Last night we shot the finals of Stand Up & BITE me to a sold out crowd at Absolute Comedy in Toronto and streamed LIVE online to thousands of people on http://www.bite.ca/: Such a fun event.
For those who don’t know, Stand Up & BITE Me is my baby. A comedy contest created and produced by a comic, me. I took a look at all the comedy contests that were on TV and essentially took the things I disliked out.
· No long lines in the cold and the rain for comics to stand in to get an audition. They simply sent in a video clip that was viewed by a 10 person focus group and the top 32 got in.
· No editing of the auditions to make good comics look bad just to add some drama. We didn’t even show those videos.
· No censorship of the comedians sets. They tell the jokes that they think are funny; dirty, clean, whatever.
· No editing. You have no idea how disturbing it is to a comic to watch their set back on TV and see that the order of the jokes have been changed or that vital parts of a bit have been removed… things like punch lines being cut out. Even seeing only 2 minutes out of an 8-minute set make it to air and it is not the best part of that set.
· No limit on stage time. I have been to contests where comics are all supposed to do a certain amount of time but some “choose” to do more; WAY more but don’t get penalized. To me a contest is supposed to be as fair as you can possibly make it. In Stand Up & BITE ME comics are to do not less than 7-minutes and no more than 8-minutes. If they go over or under they lose points.
I am very grateful to all the people at BITE TV for giving me a chance to get this contest off the ground and on TV. There are too many people to name, however this all started with a single meeting 4 years ago with Sharon Stevens, Jeffery Elliot and Greg Hull: Thank you!
So congratulations go to Winston Spear for winning the $5000 Grand Prize. All the comics did a great job. Go to http://www.bite.ca/ to see the finals when they post it online or watch it on BITE TV on Wednesday September 30th at 11:00pm.
Oh yeah… I was able to get a woman in the crowd to stand up and show her breasts on camera. Just goes to show you… you never know, until you simply ask.
For those who don’t know, Stand Up & BITE Me is my baby. A comedy contest created and produced by a comic, me. I took a look at all the comedy contests that were on TV and essentially took the things I disliked out.
· No long lines in the cold and the rain for comics to stand in to get an audition. They simply sent in a video clip that was viewed by a 10 person focus group and the top 32 got in.
· No editing of the auditions to make good comics look bad just to add some drama. We didn’t even show those videos.
· No censorship of the comedians sets. They tell the jokes that they think are funny; dirty, clean, whatever.
· No editing. You have no idea how disturbing it is to a comic to watch their set back on TV and see that the order of the jokes have been changed or that vital parts of a bit have been removed… things like punch lines being cut out. Even seeing only 2 minutes out of an 8-minute set make it to air and it is not the best part of that set.
· No limit on stage time. I have been to contests where comics are all supposed to do a certain amount of time but some “choose” to do more; WAY more but don’t get penalized. To me a contest is supposed to be as fair as you can possibly make it. In Stand Up & BITE ME comics are to do not less than 7-minutes and no more than 8-minutes. If they go over or under they lose points.
I am very grateful to all the people at BITE TV for giving me a chance to get this contest off the ground and on TV. There are too many people to name, however this all started with a single meeting 4 years ago with Sharon Stevens, Jeffery Elliot and Greg Hull: Thank you!
So congratulations go to Winston Spear for winning the $5000 Grand Prize. All the comics did a great job. Go to http://www.bite.ca/ to see the finals when they post it online or watch it on BITE TV on Wednesday September 30th at 11:00pm.
Oh yeah… I was able to get a woman in the crowd to stand up and show her breasts on camera. Just goes to show you… you never know, until you simply ask.
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