Last night I performed stand up in the meeting hall of The United Methodist Church of Hemet California.
That is right Hemet California. HEMET. I had never heard of this city, and I proved it by accidentally calling it HELMET for about a week before the show. Which in my opinion is a much better name.
for trevor and fans of frisky dingo
Turns out, as cool as HELMET California would be, HEMET California is cool only if you are unaware of what the word cool means.
If you don’t know where Hemet is, this map might help::
I was asked by a good comedian friend to come out to this random town in the middle of the desert and perform a set of comedy for his grandmother’s church.
What I didn’t know is that the only thing in Hemet is adorable people in their golden years (and an Applebees). And this church was filled with all of those old people’s grandparents.
THEY WERE VERY OLD.
I was under the assumption it was a church, but due to their age I soon realized that these were the people who actually WROTE the Bible!
It is near impossible to tailor material to a crowd that’s still thinks automobiles are new technology.
I started seeing if I could adjust material to involve terms that they would know like “World’s Fair,” “Speak Easy,” or “Flappers.” Here is an example of a possible social reference joke they could identify with::
“Hey check out that Bearcat hanging out with that Egg laying patch in that Strugglebuggy o’ theirs. That’s Big Six is higher than the Lindbergh Feller over the Atlantic! Am I right?”
At one point I tried crowd work, and when I asked a nice old man what his name was they LITERALLY had to WAKE HIM UP!!!!! I then found out he was 93 years old and his wheelchair was in the other room. He was enjoying my show against his will.
It was a demographic that I never thought I could appeal to. Truthfully, I didn’t think this Demographic was still alive.
It was a new kind of nervous. I knew they would be nice.
They weren’t going to be mean, they didn’t have their hearing aids turned up high enough to effectively heckle. All the applause and laughter was very polite.
At the end of the show, I felt like I just visited all of my friend’s grandmothers all at once.
I am a comic who will perform ANYWHERE. I really will. And now I can add Hemet “we just got an Applebees”, California to the list!
I appreciated the experience and I think everyone had a good night, even if it was just because they got in a good nap.
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At the end of the show though, I got the heck out of there. ’Cause that many old people in cars is scary to anyone. They can’t be good drivers if their first car was purchased from a blacksmith.
I didn’t want to get taken out by a purple Chrysler with a fake convertible top driven by a world war I vet.
If you don’t know what I mean, this south park clip sums up my fears perfectly
