ME FUNNY

Get READY for Some (Ab) ORIGINAL Stand-up COMEDY

{ DON KELLY }

(Polite applause)

THANKS, FOLKS. My name is Don Kelly, and I’m a Native-Canadian, Ojibway Indian. There aren’t a lot of us doing stand-up comedy. In fact, my agent keeps telling me I should play it up more, maybe use my Indian name as my stage name. But I’m going to stick with Don Kelly, because my Indian name is Runs-Like-a-Girl.

It’s been said that simply being born Native in Canada is a political act. You’re a walking shadow of the unfinished business that hangs over the country, an uncomfortable reminder of the reality that gives lie to Canada’s cherished self-image as a fair and just country. You’re Canada’s living, breathing, dirty little secret.

In other words, a prime topic for feel-good comedy! The jokes just write themselves.

Thanks for that laughter, folks. I’ll pass your positive response on to my agent, Bouncing Cheque!

It’s easier to get your foot in the door wearing a silly grin instead of a scowl. Why kick the door down when you can get them to invite you in? “Runs-Like-a-Girl,” silly as it is, opens the door. And once the door is open, then you can start hauling in the baggage.

People ask me how an Ojibway Indian ended up with the name “Kelly.” This goes back about a hundred years, to when the government wanted to pen us up on reserves. They’d send some lackey around to get everyone’s name so they could make a “band list.” So, typically, some English guy would go up to my great-great-great grandfather:

“And your name is, sir?”

“Paybahnahgahbow Shonya Gwaneb Dezhnkhaz Onigaming Danjobah Pizhew nTotem.”

(Pause)

“Okay… Mr. Kelly! Yeah, we’re spelling it ‘Kelly.’ You can pronounce it any way you want. Knock yourself out!”

Tension can be good for stand-up comedy. A stand-up act is often a cycle of tension and release, tension and release.

Sometimes I can feel a crowd stiffen up the second I mention I’m Native Canadian. “Ooh—are we going to get harangued about the evils of white society and the injustices perpetrated against Native people? Is this going to be an hour of guilt and shame?” Or I can feel another kind of tension: the uncomfortable anticipation of an hour of racial slurs. “Ooh—is he going to confront us with every negative stereotype we’ve ever heard? Is it going to be an hour of shock comedy? Is he going to drag that drunk, lazy Indian stereotype out on stage and throw him into the spotlight?” I mean, if Native issues are a touchy topic in living rooms and chat rooms across the country, then why should comedy clubs be any different?

I hope I’m not offending anyone, folks. If I have, well, as we Indians say: Boy, is my face red!

I’ve been doing stand-up comedy at clubs and conferences, roadhouses and festivals for almost a decade now. (You say you’ve never heard of me? Welcome to Canadian showbiz!) I’ve been a fan of stand-up comedy since I was a young brave. I always knew I wanted to try it one day.

Admittedly, stand-up comedy is a weird thing for anyone to aspire to, Native or otherwise. It’s definitely not for everyone. Notice how whenever they survey people on their biggest fears the top two are always (a) public speaking and (b) dying. Standup comedy has a wonderful way of combining the two into one big knot of anxiety.

Still, I knew I had to do it. And I knew that when I did I’d work on material about Native people and the “Indian experience” in Canada.

For one thing, I’d never heard that topic discussed on a comedy stage. Sure, Charlie Hill, an Oneida from Wisconsin, was working U.S. clubs way back in the early 1970s. He was by most accounts the first. (And when you’re Indian, it’s all about being first.) He wrote pretty much all the lines that have become quotable classics for us Native folk. “Take my land—please!” Or greeting the crowd with a rhythmic powwow chant: “Hey-How-Are-Ya-Hey-How-Are-Ya… ”

But Native stand-up comedy is still a newcomer to the stage. We’re still writing our own creation stories. And it’s great to be in on the ground level in undiscovered country. There’s so much new territory to explore.

I’m an Aboriginal citizen living in Canada. And I just want to say to you, on behalf of all of us: We love what you’ve done with the place.

These days there are a handful of Native comics in Canada. Of those, few are doing the mainstream comedy-club circuit. Two guys I cross paths with are Howie Miller, who’s based in Edmonton, Alberta, and Gerry “the Big Bear” Barrett, who works out of Winnipeg, Manitoba. There may be others I haven’t heard of, but I can say that the market is far from saturated.

There’s another group of performers who mainly stick to the conference circuit or special “Aboriginal” shows. One of the best-known Native comedians, Don Burnstick, a Cree from Alexander First Nation in Alberta, is big on this circuit. He doesn’t even play the clubs. For Don, who is upfront about his past battles with substance abuse, it’s a personal decision to pursue the wellness and healing path and avoid venues where the alcohol is as much of a draw as the entertainment. For others, conferences and theatre shows are the more comfortable and reliable gigs, because there’s a built-in audience ready and willing to hear all about the Native experience. Clubs and road gigs are a little dicier. The audiences are coming for laughs and beer (lots and lots of beer). They’re not seeking enlightenment or epiphanies—they want escape. They want to put their brains in neutral and let someone else drive the bus.

They’re coming to comedy clubs for a lot of reasons. But a dissection of race relations in Canada is probably not one of them.

Native people are the Rodney Dangerfield of Canadian society— we get no respect. I mean, we’re the only people where it’s okay to name vehicles after us. Vehicles!

“Hey, Don, check out that Pontiac and that Winnebago. What do you think of that Jeep Cherokee?”

“Well, I kinda like that Ford Negro myself. And that Dodge Quadriplegic.”

Is this okay for anyone else?

Native comedy can be touchy for non-Aboriginal people. In these days of political correctness, even the pure of heart and well-intentioned can find it conflicting.

“If I laugh at that joke am I laughing at Native people? If I laugh at that stereotype am I admitting that it’s true? If I don’t laugh am I offending the poor Indian on stage? If he’s making fun of himself, can I laugh? Or should I take the high road and… ” At this point said individual’s head usually explodes, which distracts from the show and forces me to end my set early.

But seriously… I’m aware of this tension. Early on I had to experiment with different ways of getting the audience to relax so they could listen, laugh and enjoy the ride. When I’m about to take my passengers on a delightful sightseeing trip through the minefield of race relations in Canada, I try to ease them into the drive. So I start with “Runs-Like-a-Girl.” (Hope the ladies aren’t offended!) It sends up a smoke signal that says this isn’t going to be a heavy lecture. I can laugh at myself. And we can laugh together, and at one another.

That’s more my style anyway. I’m not in-your-face (or in-your-anything, for that matter). My comedy style is not that of the pit bull. I’m more of a golden retriever—you know, friendly, well-groomed, and I drool a lot when excited.

Still, I also have to deal with the surprised response I often get when people find out that I’m First Nations. How can I put this?

People tell me I don’t look Native. I believe the politically correct term is “pigmentally challenged.” I am “melanin deprived.”

That’s why I don’t use the term “white people.” I know the second I do, you’ll be like: “Uh, have you looked in a mirror lately, Casper?”

If the revolution ever hits, I’ll make a great Stealth Indian.

The “pigmentally challenged” bit is not always a killer, but sometimes it’s necessary. Audiences don’t always believe I’m Ojibway, and the last thing I want is for them to think I’m faking it for the material. (The DNA equivalent of a prop act— for shame!)

There’s an old rule in stand-up comedy that you need to address immediately anything that’s obvious about yourself. If you’re really fat, talk about it right off the top. If you’re really tall, talk about it right off the top. If you’re a dwarf in an iron lung… maybe stand-up’s not for you. But if you do it, talk about it right off the top. Because that’s what the audience is looking at and thinking about. If you don’t deal with it you’re running uphill.

It’s distracting from your material. They’re too busy marvelling at how tall/fat/elfin you are to listen to your pithy observations about airplane food and television commercials.

So for me, it’s a little trickier. I let them know I’m Native Canadian, then I have to deal with the obvious: that I don’t look Native. When I did the T V talk show Open Mike with Mike Bullard a few years back, Bullard leaned over to me and said: “I can’t think of anything worse than being an Indian who looks like Custer.”

Like most things in my life, I blame it on Mom. Dad is full Ojibway, all the way back. But Mom has no Native blood. In fact, she’s Swedish. So she’s not just white—she’s downright pale.

And I know you’re all thinking of your own little joke for that: “Ojibway and Swedish? So how’s it going there, ‘Dances-with-Bjorn’? I’m sure you have the marvellous ability to track game while assembling Ikea furniture!” Who knows—the “look” thing may even do some good in a small way. Maybe it challenges the audience’s preconceived notions about Native people. Maybe they’ll realize that not all First Nations people fit their frame of reference. First of all, there’s my physical look. No leathers, feathers, braids or beads.

Second, they see me in an environment where we’re all laughing. How often do they see Indians in that kind of situation? A lot of Canadians see us only in formal settings (a lecture or conference) or, shall we say, less formal situations (stumbling down Main Street). Or on the evening news, with some irate Indian politician reciting a litany of lamentations.

It’s good to break the mould. It expands people’s ideas about what and who and where and how is an Indian. A little public education helps. And it’s sorely needed in this country.

I saw in the news that the leader of the Conservative Party of Canada sent a congratulatory letter to all the Indian Friendship Centres in the country, wishing them a “Happy Republic of India Day.” India? Come on. Granted, Columbus made the same mistake, but that was five hundred years ago!

He blames it on a clerical error. They searched their mailing list for anything with “India” or “Indian” in the title and it spat out all those names. I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt, but I can hardly wait until Gay Pride Week when he sends that wonderful letter to the Lebanese community.

The best thing about comedy—and the best thing about being a Native comic—is that you get to sneak in some points, maybe even make a statement or two.

I can’t claim that my act is heavy on the profundities. Fact is, I enjoy being silly. I try to craft material that’s sharp and clever, but that doesn’t mean it’s all politics and punditry. There’s a balance.

It’s true that in stand-up, anything goes. It’s one of the last bastions of free speech. Some take that as a licence to shock, to whack patrons over the head with a two-by-four labelled TABOO and with a bloody nail poking out the end. I won’t dismiss that out of hand, though. Shock and awe can get a reaction. Sometimes a violent one, sometimes a laugh. But if it’s pure shock value with no substance, it’s kind of cheesy. Now, it’s fun to be cheesy—we all need a little cheese in our diet. But we also need some fibre, something with more substance to chew on for nourishment.

Freedom, to me, entails responsibility—the responsibility to handle a topic in an appropriate manner. A great, wise man once said: “With great power comes great responsibility.” (I believe it was Spider-man.) The way I see it—and this is just me talkin’!—comedians get the distinct privilege of having a captive and (ideally) attentive audience listening for ten, fifteen, thirty, forty-five or however many minutes. Why not try to sneak in an idea or two?

I was doing this gig up in a small town in northern Ontario. Yeah, I was up there doing the big Just for Nothing Festival. But I got asked one of the best questions I’ve ever heard.

This woman comes up after the show and says: “Hey, Native Guy, I’ve always wondered something about your people: Do your people celebrate Thanksgiving?”

How can I resist that?

“Yeah! Just last year I had a traditional Native Thanksgiving. The European guy who lives next door came over, claimed he ‘discovered’ my apartment and now he’s living in the place!”

That’s one of my favourite bits. Fine, maybe it’s not Mort Sahl. But it makes a point. I get to use my apartment as a microcosm of the world, and in doing so shatter the entire myth of “discovery” and terra nullius. (Terra nullius: Latin for “inconveniently populated.”) When people laugh that means they get it. Not just the joke—they get the point. If they didn’t get the connection they wouldn’t be laughing. I’m happy to say they usually do laugh. And maybe, just maybe, one person thinks a little bit about it.

Humour is a fantastic communications device. If you yell at people or browbeat them into submission, they’ll tune out and walk away. But if you can keep them laughing, they’ll keep listening. People who would never walk into a lecture on Native history will walk into a comedy club. And someone who walks into a lecture on First Nations history is probably halfway sold anyway. We need to start preaching to the pagans. Do a little converting of our own. Get in their face, Jesuit-style.

“Oh sure, my neighbour kept a little spot in ‘reserve’ for me. It’s right next to the cat’s litter box—thanks a lot! I’m not sure how I’m gonna get my apartment back, but I’m thinking of blockading the bathroom. That’s one stand-off I’m pretty sure I can win.”

I said earlier I’m not an aggressive comic. But they are out there. The aforementioned Howie Miller is most definitely in-your-face, likeable though he is. Howie’ll deal with stereotypes and racial slurs head-on, no mercy and no apologies. Any audience members who challenge him do so at their own risk.

It’s interesting to me that there aren’t more angry Native comics. We have a lot to be angry about. I’ve tried to write angry material, but it just doesn’t jibe with my style or persona, on stage or off. I’m reminded of the cautionary tale of Dick Gregory, a brilliant black American comic who was active in the comedy scene and the civil rights movement in the 1960s. He eventually gave up comedy because, as he famously said, “After a while, it’s just not funny any more.”

Personally, I love comedians who can mine the most toxic topics for relevant insights and social satire. Words carry a lot of weight. And when they’re burdened with the extra baggage of race and politics, they can be too heavy for some people to carry.

The term that bothers me the most is “Indian giver.” Hey—we were the ones who got all the promises from you guys. “Share the land and we’ll give you this. Sign this treaty and we’ll give you that.” And then you don’t deliver. And we get tagged with this term “Indian giver”? Come on—that’s like saying to your black boss, “What are you—some kind of slave driver?” The irony’s a little thick, people.

Race and stereotypes. Tricky topics. And there are two ways to get laughs about them: by refuting them or by reinforcing them.

It’s parallel to the kinds of laughs you can get in comedy in general. First, there’s the laughter that comes from crystallizing an idea the audience already knows. It’s the laughter of recognition. (For example, the familiar joke of telling an American, “Watch out for Canadian beer—it’s got alcohol in it!”)

Then there’s the laughter of “the new”—communicating an original idea or making connections between things that the audience didn’t know were there. Jerry Seinfeld is a master of this. (Take for example his bit about laundry night being like a party for your clothes.) Seinfeld mines comedy from the utterly mundane things that we all look at every day. He takes a topic and peers underneath it, turns it over and looks at it from different angles. I mean, the guy had a five-minute bit about cotton balls. A hilarious bit… about cotton balls. Write me one hilarious joke about cotton balls and I’ll buy it. (I’ve got some nice shiny trinkets…)

That same dynamic (“the recognized” vs. “the new”) applies to jokes about stereotypes. It’s easier to get laughs by reinforcing stereotypes. You can rely on the audience’s mental shorthand to make the connection. But to be honest, it’s a cheaper laugh.

Now, I’m not getting all holier than thou. (What’s the Ojibway equivalent of “holier than thou”? Perhaps, in recognition of our sweat lodge ceremony, it’s “sweatier than thou”?) I admit I have material that reinforces the stereotype.

I was trying to be cool with my girlfriend at the reserve by talking that sexy dirty talk. Turns out it doesn’t really go over well on the rez.

I’m like: “Who’s your daddy! Who’s your daddy!”

And she says: “I don’t know… ”

Really killed the mood.

So, guilty as charged. But I’d rather accentuate the positive than reinforce the negative. My rationale is this: If I get a laugh by reinforcing a stereotype I’m basically saying that the stereotype is true. That’s not too harmful when it’s about bingo. It’s more problematic when it’s about alcoholism or welfare. If I do jokes that reinforce stereotypes then all I’m doing is telling the redneck in the crowd that he’s right. He can run out into the street and repeat my joke, and if anyone calls him on it he can say: “Well, the Indian at the comedy club said it, why can’t I?” And he’s got a point. So I’d rather play with the stereotype than play up the stereotype.

So I’m half Native and half white. It’s an interesting dichotomy. I often find my white side tries to exploit my Native side. It’s true. I’ll give you a real-life example: Let’s say I walk into a bank and there’s a huge mob, a massive crush of people waiting to be served.

The teller will come out and say: “Okay, who was here first?” and I’ll go, “Well, technically, moi. I don’t want to start a Supreme Court case about it… but I will.” Because face it, gang, I’ve got you either way. Dad is Ojibway, that’s First Nations. Mom is Swedish, which is basically Viking. So either way, dibs on the land!

So what is Native humour? Let’s step back to look at the beast.

I’ll start by making the obvious point that there are as many kinds of Native comedy as there are Native comics. (So in Canada that would mean seven—kidding!) But I think we can point to a couple of common characteristics.

First, it’s all about the teasing. Don Burnstick uses the example of two white guys walking together. When one of them slips and falls, the other one rushes over to help him, frantically asking: “Are you okay? Are you all right? Let me help you up.”

Meanwhile, across the street, two Native guys are walking. One of them slips and falls. The other guy laughs hysterically, then rushes over and helps the first guy up. The first guy probably contemplates a lawsuit, because odds are, if there are two or more Indians together, one of them’s a lawyer.

Fact is, we can laugh at ourselves better than anyone else can. Some of the best (and worst) Indian jokes I’ve ever heard were told to me by Indians.

The other characteristic of Native humour is a tendency towards self-deprecation. A lot of Native humour is about taking ourselves down a peg. The joke’s on me. In one way, this is just the other side of the teasing coin—teasing turned inwards.

Now, we can stretch a bit and make a cultural connection by tying teasing and self-deprecation to our Trickster legends. (As this is an article on Native humour, I am legally obligated to make a Trickster reference.) In our Ojibway Trickster stories, we call him Nanaboozhoo. Nanaboozhoo is a powerful spirit, but he is not Christ-like. Nanaboozhoo would have tripped as he made his way up Calvary or done a first-class spit-take after John baptized him. Nanaboozhoo is a mischievous, sometimes foolish spirit, but always creative.

What I remember about our Trickster stories is that Nanaboozhoo always plays games with people that make them look silly, that embarrass them. And, in turn, the minute he starts feeling a little too proud, he’ll slip and fall into the dung heap. He is more Jack Tripper than Jesus, come to think of it. The message in many of these stories is, basically, don’t get too full of yourself. Don’t take yourself too seriously. There’s only so much we can control, and the rest is nature.

The other notable thing about our stories is that they’re built on the oral tradition. Telling them is half the fun. The outline is constant, but the teller can stretch the story, change the emphasis or revise it based on the audience reaction. Our storytellers were working the room long before there were comedy clubs.

I had a rough childhood. Very traumatic. My father drove a wood-panelled station wagon. Yep, it was tough. We’d have to pile in in broad daylight and actually be seen cruising around in a wood-panelled station wagon. I just took comfort in the fact that we’re an Ojibway family. I figured anyone who saw us would assume we had made it ourselves.

“Look, Junior! There goes a traditional Ojibway family in one of those birchbark sedans they build so well. You know, they use them when they hunt moose so they blend in with their surroundings.”

And what about recent history? Some would argue that Native humour is part of a tradition we could call “the comedy of coping”—humour as a response to troubling times, dark days and oppression. People often apply this same theory to Jewish comedy.

But to me, the two arguments cancel each other out. Can we really have it both ways? Either we’ve always had humour and laughter pumping through the veins of our culture (witness the legends and stories), or we developed humour as a reaction to a history of being dispossessed, disenfranchised, discounted and dismissed. I believe that humour has always been there, in ourselves and in our culture. Perhaps the last couple of centuries have sharpened and honed our wit, but laughter has echoed across Turtle Island for centuries.

As an oppressed minority, I like getting together with other oppressed minorities to play our traditional games. My personal favourite is “Pin the Blame on the Honky.”

Regardless of where our humour comes from, I’m glad to be part of a vital and growing community of Native comics. It’s energizing to see such a range of talent. I’ve never wanted to be a “Native comic” per se. I’ve always wanted to be a comic—a comic who’s Native, certainly, and who talks about it, but one who talks about a lot of other things too. It could be because I grew up mainly in the city. I had other friends and influences. I don’t see everything I do through the lens of “First Nations citizen.” Like, when I order a pizza, I don’t obsess for hours about how I, as a Native Canadian, feel about picking up the phone and ordering this pizza. (Although I do feel guilty if I order the buffalo wings. Typical white people—hunt the buffalo and take only the wings.)

But I have no problem with First Nations comics who want to be, first and foremost, First Nations comics—more power to them. In fact, we need them. We need the full range because we are diverse peoples.

We need more Native comedians and more Native performers. It’s a dream of mine to one day see a Native actor playing Hamlet, that most classic of traditional English theatre roles.

I could just imagine a Native actor playing Hamlet, delivering that dramatic soliloquy: “To be, or not to be. Under the B… 2.”

March 24, 2004, was a landmark day for Native comedy in Canada.

On that day, the CBC Winnipeg Comedy Festival presented a special show called the Turtle Island Gala. It was the first time to my knowledge that any festival has presented a show consisting entirely of Aboriginal comedians. Everyone was there: Don Burnstick, Howie Miller, Gerry Barrett—they even brought in Charlie Hill from the United States. I had the great honour to be part of it.

It was a tremendous mix of acts, and a tremendous night. The crowd loved it. And I am proud to say that the crowd got a first-class comedy show, not a first-class Native comedy show. The Turtle Island Gala held its own with the other shows at the festival. It was a welcome recognition that we have the talent in Indian country to put on a first-class gala. It was proof that we can present a show that entertains everyone, not just our own people. Laughter is universal.

Comedy is well-trod ground, but Native stand-up comedy is wide-open terrain. There are no boundaries and no borders. It’s undiscovered country. And our people are experts in navigating new territory. Why not explore and see what you find? Who knows—you may even find yourself. Or at least find yourself laughing.

Well, you’ve been great, but I should really get going, folks. I’d love to stick around longer but, hey—land don’t claim itself!

Good night.