Opinion | My experience as a 16-year-old stand-up comedian

Chapman student Jack Fischer (right) details what it was like to work as a stand-up comic in high school and his experience meeting ‘The Goldbergs’ actor Jeff Garlin (left) at a show. Photo courtesy of Jack Fischer

When asked what they did in high school, most people will mention how they had a part-time job on the side. Usually, it would be a shift at the local grocery store or a simple fast-food role. 

Not many would say that they worked as stand-up comedians in high school. That’s what I ended up doing.

Jack Fischer, sophomore television writing and production major

I started out just attending improv and writing classes offered by a comedy club on weekends. Throughout these courses, I realized that while I enjoyed a little on-the-fly improvisation, scripting and preparation in advance was more my style. Luckily enough, I found out that stand-up was the middle ground. 

Not many realize how much preparation and writing goes into an entire performance before the comic even goes onstage. It felt like a perfect balance for me, where my planned and scripted beat sheet would be energized on stage with some witty commentary to mend into a cohesive act. 

I was immediately intrigued when I saw what seemed like a performance form that was geared toward me personally.

When I started practicing stand-up, it became apparent that I was an outlier among most of them. While plenty were anywhere from 30 to 50 years old, here I was, trying to match their work onstage as a 16 year old. 

It wasn’t as intimidating as I imagined, though, as the ones I knew didn’t treat me like I was in the wrong place. A few even said I had a similar sense of humor to them at times. I’m still unsure whether saying that I occasionally made the same jokes as a 40-something was flattering or not. 

This fish-out-of-water environment persisted until my first “show,” which was more like a recital for me and the others who took the class. The biggest fear I had wasn’t being unfunny. It was not remembering which bit came next in my 10-minute set. I learned to keep the set in my head by writing down one-sentence beat summaries for each of my jokes and then thoroughly reciting the structure by memory from there. 

Thankfully, my strategy worked when I finally went up. The entire show felt like a little over a minute, and I managed to get a consistent chuckle every time I had planned for one, which in my case meant success. I thought I wouldn’t get onstage again for anything like that for months at least. That is until I got a booking for the very next week.

Not only did they reach out to me, but this set wasn’t for any class or recital like before. I was actually getting work as a comic. Still unsure how I got this spot, I went back to the club the following weekend and performed again, using a similar act as before with little changes throughout. 

The emcee, who is usually the hype man for each comic in a lineup, had no idea how old I was before the set. She thought I was just a small 20-something-year-old. Regardless of my age, the show seemed to have gone well, and I already had another booking offer two weeks in advance. 

This cycle became common in my schedule for the next year or so.

Aside from doing stand-up comedy already, what was probably the most unique thing about how old I was, were the restrictions I had for being in a club. Since it was a comedy club with older performers, all shows served alcohol. I technically couldn’t even walk or sit with the audience due to that, meaning I had to always enter the club backstage and never make the standard entrance most performers would make. 

My age also confused most people. When performers are in the “green room” — a waiting room for talent — there is usually a bartender or waiter asking us what drinks we want. Every time this happened they would pause for a second when they got to me until I simply asked for a Sprite.

Some comics even took a second to process things. Some would come up to me after I performed and either ask whether it was okay for them to do whatever obscene bit they had planned or just apologize for one they’ve already done. A few even thought I had snuck in backstage. 

During one of my later gigs I actually ran into a famous comic who thought something similar at first. After my set, I ran right into “The Goldbergs” actor Jeff Garlin backstage. He was confused to see a teenager there and thought I was just a kid trying to get booze.Those interactions were common and oftentimes memorable during my time doing stand-up. 

I eventually stopped at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic when I already had some dozen shows under my belt. With a pandemic closing clubs up for a while, I had no way to continue my work as a stand-up comedian and began to transition from performance to screenwriting and production, which I still practice now. 

Doing stand-up work during the time I did was a fascinating experience, but it’s something most people don’t take seriously the first time I tell them. Regardless, it left a lasting impression on me and still influences how I write and think about my work today.