Anatomy of Awkward (2018) Online

The stand-up comedy scene in India has been booming for a while now. While the fans of the developing art-form have enormous expectation from the established and emerging artists, the scene never exploded like we all expected it to.

When a seasoned comedian like Zakir Khan fills auditoriums (stadiums even) across the country on his tour, only to be replaced in one of the only comedy reality show in this country by someone as untalented as Sajid Khan, it raises the question on the legitimacy and existence of Indian stand-up comdey.

Why is stand-up comedy is still struggling to find its audience? Why only Mumbai and Bangalore are the only cities with active comedy clubs?

You can argue that stand-up comedy is an acquired taste and its future is digital, but if you take a look at the bunch Amazon (couple of Netflix) comedy specials, how many of them you'd consider to be good enough, let alone ground breaking?

The stand-up comedians (barring a few) and the audience, both are responsible:

1. Audience: Most of the audience who flock to stand-up shows are still getting the hang of it. They can be easily manipulated by doing cheap tricks like crowd work (*cough* Kenny *cough*) or they might not laugh at some of the most ingenius punchlines (happended in a lot of the shows I've been to). But what is not expected from audience is to follow a trend. Trend is the polar opposite of comedy, which is about breaking the false expectations. Audience will only evolve when they leave their prejudices and expectations behind. Only then they'll hear what a comedian is truly saying.

2. Comedian: Someone in Daniel Fernandes's podcast said that a lot of people compare him to Zakir, or ask him to do Zakir. Those people obviosly aren't getting what stand-up is, but I think there's more. Perhaps, subconsiously, they identify Zakir's voice among the rest. If you look at Indian stand-up comedians, how many of them have a voice which is original? There's a race of RJs, VJs or anyone who could speak on stage that came rushing to cash-in when the comedy scene started. Most of the comedians (like Kautuk) belong to this race. They're here to do bollywood-karan of stand-up. The naive audience, who don't have many options, laugh at below par comedy thinking this is what comedy is. Veteran comedians should not only teach audience by keeping the quality up, they should point out comedians doing age-old cheap comedy in the name of Stand-up.

I dont think Mr.Kautuk deserves an Amazon special, stand ups have come a long way in India, and in such a talented pool amazon picks up a stand up as worse as mr. kautuk its beyond discription.

no were close to funny. starts by mocking Sachin Tendulkar, fails miserably. the only one laughing seem to be his paid audience or his freebie close buddies.

and has that typical tone in his satire....The Barrrrr, The girl in the Barrrrr. Tries his best with bit of physical comedy but again fails miserably.

Save your self from this supposedly so called stand up...

been very happy with most of amazons stand ups specially biswa and zakir.