Jitesh Vasani discovered the art form of stand-up comedy while doing he was in Mumbai doing his mandatory articleship for CA firm in 2012.
He registered himself for an open mic at the prestigious CANVAS LAUGH CLUB immediately after finding out about such an event. That night he realised that having a sense of humour and doing stand up comedy are two different things altogether, he shared. While still completing the course he went there for, Jitesh continued registering himself for open mic events in the city that happened quite frequently.
“I was still struggling with getting decent laughs, but there was *something* that kept me doing it even after I bombed terribly, more than once!”
{Bombing in stand up means not doing well and the term for doing well is ‘killing it’)
“I explicitly remember the night when I thought that I will do this, kind of forever; I had won a stand-up contest held by the popular comedy collective EIC in September 2013, things were somewhat different from then…”
About public speaking he says, he possesses the skill performing publicly since the time he can remember…as from his childhood he was a stage guy, displaying himself at various platforms in schools, social events, family gatherings and so on!
“I have always been the experimentation of the people around me; parents, teachers”, he says.
When you’re young, doing such things is quite easy, but as you grow up, you become more conscious, society becomes more judgmental, you have to do what is expected in an ideal scenario and all other things you really wish to do are categorised as ‘hobby’.
When it comes to stand-up comedy, audience dynamics is quite essential and the end of the day it HAS TO BE FUNNY AS WELL. It is really different from other forms of public speaking. Here you are being judged every 10 to 15 seconds for a punchline. Every time you have to do the same thing but differently, says Jitesh.
The nervousness before going on the stage is always there, he says, no matter how long you have been doing it. What matters is, how you channelize the nervousness, and according to another comic, “Nervousness is energy”, and all we need is to channelize that energy and use it for our own favour.
“I will call myself a stand-up comedian only when I am funny every night until then I am just pursuing it”.
Being conscious on the stage is quite essential, says Jitesh, because according to him, there’s a difference in how you see the audience, and how the audience sees you, and your job being on that stage is to sense the energy of the room. For example, if you are telling a story, always speak the truth, because according to him truth prevails, and then it’ll definitely reach the audience. The pretence is inconsistent; you might be entertaining the audience with false stories but, at the end of the day, you know you’re lying.
His first ever stand-up comedy show of the city happened at Mojo’s café in 2015, which involved his one-hour performance. He now performs regularly at CLC, Mumbai and Delhi and at various venues in Nagpur as well.
Talking about Stage fear, Jitesh says, stage fear is not a problem, it is similar to any other phobias, like fear of water, fear of height. If you have stage fear, and you don’t want to go on to the stage, it’s done! But, if you have stage fear and you want to go on the stage, then the most important thing is to find out “WHY”, if you focus on why and make it clear to yourself, half the battle is won. All your limits and fears will start to vanish and you’ll go ahead, and definitely, it’s not gonna happen, all at once. It’ll take time and you’ll feel your own evolution as a stage personality.
When asked for advice regarding public speaking, Jitesh gave a wonderful answer, he said:
“STOP taking any advises, go outside and fucking do something, experience it and move on”
And most importantly, don’t live with regrets, do what you want to do, you may even fail, at least you’ll get the satisfaction of doing it! The regret of not doing it is irreversible.
