YOUR JOKES GOT OLD

Recently I did a show in a small town where I offended someone. To my knowledge, It's been a while since my material has been deemed offensive by any crowd member, given that I rarely cover ground that is controversial or veer too dirty (if at all).

I was selling shirts after what I thought was a very successful show, given the responses from most people in line to buy shirts. I saw the man bee-line to me with purpose and a big smile on his face. He started with a very nice statement, saying "the first ten minutes of your set had me roaring with laughs!" At this point, I assumed he was just gonna buy a shirt or ask for my social media, but then he said "but your marriage jokes got old really quick."

I clearly triggered this kind man as he told me how amazing the institution is and how happy he was to be married. The way he approached it, with a smile and without aggression, I reacted as if he was joking but then I realized he wasn't. I was caught off guard. He clearly was offended, which I did not intend and listening back to the crowd response later, it seems as though most fo the crowd liked the joke. (see Instagram for a version of the joke)

I can count on one hand how many times in my 12 years of comedy, someone has been offended by my jokes. The last time was someone who thought I spoke too much about Covid (during Covid in a state that did not have restrictions). I perhaps did do 2-3 jokes related to Covid that night, so I can understand how that could be annoying.

As to the night in question, I do talk about being single on stage sometimes and as for marriage, I have two jokes about it and on the night in question, I did one joke. One marriage joke. If he saw my special, however, he would be offended for certain!

Ironically, my goal with comedy this year is to be more edgy and to talk about "real" issues so I imagine this will happen more and more. #comedy #single #formerlawyer #controversy