April 1, 2004

School of laughs comes to town

By WALLACE BAINE
Sentinel staff writer

If you’re like me, your family and friends have heard all your best material and, even if you’ve come up with something that is so funny it should be labeled by the FDA, you’re still going to get the wall- eyed staredown from your captive audience.

Maybe it’s time for a bit of scholarly pursuit at comedy college.

Yes, there is such a thing and, yes, it’s now in the neighborhood. The San Francisco Comedy College is on a mission to make Santa Cruz a funnier place — that’s funny-ha ha, not funny-peculiar.

The SFCC has opened a branch office, if you will, at the Actors’ Theatre in Santa Cruz. For aspiring comics, that means classes in how to get funnier. For comedy fans, that means weekly live stand-up comedy from professional Bay Area comics.

"It’s for anybody, really," said comic Kurtis Matthews, the comedy college’s dean and most tenured professor. "Not just stand-up comics, but anyone who wants to be more confident in public speaking or wants to be funny in day-to-day interaction. I get teachers, speakers, personal trainers."

On Sunday, Matthews will be around to give potential customers a free taste. Sunday’s intro class to stand-up comedy is free and takes place at 6 p.m. The course will take place over four weeks from 6 to 8:15 p.m. followed at 9 p.m. by a comedy show.

Matthews said he had had his eye on expansion into Santa Cruz for a while. Established in San Francisco in 1999, the college also uses the Improv in downtown San Jose for performances and workshops.

"Every time we’d go to San Jose, there were always a few UCSC students there and they were always excited about comedy, so I knew that area was a place for potential growth."

That, and the presence of Karin Babbitt in the area. Babbitt, once one of the sharpest young comics on the circuit, now lives in Scotts Valley. Matthews said the best way to recruit her was to move to Santa Cruz. Sure enough, he said, Babbitt will teach a class for "ultra-advanced" students in Santa Cruz.

Matthews claims he can teach anyone to be funny (of course, maybe he was just trying to be funny himself). "Being funny is a learned skill," he said. "Having a sense of humor is not."

He’s careful, he said, not to teach specific technique which he considers encroaching upon a comic’s style and personality. "Comedy is about shattering assumptions. Not all people laugh at the same thing, and there’s not one comic alive who everybody thinks is funny."

What he does instead is to present ways to develop material, mostly through writing, and focus on the need-to-know basics of point-of-view, characterization and performance. Beginners need bring nothing to the free introductory class but a willingness to learn.

The Bay Area is a hotbed, said Matthews, for a learning comic. There aren’t many well-paid gigs, but there are places to perform and get the experience needed to get better.

"Years ago, I said that all you needed to succeed in stand-up was resentment and a microphone and that was when there were a lot of young independent comics coming up through the ranks. Those performance places are still there. The Bay Area is atypical in that regard."

A student of comedy as well as a working comic himself, Matthews talks about all the species of comics that have waxed and waned over the years from the political comics of the 1960s (Sahl, Bruce, Klein) to the goofy comics of the 1970s (Martin, Pryor, Williams) to the all the variations since including prop comics, anger comics and sweater comics (of which Cosby and Seinfeld remain the gold standard).

"What audiences want and will always demand is a comic who is conversational and has a point of view," said Matthews. "When times are bad, comedy is good. When times are good, comedy is good. It’s kinda recession-proof in that way."

Contact Wallace Baine at wbaine@santacruzsentinel.com.

If You Go

WHAT: San Francisco Comedy College intro class.

WHEN: 6 p.m. Sunday.

WHERE: Actors’ Theatre, 1001 Center St., Santa Cruz.

TICKETS: Free.

DETAILS: 415-921-2051 or www.sfcomedycollege.com.

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