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No. LOL. But valid question. A lot of people have strong opinions about comedians who sit down. I do think it’s weird when I see a new comedian sitting down but I don’t mind it when I see established comedians do it. It’s conversational and it matches the audience energy who is all sitting down. It also makes sense to do it for certain jokes or to change the focus while you are on stage for a while. I never tried it but I know sometime soon as I age, I will need to, especially if I am standing for an hour. But it is called Stand Up comedy, and I like to follow the rules. I do have a show called stand up sit down, where I interview the comedians, sitting down, after they do their stand up. Come see it sometime and ask the other comedians any questions you have. #standup #sitdown #comedy 
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I was recently asked to talk about the business side of comedy for a festival. It was a cool request but a little weird, since I don’t have a manager or an agent. While I used to manage and book artists on the music side, I really don’t have any comedy business knowledge, other than what I have acquired from my years of doing comedy, being a professional before comedy and having lived a longer life before starting comedy. I guess I am a wise elder now. I think its just being a good human. I assists venues who I developed relationships from my lawyer and music days. Client who know me as their lawyer have hired me to do comedy and book shows and music venues expanding to comedy have reached out to me for comedy. There is a reason for that. I am professional, sincere and kind. I try to maintain that with everything I do, except for my unfortunate issue with tardiness. I treat everyone with respect at venues, from the bookers, the staff and comedians. I respond timely to requests and try to accommodate everyone whether it’s other comedians or a club. I look out for the underdogs, hushing loud comedians whispering loudly in the back of the room and always asking patrons to give it up for the servers and bartenders. I defend comedians who are being badmouthed and try to avoid speaking poorly of others, unless I am just gossiping with my close friends. But all actions and inactions have consequences. From time to time, I feel that I have been slighted. And I know it’s better to bite my tongue and let it go, which I often do both in my personal and professional lives. But my unhealthy need for justice and vindication gets the best of me sometimes and I respond. For example, a club was upset with me once due to a performance mixup with a competing local comedy club. I wrote an email and showed it to other colleagues who told me not to send it. I haven’t (yet). It pains me that I have done well by this comedy club for years even helping a staff member with a legal matter (pro bono) but pettiness is going to hurt my career. On a personal side, I recently severed ties with a person close to me. As with everything, I try to be respectful, kind and professional, never disrespecting them. They chose not to take the same route, being petty by removing access from content I created and paid for and going out of their way to not pay respects when my father passed away, but paying respects to members of my family who they did not personally know. The silver lining is that it strengthened my will in knowing I did right by severing ties. When I ran into this person recently, I was polite but not warm, avoiding eye contacting or anything other than one-word responses when questioned. When they asked why I was so cold, it took everything in my power not to respond with a list of grievances, but I didn’t do it. I just said that I wished them no ill will. Perhaps that is what I bring to the table for the business side of comedy. Humanity.  Well depends on what past. My past me as a young teen would think it was cool I was doing stand up comedy, since I grew up watching Eddie Murphy, Jerry Seinfeld and Jake Johannsen on Carson and Letterman and loved the format. Thirteen year old me would be confused as to why I wasn’t a lawyer and politician, like I planned. High School me would be shocked that I wasn’t in a band and again, a lawyer and politician. Also high school me would be mad I wasn’t using my free drink tickets. High school me would be confused by the years I defended law enforcement, sicne I was so against cops since I always got pulled over for speeding and was an N.W.A. fan. College me would also be mad about that. And also confused as to when stand up comedy came on the radar, since I was planning on being a musician/one-hit wonder and using that notoriety to catapult on the political scene to become the first Iranian-American US Senator. In all cases, past me would be impressed with the things I accomplished as a lawyer and even musician and how I use my platform in comedy to talk about real issues that mattered to me, even as a kid, like race relations and justice for all.  I heard a comedian say that recently in a condescending manner about another comedian. Crowd work has taken a new meaning in comedy. During Covid, comedians were posting their crowd work clips and the algorithm was loving it. Some comedians were doing it to avoid posting their written jokes, keeping those for their shows and specials. Others just were good at crowd work and leaned into it. When I started comedy, I did a lot of crowd work. I was good at it. I think because I had a sincere interest in learning about the person, it helped. I also avoided asking the same questions everyone else asked and would lean into specific details, which I found funny when I heard it. The reason I did it was because I did not enough write jokes. I was busy as a full time lawyer so I treated stand up as a fun deposition. I get to ask questions, just not under oath and with a goal of making people laugh. I preferred hosting to doing a spot on shows too. Obviously, now that I have been a full time comedians for over 6 years, that has changed. I prefer to do my jokes but know that I have the ability to do crowd work when needed, from the first few years of developing that skill set. Crowd work is a useful skill to have. Sometimes your jokes are not working so you need to talk to the crowd. Or they need a break from your jokes or they are getting their checks. Whatever the reason, crowd work is a skill that should not be looked down upon. At the same time, just know that every comedians worth their weight can do crowd work. It’s not as hard as it looks. #standup #crowdwork #deposition #formerlawyer  I just started talking about my father’s recent death on a stage. Much of my comedy was about his impending death so “revealing” that he is gone changes the tone of many of my jokes and the verb tense. Sometimes he stays alive in my joke while other times I reveal his death or just leave it a gray area. For many, especially comedians, comedy is a way to process pain. We try to find ways to talk about our pain while bringing joy and hopefully not causing any pain to others at the same time. It’s a hard balance because death is a trigger to so many people and it’s not something people want to hear about at a comedy show. Perhaps it’s even a reason why they are at a comedy show to take their mind off a recent passing. This past week, I made a joke about my father’s death and someone in the crowd gasped “Oh My God”. I said in response, “this is what comedians do. We talk about our pain.” But clearly it was a trigger and a lesson in how to handle it in the future. I once did a show when a comedian had to go on stage after his father’s death and started tearing up when he talked about him in a joke, which clearly was written while he was alive. The audience gave him a standing ovation. Stand Up Comedy is a healing mechanism and comedians should never try to be doing jokes to intentionally hurt someone or offend someone. At least thats never my goal with comedy. Shock value or “edge-lord” comedy is popular right now and that’s fine but I always find honesty is comedy is always funnier because it’s authentic. It feels weird doing stand up right now for me. New jokes feel wonky, especially when I try to brush over the recent events in my life. But if I didn’t have it, I don’t know what I would possibly do to move on. The show must go on.  |
AuthorPaul Farahvar is a comedian hailing from Chicago, Ill. Archives
May 2026
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