Name: Bill Burr - Advice from Dave Chappelle
Uploaded: 2023-04-07T17:54:41.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Bill Burr - Advice from Dave Chappelle' from Comedy University on Comedy Buff. Published 2023-04-07. Transcript available.

Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Bill Burr - Advice from Dave Chappelle' from Comedy University on Comedy Buff. Published 2023-04-07. Transcript available.

what is the best comedy advice you've ever been given
I don't know what you're doing but keep doing it was the first great advice I
got
because it made me feel like I was on the right path and I could trust whatever
it was that I was
thinking at that time and Dave that was Michael McDonald the one from Boston
not the guy from
Canada he gave me that advice and still long gone stitches comedy club and then
the Dave Chappelle
I remember in like 1998 he said to me if he was sitting on the stairs waiting
to go on I was on
stage at the cellar you know the stairs you come down yeah I was sitting there
and just waiting to
go on heard some of the stuff I was doing and he told me he basically said you
know the road that
you're going he goes it's going to take you longer but when you hit you're
going to hit hard because
you know basically saying it was it was a solid foundation and that like him
just taking three
seconds to say that to me like sustained me for like four years on the road you
know those years
those years I call you know when you're good enough to be doing but nobody
knows you I call it like the
the killing in obscurity years you're just in the middle of nowhere going up
there every night just
going up there's like third full half full they've given away the show and
nobody gives a and just that
first 12 minutes of just trying to get them on board that you're worthy of
listening to and then getting
off stage and then having those people coming up going wow you're one of the
funniest guys they've
had out here blah blah blah what are you doing here what are you doing here and
then and rather than
being like yeah what the am I doing here and getting depressed you you you look
at that as like you know
when those explorers would start to see tree branches in the water you're like
okay I'm getting
the land I just kind of keep going in this direction so stuff like that and
then like I remember the first
time somebody came out a college booker came out when I was still in Boston and
after everybody did
their sets and afterwards everyone was going up and schmoozing with the the
agent or whatever and I
said to this guy Tony V I said oh man I go I'm so bad at that I'm really bad at
schmoozing or whatever
and he was just sitting there I remember he's just sitting there relaxed I
think I think it was
I always picture him smoking a cigar because we always smoke cigars I did he
was just like I was
like yeah man I'm so bad at it he goes oh yeah he goes well he goes get good at
it and then he kind
of went back to whatever he was doing and I remember it was really profound
moment where I was just like
all right so this is a skill and I can't improve on it and evidently it's
really important because the
way he said it it was really fatherly it was no quarter he just said it
straight out and I was
like I need to come out of my shell because I was really like I was completely
withdrawn when I first
started doing stem it's half the reason I did stand-up stand-up was basically I'm
gonna get on
stage show people that I'm funny and I'm a good and then everybody's gonna stop
with me like that was
that's the formula of course that didn't happen I went up there and immediately
got heckled it was just me
you know the more of the same thing but uh I don't know but it was like moments
like that that I guess
kind of pushed me along what is the worst comedy advice you've ever been given
oh you know what sticks
you know what sticks out in my head this guy had a uh a showcase to do half-hour
comedies on showtime
at the comedy store and I was living in New York at the time and to do the
showcase I had to fly myself
out right there I should have said no I should have had the confidence to be
like you know what someday I'm
gonna be good enough where you know this is gonna be I'm obviously not at a
place to get a half-hour comedy if I
have to fly my way out there but instead like oh I'm like okay show business
and I put the you know it
didn't have you know I don't have money to fly out there you know just to do it
but I invested in myself
so I did it and I went out there I show up for the showcase it's at the comedy
store in the original room
and I am the first guy on the showcase and and you know people just three
people in the crowd there was
people in the crowd and it well maybe there was three and two I remember the
three was a black guy
with these two white women on either side of them middle-aged and then I think
there was one other
person and they of course were talking and this is you know my dream has always
been to do at this
point to do a special so I go up there to do my and you know there's three
people and they're talking
so I had to talk to him and I made fun of the fact that I flew all the way out
there for this showcase
and there's three people in the room and blah blah blah blah and I and then I
would do a few jokes
and there was barely any laughter and yada yada and I you know so whatever so I
get off stage
and the guy who booked the thing comes up to me and he just he walks up to me
and he goes seven times
seven times seven times in a ten-minute set you brought up that there was
nobody there at the showcase
okay we know the jokes we can hear if the materials there you know you stand on
stage and you just keep
going like you know there's nobody here the crowd starts thinking yeah well
what am I doing here it's
like dude there's no crowd here and I dude I've never been so mad in my life of
course I have but I was
livid at that guy I walked away and immediately was a waste of time I'm gonna
be like dude I've paid
my way out here to do your special and you at your showcase you didn't do any
work to put anybody in
the crowd and I had to showcase in front of three people and and just the way
he was coming at me like
because he went no dude you're still in the running that's what pissed me off
you're still in the running
I want to be like dude I'm gonna whether you pick me or not I'm not sitting
here waiting for you to
tap me with your magic wand you can make it now you either want me or not but
that hole in there is your
responsibility this is your showcase okay so this is what I wanted to say but I
was too scared to say it
this is what I said to the windshield of my rented car as I drove away and it
was like and the advice he was
giving me was don't address the situation which is one of the first things that
you learn as a comedian
the first time you walk up on stage and there's a fist fight in the crowd or
somebody just threw up
and you make the decision to just go into your act we've all done that yeah and
you're literally in a
comedy vacuum it's like they're showing a video of you in a comedy club where a
crowd's actually paying
attention in front of this crowd that isn't listening and that's one of the
first things that I noticed
like look I if the room was full and nobody was laughing then that is on me and
I shouldn't on the
crowd and I should be a professional because maybe the next guy's gonna come up
and get him okay but
if I go up in this you know three people and two people over there and three of
them are talking you
you know when the waitstaff out numbers your the people in the crowd like I
mean I have to do what I have to do
and like just the way it was there was that other that that thing once again
the way he was the way he came
at me now once again what he said to me was then went into my ears and was cut
with my childhood so maybe
maybe I was wrong but that's one and there's a lot of times I look back on some
where I go I owe that
person an apology I was wrong I know I get it now or I've cooled off now but
that's one that to this day
that I look back on you know you have your classic half dozen yeah you know
that teach I had a teacher
called me the dumbest kid in the room and I still think about that to this day
and I was not wrong in that
situation and but that that was one that I still I still look back on that was
like Jesus Christ I was
probably 10 10 years ago and you know and I've seen that person since and I
never brought it up and I got
along with them and everything like that and that's been like a big thing in
this business where I've
never done that we're like someday someday I'm gonna be here and then I'm gonna
walk in and be like yeah you
yes I I think that's when the moment comes it's just like I don't get you
really need to rise above
and show business like I don't even give it you need to get over and let it go
right in show business
it seems I think in life in general like no because then what that's the
mistake I'm making I'm not
applying your show business principles to the life principles well the thing is
if you do that then you've allowed
somebody to take the joy it stops being like I'm not doing stand-up anymore
because this is the funnest
job for the way I'm wired that I could possibly have is the funnest a word most
fun job I could have
it now becomes I'm doing this to tell this guy to go himself and then you just
it's just it's just like
poison leaking into your soul every time you're going up there and you will
become the bitter guy
Oh my god