoons at a guy’s apartment. He as a regular emcee at the club. He and two other comedians, all three of whom were regular dope smokers at the basement apartment. Emceeing was the only spot at Yuk Yuks, other than headliner, that paid anything. At that time it garnered the munificent sum of $25 per show. One day at our little marijuana klatsch, the fellows were talking about going on strike for a high emceeing wage. A couple of days later, they did. So I went to the club’s owner and presented myself as a guy who could emcee, you know, if they really needed someone. It cost me my friends for a while, and some primo weed, since I was no longer welcome at the afternoon ‘Let’s get high’ parties. But I got on the rotation as a host, and that meant I could go out on the road as a host, too. And that skilled my ass right up, quick. It had to, because I got way more stage time than I had been getting, which was the key to that stage of my development.
Oh, and I also got fired from my job that year and did a year on unemployment. That also helped immensely. My boss said to me, as he fired me, “You’re going to have to decide if you want to be in the brokerage business or the comedy business.” It wasn’t a terribly difficult decision. After my unemployment ran out, I never had another square job again.
Philadelphia has a three hour layover, which is fine because I have to go through customs and recheck my bag. I haven’t gone through customs in Philly since just after 9/11. (I flew to New York two days before 9/11 and was a day and a half outbound to Bermuda on a cruise ship when the towers fell. I did a show the same night. We were stuck in Bermuda for several days and finally came back through Philadelphia.) I have Global Entry now and customs isn’t the stress-sweat it used to be.
On America’s Got Talent
In my fourth year I went on some poverty tours, which were going to a couple of towns, doing guest sets at clubs and asking for paid work based on how well you did. I did those in Rochester and Michigan. I got some bookings, which led to more bookings, which led to more bookings, which led to my improving as a comedian. I began to develop stronger material, as well as recognize what could be funny. I began to understand what the audience thought I looked like up there, and I started playing off that. I wrote the piece “Comedy is Better Than Sex” in 1983-84, which became my opening, and the song, “I Hope You Die”, which became my closing.
One night I was booked to open for the redoubtable Lawrence Morgenstern at a Guelph University pub night. The audience was roaring drunk well before showtime, and the guy running the night said to me, “If they’re too rowdy, you can cut it short.” So armed with permission, I went up and did 12 minutes instead of my contracted for thirty. They were impossible. Lawrence went up after me and did an hour, just slaughtering them. I watched the whole set in awe. It was a masterclass in dealing with an unruly audience. He spoke louder than normal. He did the jokes a little faster than normal, with no pauses for effect or anything. He left them no breathing space, and he ignored most of the heckles. He just did his job. It made a real impression on me and still does, more than 35 years later. Be a professional. Do your time.
At the end of my fourth year I bought a car, and never looked back.
The flight from Philly to LAX left almost on time, which means about 25 minutes late. Got to LAX roughly on time, got my bag, got an Uber, got home. Then I couldn’t sleep for a day or so. And in five days, I’ll do it again. Because it’s what I do.
