Beyond the laughs and behind the mic

Palms sweating as waves of apprehension passed through his body, former Blair junior Jonathan Musgrave waited backstage at his sixth grade talent show. The venue wasn't a theater, but rather the cafeteria of Silver Spring International Middle School, and Musgrave was about to do something few people have the courage for: a one-man comedy routine.

Luckily, Musgrave was greeted with laughter and not with tomatoes. "I felt terrible. I felt awful. Awful," he says of his performance, dead serious. But in his eyes is the look of a calculating comedian.

Since that first show, Musgrave, like other aspiring Blair comics, has learned that the art of comedy is not an easy one. Young comedians have to do more than just be funny on demand. They've also got to keep their eyes peeled for material, hone their technique and learn to deal with a difficult audience — all while keeping their sense of humor.

A comic child prodigy

From the moment his father pulled out an old Bill Cosby record six years ago, Musgrave, who left Blair earlier this year to attend Montgomery College, knew that he wanted to stand in front of a crowd, mic in hand, and get the good times rolling just like Cosby. "The ability to make somebody laugh is just amazing," he says. "And I wanted to be able to do that."

It didn't take a classic comedian to inspire junior Laura Cole. When Cole was in fourth grade, she started cracking jokes that had her family's dinner guests gripping their stomachs in pain from laughing so hard. "They told me I was really funny, that I should be a comedian," she says.

Not long after, a then-nine-year-old Cole began to perform mock comedy shows for her friends while standing on her bed, rolling out punchline after punchline into the hairbrush in her hand.

Raw talent like Cole's is only the starting ingredient for a comic, however, according to professional comedian Marc Patrick. Patrick, who has performed at venues across the nation and on BET Comic View, insists that a much deeper commitment is needed to succeed as a comedian. In order to be confident - and funny - onstage, a comic's first priority should be to find the right material for his or her style.

Honing the punchline

Although Blair comics look to the greats for inspiration, from Dave Chappelle and Jon Stewart to "South Park" and "Family Guy," they recognize that the richest comedic gold lies no farther than Blair's own backyard.

"When you live in Silver Spring, you tend to pass by lots of strange people who say strange things," explains Musgrave.

One such incident occurred while Musgrave was standing at a street corner and the man next to him started interrogating him. Musgrave, trying to be polite, responded. Suddenly, the man said, "Hold on - let me call you back. This [expletive] is trying to answer my questions." The man was talking on his cell phone earpiece.

Sophomore Alex Georgiadis also finds inspiration in people's quirks, particularly, those of his parents. "I'll be walking across the street and there won't be any cars. And all of a sudden, my mom will push me into the grass," says Georgiadis. "What do you think you're doing?" his mother will yell. "If you walk across the street like that in Argentina, you'll get run over!" "Run over by the tricycle?" responds Georgiadis, pretending to look left and right at an empty street.

But regardless of the material they gather beforehand or how often they perform in front of the mirror, nothing can fully prepare comedians to grab the mic and launch into a routine.

Dodging the tomatoes

Although Musgrave's material has evolved since his first show in sixth grade, changing from jokes about bodily functions to cracks about dating and politics, his inability to stave off the butterflies in his stomach has not.

Part of Musgrave's stage fright stems from the fact that he doesn't prepare material in advance: He simply gets up on stage and starts cracking jokes about whatever comes to mind.

Although Patrick advises that young comedians start out by practicing their routines in advance, Musgrave disagrees. "It's more fun not to prep," he says. "It keeps me on my toes it keeps me alert, it keeps the audience on their toes and everybody's having fun."

It's when the audience isn't having fun that Musgrave can run into trouble. "If it's positive feedback, I revel in it. If it's negative feedback, I roll with the punches and go with it," he says, describing how he'll often resort to physical comedy, such as miming getting shot by an audience member, to get a cheap laugh.

Musgrave doesn't stress about not pleasing the entire audience. "If it's a really terrible audience, it's just like the tar baby; you get stuck to it, and you just go down," he says.

When faced with a "tar-baby audience," Patrick advises young comedians to try their best to finish their routine anyway. "You're not going to be funny all the time," he explains. "If you've got thick skin and can do it without people laughing and you believe in yourself, keep going."

Going too far

Sometimes, though, comedians can find themselves in hostile territory if they make the fatal mistake of not finding out beforehand what kind of people will be in the audience the night of the show.

Although Patrick emphasizes that "there's no topic out there that's untouchable" when it comes to comedy, he warns young comics to be wary of their audience's
background before they start cracking jokes.

Musgrave has made the mistake of not investigating his audience in the past. He recalls a routine where he made fun of turbans. After leaving his e-mail with the audience, he received an angry message from a Muslim audience member for having poked fun at the religion of Islam.

Racial differences can also be a sensitive spot for audiences. When it comes to jokes dealing with race, senior Ryan Dean goes by the rule that, if it's true, it's fair game. "When [comedians] make jokes about black society," he says, "things that are true, things that we do — that's funny. That's viable for them to come at us."

Being able to gauge if an audience is comfortable with edgy humor is an essential skills for a comedian, according to Dean. "When your audience asks you to stop, can you stop?" he asks rhetorically. "That's the test of a true comedian."