From Russia with Comedy, Producing Shows in Europe, and Edinburgh w/ Oleg Denisov | Ep 89

Today I sit with Oleg Denisov. We talk about doing comedy in Russia before the war, producing shows in Europe. How that affected his comedy and career. Also doing and producing shows in Edinburgh. He shares tips on producing shows. Also shares things about his brand East/West Comedy in Berlin.

Oleg's Socials
Instagram | Website

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Third Culture Talk Podcast is about people living in different cultures. Different than the culture they are from. Culture meaning, way of life, culture a person raised in, or place of birth. Guests ranges from third culture kids, artists, to comedians, to everyday people. We all are living in changing cultures and have a story to tell

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Music: "Chill Day" by Lakey Inspired

Transcript

00;00;00;00 - 00;00;26;16
Unknown
Today's guests we have somebody is very funny. You may assume all over because he does a lot of shows here in Berlin. He's an international comedian and hosts produce. Sir, creator of East West comedy. Let's welcome Oleg Denisov. Yeah. Welcome to the Third Culture talk podcast your host Nya Yeanafehn and in this podcast, we talk with people that are raised in a culture different than their parents, home culture or way of life or nationality.

00;00;26;18 - 00;00;47;18
Unknown
And now they live in in today's culture, which is vastly different than it is of our parents or even back in the day. If you like what you hear, great. Subscribe, share with your friends. Only takes two seconds to do so. Let's get in! Today's episode. Thank you for having me. No problem. I had the clap noises after, you know, okay, it sounds silent, but it would sound like there's like ten people.

00;00;47;18 - 00;01;04;06
Unknown
Yeah, in the room or a sold out audience of people in my living room here. So there you go. We have one chair. We have multiple chairs, so it's all good. I don't know how you been, man. How things been with you? I'm good, I'm good. Have been busy. Been, been a good year for for comedy here in Berlin.

00;01;04;06 - 00;01;22;10
Unknown
You know, a lot of shows, a lot of audiences. I mean, I'm sure you know. So. Yeah, but I do now. What about, like, four shows a week? Wow. The week. So I mean, obviously, like, the season is ending, so I'll do. Yeah, I'll do a bit less because there's no point. Yeah. Well are you doing good. That's a good thing because you know summertime once it comes that's it.

00;01;22;10 - 00;01;43;21
Unknown
It's like everyone wants to be outside. Well I mean, how do you like, how do you have the energy to do all that? That's like a lot of you know. Yeah, that's I don't that's that's the whole thing. Like it's just like I need to do that. Yeah. So because like, that's the only thing that I can kind of do as a stable sort of, you know, profession right now because, I mean, I can do other things.

00;01;43;21 - 00;02;00;29
Unknown
I have writing jobs, but that's never very stable. So. Right. Yeah. So that's like the only thing that I keep going kind of with it, like week in, week out, Yeah. So pretty much. But I mean, that's good, man. That's dope. And then you. So you originally from Russia, right? Yeah. And, And how long you been in Berlin for?

00;02;01;01 - 00;02;16;28
Unknown
I've been in Britain, actually three years now. I mean, with, like, small, like the first year, I was kind of around, like, all over, all over the place, but like, two and a half years legal. That's good. That's good. It's a good time for you to be here legally. Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Since we're recording and,

00;02;17;01 - 00;02;33;04
Unknown
But that's good, man. That's good. And you, do you doing great for, like, three years to be here? Yeah. I mean, this is going okay. Yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, the the first year, the first year I was, as I said, like I was traveling more because still I couldn't get any, like, a lot of work.

00;02;33;11 - 00;02;54;05
Unknown
I mean, not a lot of work. I couldn't legally do the you know, what I do? I try to do charts for the shows legally. So I didn't do it. Yeah. So I was doing more like I did, festivals. I did the fringe. I did like some shows in, like, other European countries. But for because it wasn't, it wasn't possible for me to do it in Berlin so far legally, but like, you know.

00;02;54;05 - 00;03;13;02
Unknown
Yeah, two and a half years ago, I set up the, the shows, East West comedy and, yeah, since then, since then, I've been more like, that's been my most stable thing that I do. Wow. Really? That in the world of comedy. That's insane to say, but that's crazy. That means you really unlocked something because comedy is like, you know, it could be all over.

00;03;13;07 - 00;03;28;02
Unknown
Yeah. So that's dope that you have sometimes consistent in and going well and you show the dope. I mean, I've done a couple or I don't know, I've done a lot and it's been good man. Every time you done insert things as a sub. So, so to start off or whatever. Right. So like Russia, you been here in Berlin.

00;03;28;02 - 00;03;44;22
Unknown
So like what, what made you move to Berlin? Was it like, what's going on there. Yeah. I mean the, the, the whole story was a bit, was a bit, wild initially because, like, I had this idea, even like pre-pandemic when I was doing a lot of tours, like, I've been to a lot all over the place.

00;03;44;22 - 00;04;04;24
Unknown
And then, of course, I spotted the fact that Berlin has, like, the biggest and the strongest sort of comedy scene. So it would be a really nice place if I wanted to, start from somewhere if I ever went to to Europe, like if, and then like when the pandemic happened again, got stuck inside Russia. So, I kind of abandoned most of the thoughts about it.

00;04;04;26 - 00;04;27;16
Unknown
And then, when, like when the war started, like 20, 22, I was supposed to be coming to do, like, a TV show here. Like, I was like, sort of like I had, like, a contract with, like, like a TV thing, like a production. And that was supposed to be like, they have this show which called The Understudy, which is sort of a political satire sketch stuff.

00;04;27;16 - 00;04;52;16
Unknown
Yeah. And then we were like, writing the script for like two months over zoom and stuff. And it was supposed to be about, you know, tensions between, you know, Russia and the rest of us, you know. Oh, yeah. Oh, so tensions, you know, some jokes there and then, but then when the, the actual war started, obviously, you know, like, we had to throw all the scripts in the bin in, it's like, this is this I got real everybody happy, but everybody's a victim.

00;04;52;16 - 00;05;18;26
Unknown
Yeah, yeah. Is like for real, you know? Okay. But then they decided still they were going to do the show. So I basically I took one of the last flights here and that was still going, wow. And then, after doing the show, obviously we made it like much more, you know, critical and much more open. And, actually I wasn't, you know, like, that was especially, especially, weird for me because like, on that, at that, at the show.

00;05;18;26 - 00;05;36;19
Unknown
Right. Like I was always kind of the one kind of campaigning for, oh, let's just say something like very horrible about Putin. Yeah. And they had to go, oh, we need to call the channel, you know, because, in Germany, they still didn't want to, especially then, like when it was kind of everybody thought that the war is going to be very quick.

00;05;36;26 - 00;05;56;07
Unknown
Yeah. So they have to live with like if I send Putin right, and the gas price is going to do like wait, wait, hold on, hold on. Winter is coming. Let's let's pull it back a little bit. Let's be easy on the jokes. And it's summertime. We could do it. Yeah, yeah. So basically. Yeah, that was, that was, like I was always, oh, let's say this and then, oh, we need to talk to somebody.

00;05;56;07 - 00;06;17;16
Unknown
And they go, yeah, they don't. They say we shouldn't, we shouldn't say that. But anyway, like, it went out. And then since then I've been kind of, I've been working on legalizing myself, like working on the documents. Nice. And just, doing whatever shows I could. Because of this, I didn't even have like a bank account because I wasn't, I wasn't able to because my Russian bank account didn't work.

00;06;17;18 - 00;06;33;23
Unknown
I couldn't have, couldn't have access to any money. So I just stole them the TV guys and they all. Can you just give me everything in cash? What? Like what? You. We don't do that. But, like, I have, like, no bank account and no way of getting one, so, you know, are you serious? How the hell would you able to maneuver with no bank account?

00;06;33;23 - 00;06;49;01
Unknown
Because, like, that's a big thing here in Europe. But you gotta have that. I mean, you know, all that stuff. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean, yeah, like for a few months it was like this maybe, maybe like 2 or 3 months. Then I was able to get like a spark account because they're the only bank that actually allows nonresidents.

00;06;49;01 - 00;07;07;24
Unknown
Like, if you prove prove to them that you're applying for residency, then, you can get a bank account there. So but just initially I just had, like, some cash and that's all. Oh, we're all. So he's walking around this lake. Immigration 200 years ago. Yeah, I guess he's walking around with a pocketful of euros just out here.

00;07;07;26 - 00;07;28;02
Unknown
Man, probably paying a rent all in cash. Wow. Yeah. Damn. So. Okay, that is crazy to to just think about that, man. And and to even go back further. Right, is a so you start a comedy in Russia. I started comedy in Russian. Yeah. Like. Like what? Like 8 or 9 years ago, I guess. Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

00;07;28;02 - 00;07;49;17
Unknown
Wow. Okay, so how how is like the comedy scene in Russia? Like, how was that? I mean, to be fair, it was pretty nice. Most of the time, I mean, until the start of the until the start of the war or like, the full scale war in 2022. Because when then they introduced, like, the new laws, like, it's kind of like, you know, it, you can't really say anything, which is like against the official position.

00;07;49;17 - 00;08;10;09
Unknown
That's a criminal Code article now. Yeah. You could go to prison for that. And before that it was not like, not like that. It was like basically just like a, you know, like an agreement, like a like an unwritten rule, let's say, like, if you want to go on any sort of proper media like TV, you know, make good money and entertainment, like, not necessarily comedy, you know, anything?

00;08;10;11 - 00;08;44;25
Unknown
Of course there you can't say anything and that's all pre censored. But if you just want to do shows and like comedy clubs, even though, like put something on YouTube, that's pretty fine. You know, like the nobody really cared about this so you know. Oh okay. So for for that that's and because of that like relative freedom, you know, they were like a few like in incidents, like a singular set of incidents, but like some, you know, some government official got offended or like the church got offended and there were like a few, but nobody actually went to prison for a joke, like, until recently.

00;08;44;25 - 00;09;05;03
Unknown
And then now you can really go to prison. Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Now a lot of comedians moved on, you know, like left Russia and some of the people who stayed, ones who stayed, they kind of deleted all their old videos. Wow. But yeah, but like, because of that relative freedom, comedy was really developing really fast. I think it's kind of similar to what's going on in Germany right now with the German comedy.

00;09;05;05 - 00;09;23;13
Unknown
Now, like, I think in the last few months, two big comedy clubs opened just in Berlin alone. Oh, yeah. Right. And this kind of like it's booming. Like, is there is the TV like. And it's kind of everything is pushing the other the other bit. So it's kind of like live shows. And then there's TV shows which are pushing the live shows and live shows getting more popular.

00;09;23;13 - 00;09;46;22
Unknown
They're pushing the creation of comedy clubs. So that's the process that we had in Russia, like, well, I mean, pretty much like leading up to 20, 22. Because after that, like, I'm not really following that much. I know just some people there. And like many of the people that I was working with, they also moved on because they're kind of like also, you know, you don't even have to be like a political comedian.

00;09;46;22 - 00;10;09;18
Unknown
We didn't in Russia. We didn't really have any like political comedians in the sense like, like in the UK for example, in America, you know, like there was like a common they have an hour and they're like, yeah, at least like, you know, 30 or 40 minutes political. Right? I mean, over there, Russia's real I mean, you know, but it's just like, even if you had like within an hour, if you had like ten minutes, which are political, you're considered political.

00;10;09;19 - 00;10;25;16
Unknown
Yeah. I mean, but that's how much that's the most amount of time they probably allowing it like I you you do you do your jokes. But you know, we we have apparatuses here in this government. We were watching. Yeah. No a lot of people are just like we're genuinely depressed with this. Like, yeah. Like we live with it.

00;10;25;17 - 00;10;46;29
Unknown
It's not the politics. It's not just like who we who we vote for is just like, you know, some like, you know, like the stuff that's, kind of sometimes really, really kind of oppressive or scary. I mean, yeah, yeah, they wouldn't like it's mostly it was like self-censorship, but not in the sense of like, political censorship, but in the sense of, like, people like are getting very depressed by the news in general.

00;10;47;01 - 00;11;06;22
Unknown
And so if you talk about it in the comedy for like longer than a few minutes, then people just start eating the whole experience. That's that's so interesting about this. That's what I just said about the political comedy because like, real and is like recent and it's like very it's on the grounds and what you're doing the comedy like, you know, the United States is still all those a lot of things are happening now.

00;11;06;22 - 00;11;41;10
Unknown
Yeah, it's still distant. It's like distant enough for you to be like, all right. From a distance. I'm talking about. Yeah, yeah. But here it's like no gas is expensive. Yeah. We're not going to say this joke on this TV show. Yeah. Let's scale it back into the summer. It's like oh okay. Is for real. Yeah. Yeah I think that's and then in Russia as well like because like the economics, the economy was never very stable like in the last recent, in the recent years, you know, and like in general people feel like for them like comedy, like it's was and that's kind of a big part of why it

00;11;41;10 - 00;12;06;25
Unknown
was getting so popular. It was pretty much a very escapist sort of, you know, sort of escapist situation. Like they wanted to joke, like that's why, you know, the most popular comics are the ones who don't really mention anything at all, which is real life. Yeah. To do something like very, very kind of basic, just because for them, like comedy is, very like the more detached it was, the more enjoyable it was.

00;12;06;25 - 00;12;21;15
Unknown
And even if, like, people are aware of the political situation, if they want to listen to some comedy, they would rather listen to something kind of, you know, not as current, you know, or something very kind of, you know, like abstract. Yeah. Abstract. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. It's like, please don't remind me of, like my reality. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah.

00;12;21;17 - 00;12;50;00
Unknown
So just like you go to a comedy show, it's like two hours of reality that's perfect for us. For us in person. It's like a great, great, great greatest. Okay, just forget about everything. It's kind of like either vodka or this. Yeah. That's true. Yeah, yeah. Oh. How was the Russian audience? I mean, because, you know, there's always a, a stereotype, let me say about, like, audiences in different, like, say, countries or whatever when it comes to comedy, how was a comedy like how was the Russian audience?

00;12;50;00 - 00;13;21;08
Unknown
The comedy. Yeah. I mean, like like again in the like recently like, I mean like I'm can talk about like the time when I left because. Yeah, I mean yeah, now it's. Yeah. They were like, the audience like in every country, I think it's not so much about especially at the comedy shows, you know, like, it's not so much about, like, the national, kind of, mentality, but more about how experienced they are in this particular art form.

00;13;21;10 - 00;13;39;23
Unknown
So it's sort of like when I just started coming to you like nine years ago, and there was mostly like there was one comedy club which is sort of operating. And then there were like most of the shows were just kind of random open mics and like bars and like because nobody knew how to do anything. It was basically just like, you know, like a bar which doesn't even have a separate room.

00;13;39;23 - 00;14;00;12
Unknown
And then like 50% of the people are there for comedy and 50% are just drinking, you know? And so obviously when the comedians, you know, starts talking about his dick or something like this and then like half the people got very angry and like, I think pretty much all the comedians, especially all the promoters who started open mics, like in that time in Russia, they have this story deal, you know, key as well.

00;14;00;12 - 00;14;15;21
Unknown
Key. The guy also they had a key the, the, the one with the eyepatch. Oh yes. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. He, he had like this I think he even has like one of the few ones which actually has a video of him getting punched in the face. And that's not how he lost his eye. No. Oh okay. Put two and two together.

00;14;15;21 - 00;14;31;23
Unknown
I was like wow. Yeah. No it it was later. But anyway that but I mean like each one of us had like at least like a very tense, some very tense interactions of people wanting to beat us up a damn punch in the face, though. Yeah, yeah, yeah, some some people actually got punched in the face. So comedy was that new.

00;14;31;23 - 00;15;01;14
Unknown
It was so new that people would just like, hey, look, I feel this way. I'll punch you right in the face. Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly, exactly. And then after a few years as it would get like on TV, it became like very mainstream. It became like the more comedy clubs appeared and, like, you know, as, like early 2022, it was very, you know, like, I wouldn't say that it was different from here, you know, like, of course, like the there was like, there is like a difference between, like what sort of topics you talk about and what sort of topics are more like more approachable.

00;15;01;14 - 00;15;20;29
Unknown
Of course, like the, the threshold for something like explicit is a bit kind of higher. Like you can't really go, you don't really go that detailed in most of the things though, like say, Russia even like sex though. Yeah, yeah really. Yeah yeah yeah. Because I don't know, I had this, preconceived notion that, the more eastward you go, the more darker the comedy is, like when it comes.

00;15;21;00 - 00;15;36;22
Unknown
Yeah. I don't know, like, I heard this meme from other comedians. Yeah, that one comes, like, you know, once a dark comedy, like, basically like, very like, you know, I don't know, I don't even know how you know. No, I mean, I get what you I get what you mean, because I've done comedy in, like, the place that you mean sort of like, you know, Czech Republic or anything like this.

00;15;36;22 - 00;15;51;22
Unknown
Yeah, but like in Russia, it's a different thing. It's like the culture of the public speaking culture is a bit different because they've been kind of the Czech Republic and like Poland and everything, they kind of they lived through the Soviet Union, like the Soviet Union, but like the Eastern Bloc. Yeah. And they had like all the censorship.

00;15;51;22 - 00;16;13;29
Unknown
But then they've been they've been free for like 30 years. So it's kind of like about like them saying like, fuck you to any sort of censorship and just people kind of, being honest about their experience in Russia, as I said, like it's an escapist entertainment sort of stuff. So it's just like people are like, uneasy about, like, you know, like they don't like comedy to get to real.

00;16;13;29 - 00;16;30;03
Unknown
That's the that's okay. So no. So then yeah, I mean, yeah, there was, there is some sexual but like, of course not like and not as in such detail as you can see like in Berlin or in America. You know, Berlin's insane, I mean, you know. Yeah. Well, also United States too. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, actually, this is crazy.

00;16;30;03 - 00;16;50;21
Unknown
Just as much to like the sexual stuff. So I would say, like, the audience are a bit more reserved. And of course, there's a big difference between the audience and like most Christian bitches, work like the two most kind of advanced, let's say cities in terms of culture and like the rest of the country. Then, in some places, if there was like comedy clubs and even big cities.

00;16;50;21 - 00;17;13;09
Unknown
But like, for example, the region is, like a bit more conservative. And then it's of course, like even if you come to a comedy club and they will tell you, you know, like it's kind of like they're not going to censor you. Like, like specifically, just like contractually, but they just say, oh, you know, it's like if you talk about this, you know, they're going to hate you and they're going to hate you and, and have somebody in the audience that's going to punch you in the face like, hey, you know, she what happened?

00;17;13;09 - 00;17;31;28
Unknown
I mean, we told you, but, you know, now you missing it on? Yeah. You talk to the doctor, you talk to the kids out of the ki. He has a lot of stories behind it. I. Why, how does not even missing here is just like a, you know, it's missing. Sorry. I mean, it's missing, but, like, I guess, like, it doesn't really see that, that's all, you know, like that anyway.

00;17;31;28 - 00;17;49;13
Unknown
So. Yeah, I think, I think I remember the story, but, like, you better ask him. Yeah, yeah. It's definitely not from the punch in the face from the audience. Oh. It's not. Okay, so for other reasons, we did get punched in the face, which is. Wow. Yeah. They always say, don't do don't be the first one because then you get punched in the face and that's.

00;17;49;14 - 00;18;14;16
Unknown
Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Wow. So the first place you travel to outside of Russia to do comedy, like was it, was it like Germany or was it like another. I went to to Edinburgh. Edinburgh. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. I had this idea when I started doing comedy in Russian, I realized that I want, like and especially because not just because, like, the audience were like, weird like because as I describe in this, the, you know, the venues or horrible and stuff, you know.

00;18;14;17 - 00;18;32;10
Unknown
Yeah, it's not just that, but also just because how, you know, how inexperienced the audience is, was in the comedians and like the and comedy was very as a result, you know, it was kind of very basic I would say, you know, like it's very sort of like, you know, it started developing later, of course. Yeah. But back then it was very basic.

00;18;32;10 - 00;18;57;10
Unknown
And then I was kind of like the comedians that I listened to that I like to listen to. They're like the English speaking comedians. And they were kind of they seemed like so much more fascinating than just like the scope of the things that you talked about. And so I just like, I did this thing that I basically just like I read about it like there was this festival that you can, you know, there's is like a lot of, a lot of comedy.

00;18;57;12 - 00;19;18;26
Unknown
Was what's 2017. Okay. You know like a lot of comedians that I liked that they do shows there and I'm like okay. So I guess I can go. Yeah. And then he's like fucking go ahead and wins. Yeah yeah yeah yeah. How, how was it. Because I mean Edinburgh I don't know about you man, but when I first went to Edinburgh Fringe Festival I didn't perform, but I just wanted to just kind of check it out.

00;19;19;00 - 00;19;36;02
Unknown
And it changed my whole perspective on like, how do you even make money from art? Even like the whole donation stuff? I mean, that was not even a thing when I started comedy. Like, it's a bucket and a hat. I was like, what is going on? Like, what are we expecting? Like quarters and people making like actual for real money?

00;19;36;02 - 00;19;54;28
Unknown
I was like, what's going on? So like how how was that experience for you going to Edinburgh for the first time? Oh, that. Yeah, that was like a really kind of a game changing thing. That's why now, for example, a, like, I mean, I don't like, I can't really advocate for going to the fringe now because of how expensive it is.

00;19;54;28 - 00;20;10;08
Unknown
And that's why I don't go myself like this year. I'm not going. Last year I didn't go and I don't think like unless I just want to throw some money away, you know, and then I'd rather roll with it the window and just see people's faces. Yeah. Just might as well give it to the people here. Yeah, yeah.

00;20;10;11 - 00;20;28;07
Unknown
Instead of giving to. Let's see, like for it's and everything's going to be fun but like because I think it's even that is more fun where you're throwing away your money than going to Edinburgh right now. Right. But like, back then it wasn't so bad. Completely not good. Like, it's not even it wasn't even close to to being this bad.

00;20;28;15 - 00;20;47;26
Unknown
But this, I'm saying, like, advocate. You know, going to the fringe earlier rather than later, like some because some people say it was like, oh, like when you're radio, when you have like a show that you've been working on for like many years, and then you come and and then you come and then in this case, it's just like just another platform.

00;20;47;26 - 00;21;21;18
Unknown
You just kind of it's just another stage you go to if you're already kind of formed as a comedian, you formed your style, you formed your everything. Then there's no point in being in such a fist. Yeah. It's like, why go like you? It's better to go underprepared and then just from just doing other show, seeing other shows, seeing so many great acts, you can see many of them for free or nearly for free, and you can see, like some, you know, like the top of the range stuff of very different style as well, because the, the amount of like, I mean, I'm sure you, you know, and then remember and then like

00;21;21;18 - 00;21;42;01
Unknown
how the amount of like anything which can be branded as like alternative comedy is so and it's so respected there. Yeah. And it's so, you know, like, so you basically, you come out of there not just stronger with your, like, with a stronger show because you get to practice it every day, but also with all these influences.

00;21;42;01 - 00;22;01;00
Unknown
And I think like the earlier you start going the better, because when you go like underprepared, undeformed. Yeah. Then it's kind of it forms you as a comic, you know, like all these experiences interest, because I think when you were just like a comic where you already have like clear, distinct style that, you know, makes you money and then you just go like, oh, that's another stage, basically.

00;22;01;03 - 00;22;17;01
Unknown
Yeah, you get to do it a lot of times. Right. But like, yeah. So I think, you know, it's good that I was completely underprepared the first year I went, but I went with the show. I had a show. Yeah. Oh, he did, like the whole run. Yeah. Well, the first time you did a whole run.

00;22;17;04 - 00;22;39;07
Unknown
Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was a fun experience. I did the show it to 11 a.m. in the morning every day. Yeah. And, but, Edinburgh is the only place you can do that because, like, I never had to cancel the show. Sometimes I would have, like, a, I mean, a few, just a few people, but, like, there was always some people, so that's that's good.

00;22;39;07 - 00;22;55;23
Unknown
Sometimes I would have like 30 or 40 people. That's good on a on 11 a.m.. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. I mean on the weekend. Yeah. Like on a weekday basically it was. Yeah. About like say 10 or 8 people. So yeah. But still it's still you can do a show that's good because sometimes you only get a couple people, especially around that.

00;22;55;25 - 00;23;08;27
Unknown
Yeah. So you must have a good location or something or. Yeah, it was okay. It was a good location. It was just like a kind of. Obviously it was a time slot, which wasn't like, you know, very popular. And that's why, I was able to get it. But in the end, it was a great experience.

00;23;08;27 - 00;23;34;21
Unknown
And especially since I did like this 11 a.m.. Actually, I liked, I liked the experience. And that's why I like, you know, over the years at the fringe, I do all sorts of, all sorts of time slots and all sorts of, well, locations were mostly, like, very central. So that was that was good because I, I was already I in the first year already realized, like, if you're not doing a central location, then, yeah, there's it's really going to be frustrating.

00;23;34;22 - 00;23;54;20
Unknown
Oh yeah. Yeah. So it's very bad. But like, I did the first year, I did 11 a.m., the second year I did like 12 at nights like midnight. Yeah. That's a little tricky to get. Everyone starts going out. So again, this is already too late. It's like even here to do a show. It's like. Because here, like, your nightlife starts at like 8 or 7.

00;23;54;20 - 00;24;15;13
Unknown
And so it's kind of, oh, it's a few. But like if you people start seeing shows at 11 a.m., then, you know, it's like, hey, when you start the day, you know, keep it going. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So it's kind of by that time, unless it's like the weekend where, you know, the whole city is full of people like tourists and everything, like, it was a worst experience overall.

00;24;15;14 - 00;24;36;28
Unknown
Maybe I had, like, overall, more people, but they were very, most of the time they were very tired and drunk and. Yeah, not even rowdy by this point. The rowdy ones are like 10:10 p.m.. Like, they just like sleepy. Yeah. The stag parties, as they call it, right? Where people come into like, yeah, yeah, yeah, but they already drunk by, like, you know.

00;24;37;03 - 00;24;54;16
Unknown
Yeah. Afternoon. And so, you know, they're super rowdy at like 9 or 10 and then like, they're sleepy at midnight. Yeah, they're kind of like, well, what do we do? I don't even understand if the joke works or not. Yeah, yeah. Like I don't think is me, I think. Is the audience for real? Yeah. For sure. An 11 a.m. is actually not so bad because people are.

00;24;54;16 - 00;25;20;04
Unknown
Yeah. People are alert. And I get to practice the flying a lot. So I got, like, a lot of experience with that. It's, I came to an even enjoy it at some point, you and you started. Okay. So. Damn, you was there for a minute. Who's out there for a long? Oh, if you went to that point where you're like, I think I, I think I like this, I think this, I like touching paper and releasing it and touching and releasing.

00;25;20;07 - 00;25;38;00
Unknown
No, no, no, I mean, it was it was frustrating initially, but then I got some, you know, like, I got some pleasure from the fact that I actually got better at this. And like, for example, when you just see the people and you just know, you know, like, okay, at this point it's not even worth flying for that person.

00;25;38;02 - 00;25;59;12
Unknown
And then, like, this person is like the one which you, you come, you come up to them and you just say a couple of words. So it's kind of just the general idea. Yeah. And then the other is, you know, you strike some banter and strike some conversation. Yeah. And then just kind of learning, to identify these things very early.

00;25;59;14 - 00;26;16;16
Unknown
And just being a good flier. Being good flier for yourself. Right. So I think it's, it was a it was a good experience. It's a good skill too, man. I mean, it it makes you own like your show in a different way, right? Because it's like my face is on it. Here's the name I got to convince somebody.

00;26;16;16 - 00;26;34;01
Unknown
Looks. Am I looking at you like, what is this? You know, like, oh, yeah, I got to prove myself. Oh my God, I haven't prepared some jokes because I'm like little liars, you know? They know. They know you're for real, you know? So am I looking at your face skeptically on a poster like, oh, you're like, oh, wow, I gotta, I gotta really change this quick or else this paper is going right on the floor right in front of me.

00;26;34;04 - 00;26;49;01
Unknown
Yeah. Like not too far away from it. Yeah, right. Is Raina that's your hard work there? Yeah. You're like, wow, that cost money. Wow. Okay, this is the 10th time I seen this today. This is not good. Did you, did you did you do a show there? I have I didn't do a show. I actually just went there to visit.

00;26;49;01 - 00;27;07;12
Unknown
I had a roommate who's getting married to a Scottish woman, and, I just decided I heard about this Edinburgh Fringe Festival. I was like, you know what? Let me go and check it out. And, I checked it out. I was still doing comedy at the time, but I didn't know anything like before. Pandemic. Anything outside of, America, United States was just like.

00;27;07;14 - 00;27;28;21
Unknown
It was just like, all right, I got to be top touring comedian and United States first before even thinking about, like, who am I? I'm not, you know, world renowned. Like, what am I doing? So I just went there kind of like just check it out. And then I started seeing people perform and I just traveling to do some like, oh, you can just fly here and do it.

00;27;28;23 - 00;27;53;06
Unknown
It's kind of crazy. So then I just did did I'm not sick, but it's just the rest of it. Yeah, I'm 90% believe you are. 90% believe you. If I, if I'm out, guys, just know that, or like I said, I don't joke the joke joke is allergies. Anyways, but yeah, just the whole concept of, coming out here and performing was like, just not even in the mindset.

00;27;53;06 - 00;28;09;13
Unknown
And so I came to Edinburgh and then Edinburgh, I was like, wow, okay. And I actually knew some people that perform in Edinburgh, like, there's one girl, her name is, Krista Commodore. She does like some clown stuff. Like, basically she's, she's she acted at the time as a sex therapist, and she's doing, like, the show.

00;28;09;13 - 00;28;29;07
Unknown
And was she a sex therapist? And how to. I don't know, I'll do some stuff to do. Jokes for work and things. And when I saw that, I was like, oh, okay. Cause I saw her do. Cause we did, clown class together, and we were seeing her work as this character and then actually going to Edinburgh and, and then doing it and doing it in front of, like, you know, people, different types of people.

00;28;29;09 - 00;28;57;15
Unknown
And I'm like, oh, shit. Okay. So from here to here, you can still do it. All right. Yeah. And then that kind of changed my whole perspective. Yeah. And the first year when I was there, it was like when I was doing 11 a.m., it was actually like, maybe it was even the best decision to go, like to do 11 a.m. just because, like, I would, you know, and flier for my show and I do my show and then I would, you know, the rest of the day I could just kind of I could see stuff.

00;28;57;17 - 00;29;16;21
Unknown
I could see stuff. I could meet people. Yeah. Network, I mean I did some like open mics and whatever course you have to do, but also like I was just like I prepared so well for, you know, the festival itself, I just read all the program, I just bought all the tickets that I wanted to go to see, you know, some, some kind of really top performers.

00;29;16;21 - 00;29;33;21
Unknown
Yeah. And of course, like, there's, there's so many that I learned about, but I was already there, so it's like, oh, I saw a lot of free fringe shows. And I learned that the free fringe shows are sometimes better than the normal shows. Like, they're not necessarily shit. Yeah. You're like, oh, some things are worse for free.

00;29;33;21 - 00;29;57;10
Unknown
Okay. Yeah, yeah yeah, yeah. So yeah. And yeah, since then it was like, I think the for like the, it was like it's, it's really like a drug, you know the Edinburgh experience because I was trying to be like understand how why it works like this. Because I knew so many people, especially from the UK, from London, for example, who come for like ten, 15 years and they don't even make money.

00;29;57;10 - 00;30;15;18
Unknown
They like sometimes they lose money. They don't. They don't make almost anything, you know. So it's not like a money maker. Yeah. Even like now it's like completely horrible. You know, like even a few years ago, it was never about, like, making a lot of money. So breaking even. Yeah, breaking even is pretty good. Yeah, breaking even is pretty good.

00;30;15;21 - 00;30;34;16
Unknown
And so I started to realize, like, what the. You know, what the what the catch is. And then I think it's like I realized that it's probably it's sort of like a children's camp for adults. It's kind of for a month, you kind of. You're, escape. You escape your everyday routine. Even if you were a performer, you still have a routine.

00;30;34;22 - 00;30;53;05
Unknown
Yeah. And this is like a completely different routine, which is so intense that you can't really think about anything else beyond the festival. Right. So everybody who you, if you meet and then everybody just speaks about, like the festival stuff, like how the marketing goes, how to how to fly or how to do this stuff. Do that. What shows they saw, what's like what what happened at the show today and like all of that.

00;30;53;07 - 00;31;24;04
Unknown
And so for a month it's very intense. So draining at the end. Oh yeah. But also is just like completely self-sustaining sort of environment, which is just like you only exist in the moment, in this moment. You go to, you know, like in the same like cafes, for example, you speak with like people, there, and, like, you know, so many places now that, like, I haven't been, haven't been there for like two years now, the 2023, the last time I did.

00;31;24;04 - 00;31;38;12
Unknown
Oh, okay. So. Yeah. It's been a while for you. Yeah. Yeah. That's and then, but then if I go to like, a lot of places even, like, you know, like a shop or a cafe, like, people will know me really good, you mean. Okay, so because these cafes are there for a while. Yeah. Yeah. Right. Like I remember it is one pizza.

00;31;38;17 - 00;31;56;28
Unknown
There's one pizza store is open out to late. Is underneath this bridge or something that I don't I mean, there's a lot of this kind of like old places, which is like, this is the famous, soup place, which is like, very like if you're not in if you because you can't treat it like shitty food, like for a month and, break down, you know.

00;31;56;28 - 00;32;16;03
Unknown
Yeah. And then there's this, lovely, place which is owned by, like, a Polish guy. And it's been there for, like, a long time, and they have, like, this salad, soups and, like, sort of paninis with, with, like, kind of meat and vegetables. And it's kind of like as close as you can get to, you know, like a normal food.

00;32;16;05 - 00;32;30;15
Unknown
But in the center. Yeah. And also it has like a super nice view on the castle, and they just sit outside and drink. Okay? Everything else is fried. I remember that was like, oh, yeah, that was good. The food is. Yeah, it was just it was just like grease fried. But the thing is it was in season.

00;32;30;22 - 00;32;52;14
Unknown
So you're eating and you're like, this should taste like more season, but it's just grease that I'm tasting. Yeah. What's going on? Just like fried fish, heavy oil chips, heavy oil with no salt. And it's like, I know. How could I never eat? Fried food is not salted. I was like, this is, culture shock. They just like to fry things, that's all.

00;32;52;14 - 00;33;14;25
Unknown
Yeah. It is. Give it to you like this. Is it my. That's it. You sure you missed a couple steps? At least get some sort of some pepper. Have you tried the fried Mars bars? Deep fried? No. No. What? I never came to try that. That's immediate diabetes. That's immediate diabetes and high blood injection of diabetes. Yeah, though that's immediate to the top ten things that kill people immediately.

00;33;14;25 - 00;33;32;23
Unknown
Right there. Yeah. Wow. So. Oh, so you did you do you start running shows before going to, Edinburgh? Like or so I was the first leg back in Russia, and I didn't run the show. No. And just so it will also it was my first experience actually promoting sort of like a show. Whoa. So you this is a crash course for you?

00;33;32;23 - 00;33;54;01
Unknown
Like. Yeah, go right in and then learning how to flier and my market your shows and yeah market right. Press releases everything like I didn't know anything but then that's why it got it was so you know informative and so such as like this crash course was like super useful. And even if of course I lost money the first year and, but I gained a lot more.

00;33;54;01 - 00;34;08;15
Unknown
Yeah. So then you probably came back to Russia, like. Yeah, I know how to do some shit. Yeah, yeah. Pretty much. Yeah. If I came in, I was like, all right, we start the show soon. As soon after. Yeah. We were I started to to. Yeah. To organize more shows. To write show. 8:30 p.m. you know, pay what you want.

00;34;08;16 - 00;34;27;09
Unknown
No one gets punched in the face. Oh, there's no punches here. Everyone's like, oh, wow, this guy, this place is great. What? I have a nice evening. Take a day now and I have a scared our alarm. That's good. Yeah, yeah. Pretty much. Yeah. So then you went to Edinburgh and then, came out here and then I guess because you're most,

00;34;27;11 - 00;34;42;27
Unknown
I mean, obviously you do a lot of things, but like here in Berlin, you have a lot of shows where you. I like the, the Wednesdays to Friday to Saturday to Sunday. Yeah, yeah. No, no. Yeah. And, when you first got here to Berlin, like, how was that, like, process. Like, how was that for you? Because, I mean, you came here.

00;34;43;00 - 00;35;22;03
Unknown
No bank account. You know, you figure things out. How was like that journey? Like, to get to a show, basically. Yeah. I mean, because, one thing that, like, between this kind of time when I was doing Edinburgh, and I was doing shows in Europe. And the and me coming to Berlin after, you know, 2020, in 2022, there was also this period of like, because like when the pandemic started, the 2020 like early 2020, I was only kind of I was getting the bigger, the biggest, kind of direction with my tours here in Europe.

00;35;22;05 - 00;35;38;22
Unknown
So I was, like just like when the lockdown started, like, like a month before I was on a month, like, I was touring for a month here in, in Europe. I did like, oh, wow. Where like 20 something cities, something like this. Nice, bro. Yeah. And it was, it was pretty good. And it was like.

00;35;38;22 - 00;35;54;15
Unknown
And where you was planning. Okay. And I will organize it. And not just like a solo tour, but also like a tour for like, myself and two more people. So it's kind of like a line up sort of tour. Right. And it was going well, I figured out by this point, like how to market, how to do, how to do like a lot of things.

00;35;54;18 - 00;36;16;16
Unknown
So he was like, then he was like, all right, I'm ready. I'm comfortable. Let's do this. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And so I was already planning like new dates, new tours. Yeah. But in, in Russia, like, I've the when the pandemic hit and then the lockdown happened, like, got Russia got disconnected because, like, our vaccine wasn't accepted here, and, the vaccines from here not accepted there.

00;36;16;16 - 00;36;34;23
Unknown
So they had to disconnected, more or less completely. Not completely. But like, the travel was, like, pretty much non-existent, even though, you know, like, lockdowns in Europe were different, like, I mean, like in the UK, in Germany there were pretty hard lockdown in Spain, not so much. Yeah, I heard it still shows happening. A lot of shows were happening there.

00;36;34;23 - 00;36;57;26
Unknown
Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's how Barcelona became so prominent during that period. Oh, wow. Okay. Not before that. Barcelona was never like a big, big scene. Yeah. It's like small went. I went there one time, and it was like, it was. Yeah. I think Comedy Club House was still. It's actually so funny. They had it like where it, it now to have like that long, they kind of reoriented the clubhouse or whatever.

00;36;57;29 - 00;37;17;15
Unknown
The downstairs, they used to have it like to where it was like on the, so all the way at the back. But they had it this time near the door. Yes. Not like more like of, around the room, like I. Yeah, I set up even more because, like, when it's, like long. Yeah. Like it's always kind of like there's a disconnect between, like, the back rows and yeah, they start talking and blah, blah, blah.

00;37;17;15 - 00;37;33;26
Unknown
And like, I like the setup which like, that's why, you know, like I like the Brigitte like British comedy clubs, for example. I do that a lot because like in American comedy, I mean, I've never been to America, but like, I, I know a lot of comics from there, so I just like what I know from them was that in America is mostly like in a comedy club.

00;37;33;26 - 00;37;54;05
Unknown
You also have like food and like table service and stuff. And so like some disconnect even is like encouraged, you know. Yeah. But in the UK it's because they do this shows with breaks and they only serve drinks. And so sometimes they do the shows even they would like not just one break, but like with two breaks, like half an hour, ten minute break, half an hour, ten minute break.

00;37;54;05 - 00;38;12;13
Unknown
That is so okay. Is that a that's like a norm across all of Europe, like a 30 minute break thing? No, no. Like a like a 30 minute, like part of the show. Like not breaks. Yeah. But I mean the, the, the, the whole, you know, like the norm I would say or like the what is like accept like the most acceptable is like just two halves with one break.

00;38;12;13 - 00;38;31;22
Unknown
Yeah. But as I said, like in the UK, in the comedy clubs they have more than like 2 or 3 breaks. So it's like 30 minutes break, 30 minutes break, the two minutes break. Wow. So okay, so it's like after 30 minutes it have to be a break. Well after 45 or 50 minutes I would say. Yeah. So that's like the normal way of doing it.

00;38;31;22 - 00;38;51;02
Unknown
Like I mean that's what we do here in Berlin. But like in the UK like like I don't think anybody else does it. It's kind of like a show, which is I mean, it's kind of I think the tradition actually dates back to like, like circus variety shows because because they had that, you know, like a dinner show, for example, that there's like a 30 minutes of, like, art, like performance.

00;38;51;02 - 00;39;16;01
Unknown
Yeah. And then there's like a little break where they give, bring out the food or drinks, and then they take your, you know, dishes and stuff. So it's kind of so that people wouldn't eat during the thing or, you know, and then in the UK, comedy clubs like, especially like the, you know, the big comedy clubs, they have this kind of, like the, the chairs are very close to each other.

00;39;16;02 - 00;39;34;19
Unknown
Yeah. So it's kind of there's no, no, like there's no tables or anything. Just people are just kind of huddled together. Yeah. And the only can have this kind of like plastic glasses of like beer or wine or whatever, right. And they kind of, they listen to the show for 30 minutes and then there's like ten minute break for drinks.

00;39;34;19 - 00;39;51;24
Unknown
They go out to like a bar room and there's like a lot of taps and like a bar. The bartender is kind of serving. Serving them. Yeah, go to the toilet and whatever. Then they come back with the beer to, to listen to another 30 minutes and there's another break. And sometimes there is like even a third break.

00;39;51;26 - 00;40;10;16
Unknown
That is okay. So that was the first that was one of, main things that really threw me off, as a comedian, coming from, New York City, coming in here was the breaks. I was like, all right, why are we stopping? You know, so going was what about let people leave? Because, you know, I was like, are people going to come back?

00;40;10;21 - 00;40;29;03
Unknown
What? Why are they going? There's like, oh, we're going to take a break and then we'll come back ten minutes. I'm like, yes, what is happening? And then even actually, it was funny, I recently did my hour or something. Right. And I didn't do a break. So yeah. So I realized, because I'm like think are you do an hour or so I'm doing an hour right to an hour.

00;40;29;03 - 00;40;47;11
Unknown
Right. But, as I was performing, I realized some people were just kind of like, all right, break, break, break. And and somebody told me at the end it was like, what happened to the break? I'm like, what? And it's an hour was like, yeah, but, we needed a break. Like, some people were getting up there shielding their face, like, oh my gosh, I want to because I don't want to disrupt the show.

00;40;47;11 - 00;41;01;04
Unknown
Don't interrupt. And yeah, yeah. Is it polite? And I was like, Americans, be polite. Yeah. I know for me I'm like, yo, please disrespect. Are you serious? Like, don't piss on yourself. Why are you watching me? I don't want that liability. I might get sued, you know, come from a suing country. So I'm like, hey, use the bathroom.

00;41;01;04 - 00;41;28;26
Unknown
Do something. I'm not liable for your pants being pissed off. But here. Yeah, yeah. Like the breaks here and. Yeah. So. But the thing about, like, actually in Russia, that's what happened. Like when the, when, when it was disconnected. I opened a comedy club in Russia, like a full time sort of comedy club. I, it just kind of happened because we were organizing some shows before, but then we realized that, like, we're not going on tour anymore, you know, me.

00;41;28;26 - 00;41;47;00
Unknown
And, like, my friend was kind of helping me organize that, and so we were like, yeah, well, we like, basically we just were searching for like a venue for some, like some some new venue for some new shows. Yeah. And then we came across like a room which you could rent out and just it was like a concrete box, like nothing there.

00;41;47;00 - 00;42;06;00
Unknown
Oh, this stuff. Oh, that's so good. Low ceilings. Yeah, yeah. Oh, so good for comedy. You guys had a good. Yeah. Yeah. And so, yeah, we basically just built it like there was like a lockdown because in Russia the lockdown didn't really exist. Like as such because, you know, it was like a lockdown for like two, two months.

00;42;06;00 - 00;42;23;04
Unknown
And then the government realized, okay, so we if we don't allow people to go to work, we need to give them money and fuck that. So they then there's like, oh, you guys, you'll be fine. Yeah. Like you know, like in the Rocky movie, if he dies, he dies. Yeah. Like a drug goes. Yeah. So yeah.

00;42;23;04 - 00;42;46;01
Unknown
And, so for like, especially. And so it worked out really well, in terms of, like when there was lockdown and, like, open and like a place, it started to open up and then like, even start to open up. The show was, weren't allowed, like, you know, like cafes, restaurants, but not like public sort of events like, and so during all that time we spent to, to building, like, the place.

00;42;46;01 - 00;43;06;00
Unknown
Wow. And, it worked out and like, it's like, precisely when the lockdown was lifted, we were actually able to open, and, of course, people were starved for, so it's a great time. Yeah. It was, it was two, two years. We did that great times. Like, it was one of the best times in my life, really.

00;43;06;00 - 00;43;25;23
Unknown
Like, Yeah. It was so much fun. But I was basically kind of. We built it like three it plus three people. And then we had, like, a team, later, like, some people change. But like, overall, I would say with like five, six, about six people work there. Wow. But I was the one which well, basically it was my legal responsibility and.

00;43;25;23 - 00;43;50;00
Unknown
Yeah, you know, like organizing and creating the, the schedule and the program and marketing and pretty much everything. Oh, again, like, which is something like on this scale, I never had this experience before. Yeah. And, so I just learned through, you know, like doing but then, it works really well. It was exactly the type of club that we wanted to do initially.

00;43;50;07 - 00;44;09;02
Unknown
We had shows in English there, and we had shows in Spanish there. Wow. Which is apparently a thing like in Russia. There is little to like the number of Spanish people, but there's a lot of like, Latino like people from Latin America. Yeah. Mexicans. Wow. In Russia. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, because for them, Russia is a rich country, so.

00;44;09;09 - 00;44;35;18
Unknown
Well. But it's a far country. It's way. Yeah. Like there's a lot more Latin countries and clubs much, much, much safer and, you know, much less guns, much less in Russia. Yeah, yeah. Oh I mean in the street. Yeah. It's not some I mean now it's more but yeah we go. Yeah. Like, you know, kind of like illegal traffic but like let's say, you know, like in the last, you know, like ten, 20 years before the war, like it wasn't, it wasn't so like, I mean, big cities were pretty safe.

00;44;35;18 - 00;44;52;28
Unknown
I would say they were the safest here, you know, like it was it wasn't it wasn't bad. This way. So like, for people, like for people from Latin America, of course, you know, some of some countries which were kind of like, you know, like Mexico or, you know, Bolivia or Colombia. Yeah. Like it's, like a pretty nice place to go to.

00;44;52;29 - 00;45;09;17
Unknown
They came from all the way because, you know, he got I mean, he got Spain, you know, Portugal. You got. Yeah. Yeah. You know, a lot of countries to go from there. And I mean, if you going even westward in I mean that's to go to Moscow or Saint Petersburg or any of those places like you got to fly way over.

00;45;09;17 - 00;45;34;08
Unknown
So that's like a migrant visa situation. Of course, it's more difficult. So I wouldn't say there's like, like a huge number, but like, you know, there's enough. Apparently it was enough. It was enough to get to have all country shows. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So and then we did the shows for, I'm saying, like we had this vision of, like creating a club for the people that didn't really have a club for them, you know, like something like this.

00;45;34;15 - 00;45;54;23
Unknown
So, we, because of course, you know, the comedy. And in Russia it has like, a certain flavor. It was very like big part of it is very sort of bro ish, sort of hyper masculine. Right? I mean, Russia comic. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Russian comedy. Yeah. It makes sense. Yeah, yeah. It's kind of own brand. And then like the TV comedy again, just because they're very sensitive.

00;45;54;23 - 00;46;19;01
Unknown
But also that means that they also kind of push a lot of like this narrative is kind of like, you know, women joking about how their husband can go to the can't go to the shop properly. And you know, all of this and it's, hacky stuff, basically stuff. Yeah, yeah. And so like, most of the like, but by that time they're like, you know, so to have a like I always say this, you know, to have a to have it like when I started to do comedy in Russia, I was trying to be an alternative comedian.

00;46;19;01 - 00;46;37;28
Unknown
But then I realized that there's if there's no mainstream, then there's no alternative. So yeah, it's like, where are you going to that? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because like, people won't understand what you're trying to do unless they know what's supposed to happen. Right. And then like by that time, the mainstream already formed in the mainstream was that there was like the, you know, like very, like a bluish stuff.

00;46;37;28 - 00;47;01;18
Unknown
And then there's like this hacky, middle aged TV stuff, and then the people who are like younger people like Gen Z and people who are like, more want to listen to more political jokes. Yeah. And people who are like, into, you know, like family. There was like this small, like there were like young, you know, like young, younger girls were doing, like, feminist combing, like, and then them stand up.

00;47;01;21 - 00;47;19;21
Unknown
So I got them in. There was, oh, no, they were doing like some very shitty bars. And then like a, they had a I for them to to. Yeah. To like a proper club. And so and the comedians who are like in Berlin right now like then we moved on. Yeah. Denis stranger and Sasha, Sasha and Key as well.

00;47;19;27 - 00;47;44;13
Unknown
They all did shows there, in my club there because it was like a place where not just there, but like they were very, very regularly doing shows there because especially their own shows that they could set up, like and just market the way they wanted to. They've quite often did the shows there just because it was like the place for, you know, people who don't have another, you know, community as a comedy club.

00;47;44;13 - 00;48;03;24
Unknown
Yeah. It gets very tough. Yeah, yeah. So it's kind of more about like this sort of like and it became in the end, like an alternative comedy club, more kind of, for, for for people who are like, you know, more aware more. I wouldn't even say like, it's it's in Russia. It's not like, like, you know, the whole debate about political correctness.

00;48;03;24 - 00;48;20;07
Unknown
It's not like here, of course, like it's a very different thing, I would say. So I would say like, that there's like by Russian standards, these people were kind of more progressive. But like now in, you know, because in the, in the West you have like people who are like too much progressive, like you just weird. Yeah.

00;48;20;07 - 00;48;38;00
Unknown
And then, in Russia it was like the progressive which are actually progressive, which actually have like, you know, or you shouldn't, you know, beat women or you shouldn't joke about rape or whatever. Yeah. Well, what was progressive in Russia was like regular for some. They like, you know, don't punch. Don't you have a disabled people don't hate minorities like that.

00;48;38;01 - 00;48;59;05
Unknown
So it's kind of like the normal use words. This emotion, this thing is emotions, you know. Yeah, yeah, yeah. A and so yeah, that's that's was the idea. Right. And it actually works really well. Yeah. So I mean how how did you balance bro, the, the comedian part of like performing and then you running a club because those are two different.

00;48;59;08 - 00;49;13;01
Unknown
Yeah. Yeah yeah yeah. I mean I don't know I didn't, I think I managed it for a while because I had this, I had this outlet because I was still going to the fringe and, and for me, the fringe was still like the biggest thing in comedy for me personally. So it's the thing that I enjoyed the most.

00;49;13;01 - 00;49;30;05
Unknown
And so, of course, like during the pandemic, like I wasn't able to go, but like as soon as I was able, I went again. And so for me, like the whole kind of year was and it doesn't matter. Like if I wrote jokes on like in Russian or in English, right? Yeah. It was like I had this kind of idea that by August I should have like an hour of jokes, something like this.

00;49;30;05 - 00;49;56;17
Unknown
Now, and so I kind of like sometimes I would write more, sometimes write less, but then, like in the end, I always try to, you know, go for something like this. But of course, like the opportunities for touring were much more limited when they started to do the, the club like kind of but but this I guess I started to enjoy the whole thing about like, you know, doing it, having a place which, you know, yeah, it's going to be good shows.

00;49;56;17 - 00;50;20;14
Unknown
Right. And so you just kind of you go on stage, you do good shows, you know, that's it. I enjoy it, you know, just because you control, you know, like you're not going to do like a random venue which will cancel on your inside. You know, that's a good bicep to have, man, because, you know, when it comes to most comedians in terms of doing logistical things like promoting or having the your show and things like that, it's it's like hell, you know, it's like people are like, I don't even want to deal with it.

00;50;20;14 - 00;50;34;14
Unknown
And then for you, you found like a, you know, like a love or a, let's just say an if, let's how would you say not efficiency, but you, you, you, you know, you know, how do I actually make it happen? You know what I mean? In a way that's a consistent because again, you shows are very good man.

00;50;34;14 - 00;50;51;19
Unknown
Like, you know, in terms of the people that come out, the marketing and everything, but then balancing that and the comedic side, it's like, that's a difficult oh yeah, that's a difficult thing. Can you want to do spots? But then you might be like, I gotta say like market shows, like, I mean like, yeah, I gotta be I wouldn't run this computer movie, you know, like and.

00;50;51;21 - 00;51;17;17
Unknown
All right. But yeah, I mean, like for me, the easiest, easier part is and I don't really, you know, especially since the start of the, the start of the war and everything, I realize that there's not much, not much going for me in terms of, like, solo shows in general anymore. Why so? Well, I mean, just because of how reality works.

00;51;17;17 - 00;51;41;23
Unknown
Just because, of course, you know, like when I was even trying to set up some shows in the places which were obviously some places which I loved doing before like that, I can't really do anymore, like the Baltic states and stuff. Oh, you can't. Yeah. Yeah. Because that's the difference between like, for example, because like, you know, some other Russian comics like done and such and everything because they played to like because they had like a lot of fans back home in some, some of them, some of the fans also moved here.

00;51;41;23 - 00;52;05;25
Unknown
So they just play to their own people. They don't play to foreigners, they play to Russians. But like, do we do in English for some reason? Let's do it in Russian and English. But just like, you know, like, that's this kind of like they don't do, you know, they don't promote it as, like they don't set up a concept, they don't run ads for like, non Russian speakers, for, you know, so they would come to that interest.

00;52;05;27 - 00;52;23;04
Unknown
But I always like when I was doing shows in Russia that I did shows for Russians, but then I did shows in, in the, in like a foreign, foreign countries. I would do the shows for foreigners. And so that's why, you know, like always kind of, you know, had let's try, try to do marketing to have like a lot of visibility.

00;52;23;04 - 00;52;42;28
Unknown
But anyway, I started to do that, after 2022, it's got pretty, you know, like some place I can go to, like Baltic states, because all connections, because of, you know, I mean, they're understandably anti-Russian, even though I understand that, like, I mean, they I understand that they understand that I'm not, like, pro-Putin, obviously. You know that.

00;52;43;03 - 00;53;07;13
Unknown
Yeah, but, like, the whole thing is, like, venues won't accept you anymore, like, all the really. So even venues because of the whole political aspect. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Because they kind of view the venues which are like, you know, they're kind of aware of like, you know, some of their customers will be upset and people sometimes are just like stupid, you know, just just like they see somebody who's coming from Russia and they just go, oh, you know, why would you have a person from Russia?

00;53;07;14 - 00;53;23;21
Unknown
Interesting. But then if you have like a following or whatever that like kind of, you know, in Russia that came over, then they would at least bit. Yeah. But I was, as I said, like the for the last like two years in Russia, I wasn't even touring that much. I was running a club. So I didn't really have a much when you went to a club, you you got to pick a lane, you know, I guess.

00;53;23;21 - 00;53;56;19
Unknown
Right. So you can be a, you can have a big following in, have a club, you know. Yeah. You know, you see. So yeah, I mean that's kind of just like the particulars of my situation. But also, you know, I don't really mind that because, I'm not even sure because like, I had this idea of, like, what I want to do with stand up here, like, I mean, as a Russian comic coming to do shows in, you know, like in the West, and I can't see, like, achieving this or anything because, like, but I achieved pretty much what I wanted to do is I wanted to, I was the first Russian comic,

00;53;56;21 - 00;54;18;04
Unknown
actually, who didn't do, like, a stupid foreign or accent or anything like this because, like, you know, like, I don't know, I appreciate when people don't do that, you know, like some other things. I'm done, for example. Also done. Like it just kind of he speaks like like he wants people to understand him and. Yeah. And, you know, all the Russian comics started from, like, Yakov Smirnoff and like, oh, yeah, know, just say yes.

00;54;18;04 - 00;54;35;05
Unknown
Say it's like there's, you know, like all of this, and pretty much everybody, each one, even when they kind of try to do some, shows to go abroad, they just all played the same stereotype, played the same accent, you know, say, hey, you sell. I take it that way. Unfortunately, they didn't, but. Oh, they did.

00;54;35;05 - 00;54;51;25
Unknown
Okay, well never mind. Wow. Okay. No wonder why I changed. Okay. Yeah. It's like, well, I'm doing this. I'm good. I mean, yeah, Yakov Smirnoff, it was pretty popular at some point. It was like, yeah, yeah, but he was already living there, so it was kind of a different, yeah thing, you know? Anyway, so I'm, you know, I'm not I'm not here to know Yakov Smirnoff.

00;54;51;25 - 00;55;08;11
Unknown
No. Is another Russian, comedian to the one he lives in California. Forgot the guy's name. Actually, I have a friend. His name is Natan Battler, and he. He speaks Russian. He's done. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, in a town. Okay. You know. Yeah. And this one, this session is loving this. This guy also Sasha who's awesome. Yeah.

00;55;08;11 - 00;55;25;07
Unknown
Yeah. But he's I think it's. Yeah, it's actually this guy. Yeah. From Yes. Yeah. But he also like, he does like he used to be like a really big comic in Russia. Like even bigger than, you know, wherever, like, he here is like, whatever we all. Sasha then. Yeah, he was much bigger. But, again, like as, like in America, he only does, like ten minute spots.

00;55;25;07 - 00;55;41;01
Unknown
And he's been living there for like ten years. Really? Because. Yeah, like some, I guess, you know, to your point then I think he did some spots, not spots, but he had like, shows in New York City, Iowa. So that was mostly Russian. Yeah. Yeah, it was Russians. Interesting. Interesting. So, yeah, it's kind of like,

00;55;41;03 - 00;56;04;19
Unknown
Yeah. I mean, the point is, like, I'm, you know, I'm not saying like, oh, somebody else is like doing something wrong, but like, I want to do this. I wanted to do this. I wanted to talk about politics. I want to talk about, like, culture. I want to talk about it in, like, the language that I want to talk about, you know, like the, you know, the, the using kind of more, you know, like a more advanced, you know, satirical mechanics of this whole thing.

00;56;04;19 - 00;56;32;17
Unknown
You want to do more storytelling, more sort of, you know, like you like, I wouldn't say like, I wouldn't say like infotainment, because that's what critics in Edinburgh called me. And I'm infotainment. Like, fuck those good. Yeah. But like, I mean, they were weird, you know, like, I, I had like some good, really very good reviews and I some, some reviews which were kind of like they were I never I didn't have like bad ones but like they were kind of like mediocre in terms of like they're like, yeah, it's very cool.

00;56;32;17 - 00;56;50;21
Unknown
But also like there's not enough, you know, punchlines because some of the parts which are just kind of, yeah, they're looking for puns and punchlines and you're talking about like some real shit and, you know, interwoven with some jokes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Exactly. So it's kind of like they didn't get the style. And so some of them called me like I say, you had like a few jokes about like about that later.

00;56;50;21 - 00;57;06;24
Unknown
How big the critics they like called it like, oh, it's not so much comedy but more like infotainment. Oh, I didn't laugh, but I learned a lot. That sort of shit. Yeah, well, maybe don't like to learn, I don't know. But anyway, so, I mean, I was doing pretty much what I wanted to do and then like, and then I got at some point I was like, I can still do that.

00;57;06;24 - 00;57;23;00
Unknown
I mean, if I, if I could just kind of, I, I take some effort, I market, I mean, and I still get like, you know, 50 people in like some, you know, getting in or whatever. And so like, I don't think anyone it's good, but like I'm past that, like I've done that. Okay. You done the touring stuff.

00;57;23;00 - 00;57;40;16
Unknown
All right. I realized that, you know, being a Russian comic now and just doing the stuff that I do, I can make any room laugh. Yeah, that's for sure. But, like, I will never get, like, a theater. That's not going to happen for me. So, you know. Yeah. I mean, but then again, you got the marketing stuff down and, you know, that is a big thing.

00;57;40;16 - 00;57;58;05
Unknown
It seems like out here that marketing really is a good part of if your show is going to do good or not. But, you know, like, that's, the story that did, you know, Terry, Terry Norman, the, Irish guy used to live here, but then I think somebody told me about this guy Terry. He he now lives in, I think, in Prague.

00;57;58;05 - 00;58;16;02
Unknown
He's doing comedy there like he used to live here for a number of years. And, you know, he's a good friend of mine. He went to. We were talking about also like, because before he moved to, like, Europe permanently, like the continental Europe used to do a lot of shows, in, in the UK, in Ireland, of course, and in the UK.

00;58;16;02 - 00;58;38;06
Unknown
And he did Edinburgh as well. And then he, when he moved to Europe, he just wanted to, you know, do the show that he did in Edinburgh and he did some because in Edinburgh it's very difficult to get like, you know, to win a competition. Because there's thousands of shows lot. So it was just kind of just to, to get some audience share people always.

00;58;38;08 - 00;58;57;06
Unknown
And I like this that people do some gimmick. So it's sort of like it's not just like an hour of my jokes. Yeah. It's something like this. Either a topic, it can be like something like, you know, there's like, at some point, like when, you know, there was the comedians who were like, won the Fringe Award for a show about like, how they better like how they dead died or something.

00;58;57;08 - 00;59;14;02
Unknown
And there's like next year there was like 100 shows or like, my dad died. Oh, shit. It's like, oh, okay. Yeah, yeah. And then like, now it's like a lot of, like, especially after the pandemic, there's a lot of, like, mental health themed to of shows. So it's kind of it's this stuff or even like gimmicks which are like weird.

00;59;14;02 - 00;59;32;15
Unknown
Like I have a friend in, she's from, she lives in London, but she does. She started doing this show, about like where she does stand up and also pole dances at the same. Interesting. Yeah. Oh, wow. Interesting way to deal with, with, with trauma. Okay.

00;59;32;17 - 01;00;04;17
Unknown
Why did the chicken cross the road? Isn't the whole comedy way of dealing with it? Yeah, but with the pole, that's. It adds a different complexity. But even if you don't do this sort of stuff in Edinburgh, it helps when you have some sort of, like, like a storytelling twist to it and some, you know, like, it's, it's just it's not just like jokes, but it's also kind of it's, it's my experience or it's like about this topic and then, my, you know, my, let's say one of the most like the success of successful shows that I did in Edinburgh was the one where they did about philosophy was kind of like

01;00;04;17 - 01;00;23;03
Unknown
the kind of a 100 jokes about philosophy. Oh, yeah, it's on a poster. Right? Right. Yeah. So it was like it's always some, some gimmick and some of the Terry, he was telling me, like when he came to Europe, he started to, you know, he basically took the show that he did in Denver and, he was like, you know, started to market it here in Europe.

01;00;23;06 - 01;00;46;27
Unknown
And he never got much of that, even though it was like a kind of a show which was popular and was like some story and some topic and everything. Yeah. And then somebody just told him, you're from Ireland just to fucking, you know, what's it called, like a clover? And just, you know, do a Microsoft paint or poster with like, Irish, you know, some Guinness and a leprechaun in the clover.

01;00;47;01 - 01;01;07;21
Unknown
And he said, yeah, I did that. Sold out every show because marketing is not like, you know, like, yeah, like what I do, I know marketing really well. But then you can bypass the fact that, the identity team plays like such a big part in that big part. It's the biggest part. You can you can be the marketing guru.

01;01;07;23 - 01;01;25;01
Unknown
But, you know, the Irish comedian will always sell better than the Russian comedian, even if the Russian comedian is ten times funnier than the Irish give me. I'm not talking about Terry. Yeah, okay. But but isn't that isn't a, Yeah, that's I guess that's like one of those, bittersweet things, right? Especially in marketing or advertising. That's entertainment.

01;01;25;01 - 01;01;46;23
Unknown
That's that's the business, you know? Yeah, yeah. I mean, I guess people want to people are associating Irish people with having fun and being drunk and having a night out. And they they associate Russian people with war and genocide at the best of times. So yeah, this is yeah. It's true. Yeah yeah yeah. Oh yeah. Yeah. I mean, it definitely goes back to the overall entertainment and marketing.

01;01;46;25 - 01;02;03;24
Unknown
It's not about even like thinking, oh, this Russian is bad of course. No they understand like if you see as a comedian who's doing comedy in English, they understand, you know, what political stands this person has that feeling. But it's just the feeling is like, oh, do I feel like going and listening about, you know, some yeah, some of this, you know, what's going to happen.

01;02;03;24 - 01;02;19;11
Unknown
You know, what are they going to talk about? Right. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. And then you know, and then they choose again like I mean you can we're in the escapist entertainment. We can change that. You know like in the end the escapist value of it still has to be very high. Yeah. To be successful, you know, that is okay.

01;02;19;11 - 01;02;33;19
Unknown
So I mean, so you, you have a live series of running shows doing comedy and stuff, and I feel like we're in a place, comedy wise, where a lot of people are going on tour is like people doing the shows and stuff like that. And it's, you know, there's a thousand different ways to do that or like that.

01;02;33;21 - 01;02;58;18
Unknown
Yeah. So you being the person that you are, you know, know how to do this stuff. What are like the top three like tips you would give someone if they wanted to, as I say, started touring and or doing a show where wherever they're. Yeah, I mean, I think that's kind of like it's two different to different things about like, like when you if you want to like, especially if you want to set up like a regular comedy night, like, this is what I do now.

01;02;58;20 - 01;03;24;06
Unknown
And I think the most important tip is just, this is just like over 50% of the people's experience of how people experience your show is not the comedy content of it. It's not the jokes that people do is the combination of, you know, the venue, the hospitality, the how everything is organized, how it's run time wise.

01;03;24;06 - 01;03;39;19
Unknown
So it's not like, you know, you don't start like an hour, a half an hour later and stuff. So like, even everything, the whole experience, even, like, if it's not too hot or too cold or anything like this, because this is the how, because people come out of the show and they don't remember, oh, this guy did this joke.

01;03;39;22 - 01;04;02;16
Unknown
They remember the whole thing, how they felt and everything goes into that. So it's like 50, but like I never I would never do I mean, I did, but like now I would never do a show in the venue which I don't see fit for doing the show. Just because, I mean, now, I would never do a show with like, even like in a room where the bar and the stage are in the same room or something like that, like, with like rare exceptions.

01;04;02;16 - 01;04;25;00
Unknown
But yeah, depends on the room itself. But like, there are some things that are just crucial. And if you run it like, as a producer for a long time, you know, you even if you experienced this like troubles, like with something like, like it starts bugging you that you see that is bugging the audience as bugging you and then you, you basically drive yourself mad.

01;04;25;02 - 01;04;51;29
Unknown
So like, I was like when I was starting the door to do shows here, like for the first few months, I only did it once. That album of like it like on Sundays because I couldn't find like and like there were venues, but I couldn't find suitable ones. Yeah. So it's like night now. The two venues that I run, chosen, like they both have, you know, the basic stuff, which is like, first of all, is a professional room, like with a stage where the whole professional equipment lights very hard to find sometimes.

01;04;51;29 - 01;05;16;29
Unknown
Yeah, yeah, it's isolated from the bar room, like it's two separate rooms. It has all the opportunities to, for, you know, like in summer, you can, put you can do ventilation, you can ventilated in winter, it's not cold. In summer, it's not hot. Like all of the stuff which allows you to run the shows, you know, all year round.

01;05;16;29 - 01;05;40;16
Unknown
Yeah. Like it's really just take a time to find a good venue, to find a good place. And even if it lacks something like, for example, I have my own set of like this venues that I do now. They have everything. But like when I was testing out some other venues in the first year when I was here, like for example, some like it, so the other like there was this place.

01;05;40;16 - 01;05;59;08
Unknown
So it was, it had like equipment, it had like a stage, but like the background was just like a random shitty wall or whatever thing. And he talking about it. And so, yeah, by the way, the place where, you do the tour thing. Yeah, the blue curtain. Yeah. Yeah, I brought that. Oh, really? I bought it and I sent it up.

01;05;59;08 - 01;06;14;00
Unknown
Oh, shit. Well, thank you very much for doing it. All right. Hey. Wow, I could have done it without you. Well, you see. Yeah, yeah. And so I also have, like, I still have, like, a red curtain as well as my, in my home with, like, a rag and a curtain, which I used at, like one of the places before.

01;06;14;02 - 01;06;33;07
Unknown
Oh, nice. And it's just, yeah, it's sort of like one of the things that kind of it just adds to how people perceive the show is like, oh, it's not just like some random people taking the mic and coming out now. There's sort of like a stage experience, even if it's small, even if it's like, you know, even it's like 40 people room where it's still important.

01;06;33;07 - 01;06;53;06
Unknown
So for, for, for running the shows, I think like what, what a lot of comedians don't get is how to look at the, at the show from the through the eyes of the audience. Right. They just think of, like how we like it, how comedians like it, but like, it's not about you. But the problem is that a lot of comedians are fucking narcissists.

01;06;53;06 - 01;07;09;18
Unknown
So, you know, I mean, it's for, you know, it's hard for you to be a comedian and not be that. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, exactly. So you need to. Yeah. Kind of. Somehow, if you want to run the shows, you still you need to have a part of you which, you know, like, can do this, do this thing, look at it from another point of view.

01;07;09;18 - 01;07;50;03
Unknown
Yeah, yeah. And in terms of touring, in terms of comedy, I think just genuine generally. Now a lot of people are more, like because, you know, like now I would say that a lot of people are more concerned with, you know, like doing content and doing getting views rather than actually developing their comedic, you know, like not live insane skill, but just kind of trying to achieve something in terms of like because like before when I started comedy, when like a lot of people who studied comedy like, ten, like ten, nine, eight years ago, everybody was like, oh, my favorite comedian, like Bill Burr, I wouldn't be like Bill Burr or something

01;07;50;03 - 01;08;15;07
Unknown
like that. Yeah. Or like my hair is comedians like this. It's Louis C.K., Stewart Lee or Dave Chappelle or something. Yeah. And they would just kind of watch it a lot now and just then with like a lot of this kind of like older, older comedians who have been and, you know, like in, in the States, like, I mean, of course there's a reason why, you know, like old specials by like Dave Chappelle and like, whoever they way, way better than the new ones because they spend like ten years writing them.

01;08;15;07 - 01;08;33;01
Unknown
And then and that was normal, like, you know, ten but like, even like Carlin, who was very, very productive. I think he did like a show every like, oh, some like 3 or 4 years. He put out a special, I think, something like this. But now it's like, you get it, like if you know, if they see, like basically they see the marketing figures for like Dave Chappelle.

01;08;33;07 - 01;08;51;22
Unknown
And he said something bad about Transpeople and he's like, okay, so we're going to market that. And so it's just like, and then Netflix comes to him, they give him a deal of like, oh, you need to do you need to record like two, three specials in three years. We pay you this much. And it's like, of course they're all going to be as good.

01;08;51;25 - 01;09;15;01
Unknown
Yeah. Because now the capitalize on you know some normally it's sort of like a political issue. Is that and why this person gets some traction now on the social media. So and it's it's and the problem is like for these guys it's fine because they were already great. You know they were already professionals. Yeah. Already. You know they hone their skills for like 30 years.

01;09;15;04 - 01;09;36;23
Unknown
And so yeah the new special is not as good. But it's fine. You know like that's the system. Now you need to put out a lot of content and their content is still kind of way more professional than, you know, than many of the others. So for them it's okay. But if you're just starting out or you're just kind of doing comedy for like a few years, you know, one, two, three years, it's just like people are like, oh, you know, I have this one video which got a million views.

01;09;36;23 - 01;09;51;26
Unknown
Oh my God. Yeah, that's how the algorithm works. They just they, you know, they love you in. They get you, you know, like you get your big shot. And then for a year you have like, you know, videos with 2000 views. That's how the algorithm works. Yeah. Because they want you to keep working for them for free. Yeah.

01;09;51;26 - 01;10;15;08
Unknown
You got to play around with it, you know. And then you never know what's going to hit and what's not. Yeah exactly. But at the same time like everything. And that's was even the last time I was at the fringe, I noticed that like the whole networking situation, the whole, kind of how communities form their, it's not the same anymore because everybody's just like, first of all, everybody runs home to do their reels straight away.

01;10;15;11 - 01;10;34;20
Unknown
Nothing out that much. Interesting. So they're like this up now. I need an awful lot of storage so that I have enough storage for tomorrow. Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. And then and then they just generally kind of they don't talk about, like when they talk about the shows and normally again, they all, they all the people talk about now is like how many views they got on this or on that.

01;10;34;23 - 01;10;49;00
Unknown
And like five years ago when I was there, everybody's like, oh, I saw this fantastic show that nobody knows about. You should see that as well. Or this person had as many followers in and you know. Yeah. Yeah. So it's happening here too. Yeah. Because the follower count thing is a big thing. Now to where I mean, you know, it is what it is, man.

01;10;49;00 - 01;11;06;16
Unknown
I think that's a human thing where if you see like a lot of something in a, in terms of a number, you can just be like, wow, like a million, wow, a million pennies still. Wow. It's like, wow, how'd you get all those pennies? Like, how how am I even seeing. How did you get all million pennies in a room a million back?

01;11;06;21 - 01;11;40;20
Unknown
I don't know, wraps of dinner you can like. Whoa. How to watch. You got to like you need to know this guy. Like how I how did he secured? You know. So those are very interesting thing in terms of numbers and how is displayed and how is, you know, factored into someone's overall profile. Yeah. I guess what they bring to the table, I think, like what, what I'm trying to what I'm trying to get to is like, it's all good, but at the same time, at some stages, especially, I gotta say, in the first years of doing comedy, like, you need to really concentrate on, like, this is just, you know,

01;11;40;20 - 01;11;58;06
Unknown
that being good, but being what you want it to be, right? Like being like, good, but not just like good. Good. Like in terms of or getting laughs, but like, people like, don't seem to have this, you know, like, ID like not the ideal, but like something to aim for anymore. It's all they aim for is numbers.

01;11;58;13 - 01;12;12;24
Unknown
Yeah, but like how? Like when they look at, like, you know, like. Because again, like when I started comedy, everybody's like, oh, I want to be like Carlin. I wouldn't be like that. Yeah, I want to be like that guy. Or like, I mean, not like exactly like that guy, but like, I want to have the same, you know, weight to what I do.

01;12;12;24 - 01;12;27;16
Unknown
I want to be, satisfied with my stuff. I know I want to, you know, I think this is art. I want to do the same type of thing. And now it's like, oh, I want to just get another viral video on, you know, something like this, I guess, because still new here, still the Wild West, you know?

01;12;27;16 - 01;12;43;10
Unknown
So, you know, like, and again, I'm biased because, you know, sorry, New York City. So like you, you there's no choice but to start reaching out for stuff. Other than that, you're going to be performing front of comedians forever. Yeah. And boy, did that happen a lot. In terms of, you know, like being in for a long time.

01;12;43;10 - 01;12;57;06
Unknown
And then because I was most of your existence just performing in front of other comedians. So you want to perform in front of people. You just had to be funny enough for someone to even take a chance for you to start performing in front of people, and even the people you want to perform in front of. That was not the ideal people.

01;12;57;06 - 01;13;14;03
Unknown
It was sometimes people in a bar, you know, they don't even know. It's a comedy show. You know, they watching the football game on TV trying to, you know, not go back home to the wife. And then now you turn off the TV and you're like, whoa. So like, it was always this brutal uphill, like, okay, let me fight, okay?

01;13;14;03 - 01;13;30;27
Unknown
There's five real people in the room. Oh my God, this is a show. Let's let's hurry up before they leave. What do we. Why are we talking. Let's let's go. Come on. Let's do this. So, you know, it was like, such a, you know. Oh my God, what is seven minutes? Oh, God. Ten minutes. Oh, okay. I gotta make sure this is for real.

01;13;30;27 - 01;13;49;28
Unknown
We gotta, you know, whereas here it's like, is this. You know, I guess it's, it's new is plentiful. Yeah. And in terms of, what to aim for and reach for, I will not live it. Oh, man. You see? Yeah, but that's the issue. We stopped thinking about it, you know. Yeah. Because you could do you could be like.

01;13;49;28 - 01;14;08;26
Unknown
I mean, you could star in 3 or 4 months here and perform in front of 80 people. Like, now you, like, worked 80 people. I thought I had a b, superstar. Not even a good. Just a superstar. Like. Okay, how can I be, like, close to the funniest person I know to maybe get to it? 90, 80?

01;14;08;26 - 01;14;32;09
Unknown
We're talking about, like, 30, 30. Well, I've been like, all right, I was my. This is all right. This is okay. This is great. So yeah, but, you know, things have changed. I guess people are learning. Hopefully these things happen in terms of people like focusing on the funny really like, you know, but I mean, like, for example, I am I do some, like, I produce some bigger shows here as well.

01;14;32;09 - 01;14;58;22
Unknown
Like, I mean, the, the ones which I worked for with the, the agency, like the UTA, the agency. Oh, really? Nice. Yeah. You had Kev on stage. You had Tony Baker. That was a very dope show. Congrats on that. Very good job. Cheers. Yeah, but then like, some of them, like some of the, like, basically just doing shows in Berlin for them, like, I mean, not even all of them because, like the bigger ones which require like arenas and stuff, like it's sort of like they do it through Live Nation because they have like of like monopoly on that stuff.

01;14;58;22 - 01;15;19;11
Unknown
Yeah, they get tickets. But like whoever is like doing the shows, especially these like younger comedians who are doing like the first or like first or second tours and they do like the only need like maybe like 300 people theaters or something like this. Like I do that and, like some of them are like, of course, like people like Tony Baker, who's been comedy for a long time.

01;15;19;11 - 01;15;54;14
Unknown
And it's very funny. Yeah. And we, had this. Yeah. Now we have this Rory Scovel guy. Yeah. He's coming through, like, also very, very experienced, very funny. But some of the stuff, like some of the people that they send, it's sort of like this kind of social media sensation guys. And, well, the live shows are not good, and I like, I don't like to say like, and even people who like, people who came to see that and they're kind of people, they're subscribers because like at some point, because especially after the pandemic, it was like very, you know, like it was very, evident what's going on.

01;15;54;14 - 01;16;17;13
Unknown
It's sort of like people were so hungry for this entertainment and they got subscribed to this, kind of, you know, people on like, Instagram or TikTok. And then when they come to see like a live show by this person, they don't realize that, you know, the like I'm taking a shit and I'm looking at like 30s of his video and I do and it's not the same as paying like 30 years.

01;16;17;13 - 01;16;40;19
Unknown
Like it's like, wow, I took a shit before I got here. What am I supposed to do? What am I supposed to do? 40 to 59 more minutes? Like I don't have 59 more shits and me, it was eight already, you know, took a shit. I took a piss. What am I? Yeah. And so it's like, for me, it was sometimes quite disappointed because, like, I kind of I still put this on, you know, and I was like, I see that people are disappointed.

01;16;40;22 - 01;16;58;00
Unknown
They expected better. Yeah. You know what's at least like some or something. Well, I mean, they're not necessarily solid. Like we had pretty good audiences. But I think that's also like a learning curve for the audience as well, because I think when the first year and the first year, which was like 2023, I did a lot of this shows nice.

01;16;58;00 - 01;17;24;08
Unknown
And I got like, like pretty much everything was sold out. But then and then the next time, for example, there's this the act that they sent me for the second time, and they said, okay, so last year it was sold out. So we can we'll get a bigger venue. We look at the statistics in the like, the subscribers, their subscribers in Berlin and in Germany, like Germany, is the biggest non-native English speaking country that they have.

01;17;24;08 - 01;17;43;25
Unknown
And they have like what, like about 800 or 100,000. Just on Instagram, on TikTok, I think it's the same number. So they have that. And so it's in Germany, like should be really good numbers. So I got this theater, and we sold kind of the same number, even though I spend a lot more money on advertising.

01;17;43;25 - 01;18;02;23
Unknown
Yeah, it's in kind of the same number as we did the year before, because I guess people are trying people are figuring this out, people figuring this out that like, because they were so excited to see this, after the pandemic because that helped help them get through the, you know, the whole thing, just watching, watching these videos.

01;18;02;23 - 01;18;36;12
Unknown
And yeah, they wanted to see that. But then I think, you know, like at some point they went to see, like, let's say one of the people that they were subscribed to and then they got disappointed. Then they realized connected the dots. They're like, okay, so probably not the same job being performer. And and this and so I can't really see any other explanations for this because, yeah, you know, like they have more followers now, more followers based in this particular city, which is something that people often overlook in terms of like, oh, you know, if you get like, you know, 100,000 followers, for example, but like, it kind of depends like if

01;18;36;12 - 01;18;50;18
Unknown
you that that doesn't mean that you go to like, you know, Prague or something like this and you know, you're going to sell out to shows because, yeah, you know, just how many people are actually ready to buy a day, how many people are based there, how many people want to, you know, and everything. So but the point is like it looked good on paper.

01;18;50;21 - 01;19;11;25
Unknown
Then people just didn't want to go, just because I guess the only reason is that they know better now. Yeah. So you I got some insights bro. You got some insights on like what's really on the ground because. Right. People are reaching out for this like number. Try and get these followers. But then you know via you producing these shows like a low this doesn't really translate on the ground in terms of amount of people by itself necessarily.

01;19;11;25 - 01;19;48;21
Unknown
Yeah. Not necessarily. It really depends on the content and maybe it depends on, you know, like it still depends on like, you know, pretty much like how much it really connects on like some deep human level really. I think some, some sort of, some sort of stuff like this. And of course, you know, and I know some good, really good success stories from, you know, like in the UK, in America, probably the same, just follow the UK company more but like who comedians who are like been doing comedy clubs for like again 30 years, 40 years and like people are like in their 60s and they got like a really nice production like

01;19;48;21 - 01;20;09;12
Unknown
for example, like somebody said like I guess the manager or something like this. Let's try to do that. You know, the videos, the reels. Yeah. And they got like really got cool, good quality on the videos and everything. And they started to do this, you know, TikTok, Instagram. I think they got like a lot of, a lot of followers and they started to sell out theaters.

01;20;09;15 - 01;20;26;29
Unknown
And this is the guy who's been like, you know, like a club comic for like 40 years, literally. Yeah. No. And everybody's like, you know, if you ask any British comedian like, oh, we respect him a lot. But that's what he's been doing. He's been doing only comedy clubs. He's been great. He's been, you know, doing his job really well for like 40 years.

01;20;26;29 - 01;20;49;03
Unknown
Got to living out of it. But you would never aspire to go on like a nationwide tour in like theaters. Yeah. And, you know, the videos and the reels, the, the followers that helped them to do that. So, you know, there is like, that's and that's definitely like a positive positive thing. Right. So I guess it's all sort of like a learning curve like everywhere else.

01;20;49;03 - 01;21;06;12
Unknown
It's sort of like yeah, it's now it's like, you know, it's like Sasha has this great joke about, like, I've been doing comedy for, like, you know, over ten years and I've been doing it my whole life, and now I have to compete with fucking kittens. Like, how is this? Because, like, in the world of content, everything, you're on par with everything else.

01;21;06;14 - 01;21;26;23
Unknown
They're all like you do. Like in the comedy clubs, there's always like especially like there's some tiers. Basically you're like in the in the UK it's like, oh, you're like or like, what are you? And you can say, I am a middle in like Comedy Store. And then you understand, like in this new middle spot that it's like you're not a headliner yet, but like, you can be a headliner in a club, which is worse, you know, like something like this.

01;21;26;23 - 01;21;49;28
Unknown
Yeah. And, and so there's always kind of like this sort of, you know, a system which is in place somehow it's formed and then, in, and with the content, like, everybody is on, you know, like, seemingly on the same level, like if you get like a, I mean, Instagram is not monetized, but like, YouTube is monetized and the TikTok is monetized now as well.

01;21;50;00 - 01;22;12;11
Unknown
And so you basically the kittens get the same monetization as, like literally somebody who's done comedy for 30 years. Yeah. So that like, you know, it's so yeah, as you said, it's the Wild West with now what's wrong? Somehow, somehow I like there's positive and negative sides of it and everything is like it's like but like translating to life shows.

01;22;12;11 - 01;22;41;22
Unknown
It's really not straightforward. That's why I'm thinking. That's why I still think that, you know, I'm not saying like you shouldn't do, you know, like riyals or anything like this, but the point is, like to have this, to have this aspiration, to have this idea and to have this kind of standard in terms of quality, you need to understand it yourself because you're the only judge for yourself, really, because like, whatever is going on on the, you know, like how many views something gets like it's it's very like and especially at some point it's very random.

01;22;41;27 - 01;23;03;11
Unknown
Yeah. And it's very unstable because you need to have a vision in your head like this one. Yeah. Because you ask me for like advice for you. No no no no this is very good. Yeah. And so it's sort of like, you know, you still have to have what people who started like ten years ago had like or like even, you know, of course, earlier is like you need to have like an understanding of, like why you're doing this and why you love this and what you want to achieve.

01;23;03;11 - 01;23;24;29
Unknown
It's like, oh, I want to be like, like that guy or I want to be, you know, as as funny or as insight insightful as that guy. So it's sort of like you need to have some something to aim in terms of quality and in terms of message and in terms of integrity. So yeah, just because just because in the end, the quality still matters.

01;23;25;01 - 01;23;45;28
Unknown
Like it's not necessarily, you know, it's like with this everybody now everybody can get their like five minutes of fame, like, you know, the girl who did the coke to a thing. Yeah. Right. Like literally that's been what it's been going in for like three months and now she's in jail or what is going on. Yeah. That is, some random coin or something.

01;23;45;28 - 01;24;07;16
Unknown
Yeah. It's like scam. Yeah. So yeah, it's possible. And like, the last thing I'm going to say about, because that was also talking to some comedians who are like, now getting signed on to, tickets or just, I think Ticketmaster, they're setting up like their own promotion. Nice. And they do like and the German companies, they do German comedians a lot.

01;24;07;18 - 01;24;31;24
Unknown
And also they add some English speaking. Yeah. A couple that we know. Yeah, yeah. And you know, we know that. Yeah. And but that goes for most like German, English speaking. They get this, like again, like now they have this very strong, sort of preference for just whoever has the most followers and they try to milk that, and, you think that you know.

01;24;31;24 - 01;25;05;05
Unknown
Yeah, some like that. You think that the system might work this way, right? That that's basically, that they're making a mistake as producers, possibly just because, you know, somebody who's like, not very good as a performer, but they have a lot of followers and they sell that, and then people start to lose, you know, you start to lose credibility and, and so on that on one hand, on the other hand, what it basically means is that the window for, you know, like the casino still wins, you know, the, the, the.

01;25;05;09 - 01;25;23;05
Unknown
So it's kind of if you're a performer, you can be like famous for like a little bit. And then when they realize that, oh, it's not working anymore, they just drop you. So yeah, in the in the end, quality still matters. Kind of the promotion and everything. So just and the quality doesn't just come on its own.

01;25;23;07 - 01;25;42;16
Unknown
You need to have an aim. You need to have some, you know, as I said, like something to aim for in terms of quality, in terms of, like the image of what you want to do. And I think like the, it's the only way of actually being sustainably, you know, good and popular and developing your acts and developing your career.

01;25;42;18 - 01;25;58;29
Unknown
So it's kind of it's still, you know, it's still important. Yeah. So it's just you always need to have that. So, you know, everything else, you know, tomorrow is going to be like a new TikTok, which, you know, which will render the old cat, you know, who knows? Yeah, there's a cat now that makes a weird sound.

01;25;58;29 - 01;26;13;28
Unknown
And this DJ is playing around the world, you know. Oh, yeah. They're making money. It it it that they did it do that. Yeah yeah. Spin around circle yeah yeah yeah yeah it's crazy I'm like what is happening? I'm like, who is this cat? The cat. The cat's making money. The cat itself is making a lot of fucking money donating all the funds.

01;26;13;28 - 01;26;51;13
Unknown
I'm like, what is going on now? This cat has allegiance to other international deeds. He's receiving back in funds from, like, shows and shit. I'm like, wow, this is Cat. I'm doing something wrong. I need to turn myself into a and one is are barking. Yeah. And that's also that's also that's also interesting because like now it's like when you compete with you don't just compete with like other comedy, you compete with everything, you know, because like the, the whole world of like content makers who then sell live shows, it's it's it's kind of like it's not really about like, it's more about like, you know, not even about the content of

01;26;51;13 - 01;27;10;21
Unknown
this live show. It's about people connecting with somebody who they've seen every day for like a year. Right. So is there like a celebrity sort of thingy, you know, so and then in this sense, yeah, you can, you know, like they will choose between when they see, let's say, okay, we have like on the same day we have like a live show by this comedian or by this cat deejay a cat.

01;27;10;27 - 01;27;24;22
Unknown
I might go for the cat. Yeah. They one all the cat making a real life. And parents, let's do this. Oh my gosh, I want to pet the cat. I don't want to pet a comedian. Yeah, you know. Exactly. You never know. But, Yeah, usually I ask a question about, like, you know, advice you give to a younger self.

01;27;24;22 - 01;27;45;19
Unknown
But I feel like that last part you gave me, which is advice for anyone but you in my for my younger self, as I was as you sitting, I, I, I was like, let me ask you one question. I know you actually thoroughly gave a response to that question before I even asked it, but, I mean, before, before in this, the, I want to say thank you very much for doing what you're doing, for producing the shows.

01;27;45;19 - 01;28;00;22
Unknown
I mean, you have it at a quality that, like, you know, is fun to do. Also to men, anyone who doesn't know, man, you actually helped me to get a visa out here because you wrote a letter of intent or. Oh, yeah, I think I did. Yeah, I think of intense. Yeah. So that was very helpful, man.

01;28;00;22 - 01;28;14;27
Unknown
So I want to say thank you very much, man. That was what you want out of, few people. Not men. Not everybody from the, anybody from the house, anybody watching that. That totally. We did that. That wasn't a scam. It wasn't a scam. I still have the document, you know. So give him the visa. All right?

01;28;14;27 - 01;28;28;05
Unknown
He helped me out. He helped another person, be a comedian as well. Not for his own gain, but for, you know, the better man of art here in Berlin. So, you know, anything else you want to say? Anything you want to leave off. Well, okay. I'm just. I'm. I'm happy. Happy to be here. Thanks, man. Yeah. Oh.

01;28;28;05 - 01;28;44;19
Unknown
Like, man. Thank you very much, man. You gave some, deep information. Hopefully people get to, you know, tour better or to. Yeah. You know, I don't know, compete against a cat better. Other than that, guys, thank you for listening and are watching to the third culture talk podcast is you, boy. Nya Yeanafehn. Anything is all like that is all.

01;28;44;22 - 01;28;47;14
Unknown
And I'll see you guys in the next one. Peace.