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So in addition to the nerves of the Duke/Texas game wrapping up, the first couple of folks TANKED. Thus, my confidence in my material, my usual swagger for being on stage (I've never once had stage fright for a play...ever), and my self-assuredness in general flew out the door. The audience was simply not responding to jokes.
Luckily, Duke won about TEN seconds before I was supposed to be on stage. As in, the guy before me was leaving the stage to applause when I found out. So the MC announced me, I went up on stage (I have no recollection of what my intro song was), and I went, "I don't know if y'all have been following on your phones or whatever, but Duke just lost." The whole crowd goes quiet in shock. One girl in the front row says, "Oh my god, are you serious??" Then everyone cheers. I give it a beat. Then I yell, "I'm just fucking with you, we WON! YEAH BABY! YEAH!!!" A big laugh. I get some swagger back.
I do some material about my superstitions, get decent laughter. I do a bit about UNC vs. Duke, and a bit about how Clemson sucks. Pretty big laughter there. My closer, an impression of Dick Vitale as a pimp, didn't go over as well as it did on my test audience, and I felt myself rushing because they were flashing the "wrap it up" light in my face. Still, when I left, I felt alright, mostly just relieved to have it done.
The competition went on VERY long. I felt bad for those who went towards the end of the night, cuz the natives were extremely restless. The Duke people were at a particular disadvantage, because aside from my girlfriend, one other comedian's girlfriend, and the fellow comedians, ZERO DUKE PEOPLE WERE THERE. By the time the Duke game ended and folks arrived, they were already full and sold out. So it was a pretty tough crowd.
Still, I made it through to the next round. The video will be online, for those of you interested-- I'll post it when it arrives. It was 5 minutes of BRAND NEW material, untested to a big audience, so I'm sure I'll absolutely hate watching it, lol. The way the next round works is that internet voting determines whether the top Duke comedians or the top UNC comedians make it through. I'll post the link here and in GD, with the hopes of pushing this thing forward. We'll be in the Elite Eight if we win that round, but since UNC has about a million more people than Duke, I'm pessimistic.
It's been an unbelievable experience though... although it's nerve-wracking, it's really a thrill, and feels great when it's working. Plus, the independence of the creative outlet is really refreshing since I've done nothing but collaborations the last few years. I might continue trying this out, going to open-mics and shit, seeing if I can develop this into something worth sticking to. Any of you comedy types, when you see my nerve-riddled untested material video, I really would welcome all feedback and/or words of encouragement and discouragement. My movies: http://russellhainline.com
My movie reviews: https://letterboxd.com/RussellHFilm/
My beer TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@thebeertravelguide
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