Jason Salmon on Comedy, Joy, and Finding Your Playground

[00:00:00] Welcome to Plot Twist Radio, the show where creativity, storytelling, and the unpredictable path of the creative life all collide. I'm your host, Erin Egnatz. Hi Jason, welcome to Plot Twist Radio. Thanks for having me, Erin. I appreciate it. It's great to have you. Before we get going, can you tell the audience a little bit about yourself?

[00:00:22] I am a stand-up comedian touring all over the U.S. right now. I'm also an actor and a writer, but I'm mostly on stages, live stand-up. I have a little social media stuff that I do, but yeah, I'm just a dude from Texas, living in New York City, chasing my dreams, you know? Absolutely. And as you said, you grew up in Texas. I grew up in Georgia. I know. Okay.

[00:00:51] Chicago. So how much of Texas still lives in you? Because a lot of Georgia still lives in me. Yeah, I mean, if I pan up here, that's my Texas Rangers baseball camp. So I'm still very tied to Texas. I love Texas. It's where I grew up. That's actually where I've been the last few weekends doing comedy. So yeah, it's still a part of me.

[00:01:16] I feel like you come to New York City and it's like, you know, the city wants to beat everything out of you. And I'm like, yeah, you know what? It's okay to have some Texans in New York City. Oh yeah, absolutely. Yeah, it's good. I love it. I love both Texas and New York. Yeah. Totally different worlds, but... Yeah, just two different speeds of crazy. For sure. So what originally got you into comedy? Were you always just like the funny kid or...

[00:01:44] No, I was always... I always was curious about people, I think is probably the thing. And I didn't... I was always fascinated by the concept. I remember telling, saying something funny when I was a kid and some adult laughed. And I thought, what is... what is this? You know? And I come from a really solid family, you know? And so I didn't have a rough childhood. I'm not trying to fill any voids.

[00:02:13] I'm not... I'm not depressed. I'm optimistic. I'm, you know, I'm sort of this weird style of comic, I guess. But I look back on it, and I used to sing in church. So I would sing these solos in church. And before I sang in church, I would always talk a little bit, and I would try to get them to laugh. And my thought was, if I can get them to laugh, then I can feel relaxed enough to sing this song, which I'm really nervous about.

[00:02:43] And little did I know, I'm like, that joke was my career. The song, you know, my singing voice now is more like a joke. But, uh, so it all just switched places, I guess. But you look back, and that's what... It just, you know, the ability to bring another person joy. That's an alchemy that they can't always access themselves. And there's something magical about that. And it just... it's one of my favorite things. Just joy, you know? And I love comedy. I think we need more comedy in the world.

[00:03:13] But I just love it. A lot of my books, because I'm an author, I think I'm funny. I'm probably not, but I think I am. I don't know if that translates to my audience. But how do you go about writing your jokes? I write what I'm interested in first. Because like I say, the thing that drew me to any sort of entertainment is just a curiosity about people. And so if something's interesting or confusing or new

[00:03:40] or, you know, a different perspective on something, I'm always looking for that thing that stimulates me. And it's... and, you know, I mean, we sort of... Because life is so chaotic and it's so fast, you know, and you've got to do so many things, we tend to categorize things in very broad styles so that we can... so that we can organize ourselves to move forward in the world instead of just, you know, cowering in fear.

[00:04:06] And I think a lot of times those little spaces between what's actually real and how we organize them, that's where a lot of the comedy is. And for me, so I just... If I'm curious about something, I'll just start writing. Sometimes I'll start, like I'll have a joke in my head and I'll start. But I find that... And I write by hand in a notebook. And I find that, you know, if I'm writing by hand, inevitably by the end of two pages of writing about a subject, the thing that I thought was funny is not the thing

[00:04:36] that ended up being the funny thing, you know? So it's just fast enough for my brain to keep up with, but just slow enough for my brain to process while I'm writing. So that's really my process is start with curiosity and see where that leads you. It's a good starting point. Yeah, it's good for either a comedian or detective. Either one of those. You can go either way with that. I love that. For sure. So comedy, you know, it seems like a fun career from the outside, but it can be brutal.

[00:05:05] Like the grind can be brutal, you know, a different city every night. Yeah. Basically audiences vary. Yeah. Something people don't understand about that lifestyle. I mean, the best part of it is that, you know, when you're successful at it, you can get paid a solid amount of money to go and stand in front of an audience and just make them happy for an hour, which I always have contended just in a personal capacity that the greatest way to be happy

[00:05:33] is to strive to make someone else happy. Incidentally, the greatest way to be sane is to realize you cannot make everybody happy. So you got to use both of those facets of it. But I mean, I literally get paid to make people happy and there's nothing I would rather be doing with my life than that. There's, I mean, that is such a wonderful, beautiful thing. But in order to get there, I've done a lot of work for zero money. I've failed a lot.

[00:06:02] I've, you know, you have to fail miserably in order to get good. You know, I think in anything that's true. In comedy, it's just in your face because when you fail, it hurts immediately. You know, you don't get any buffer between an audience who's angry at you and failure. So I think you fail a lot. You get paid very little for a lot of it. And, you know, you're constantly rejected

[00:06:30] because it is a great, it's a great career path and everybody would do it if it was easy. But part of the thing is, is you ask bookers, you say, hey, I want to bring joy to your place. And they're like, no, no. We will have none of your joy here. But, you know, there's a ton of rejection and you got to be comfortable with that. And you have to be, I think there's a level of it where the highs are so high

[00:06:58] that the lows can be significantly low. And if you're not equipped to stabilize in that from both sides, you know, that's where you got a lot of people in the past, you know, a lot of drug use, a lot of alcohol abuse, a lot of depression, you know, and I think people have to contend with that. I mean, I'm fortunate enough to be just dumb enough to sleep at night. So I'm not as susceptible

[00:07:26] to some of the more depressive components of it. And I'm too boring for some of the more excessive parts of it. So I'm in a sweet spot, but it's still, you face a lot of rejection. You face a lot of pain. You face a lot of people who just, you know, and look, there's in every crowd, there's likely to be one person who's just like, he's not my thing, you know? And, you know, that's, you get that right to your face. Most people don't get it right to their face.

[00:07:55] You get it right to your face. Yeah, I can imagine that would be, that would be like my biggest fear. I hate speaking in public to begin with. So I would hate that. But how do you psych yourself up before you go out? Um, because I've done it for so long, it's not as psychologically taxing before I go out. I know what I can do. So it's easy for me to go out there and go, look, I can make these people laugh.

[00:08:24] They're going to have a good time, you know, which is great. I mean, sometimes you're exhausted when you're doing it. I mean, I've had, you know, my dad was sick for a long time. Sometimes I would get off the phone with my mom about what was going on with my dad and literally walk onto a stage. So sometimes the shifting from where you are to where you need to be, you know, is, is, uh, a challenge. Uh, but I feel like going out on the stage, that's where I'm most comfortable.

[00:08:52] Everything else is chaos to me. I, you know, it's just, once I step on the stage, I'm like, oh, this is relaxing. This is where I'm most relaxed. That's good. Then that, you know, you're like in your element. Yeah. Yeah. That's, I think that's where we perform our best, no matter what we're doing. Right. Find your playground and land and work there. So you've performed pretty much everywhere from clubs to military tours. Yeah. Was there a unforgettable crowd that you can still like not get out of your mind?

[00:09:23] Um, there are two sides of it. One, there was a crowd in Dallas, Texas, and this was when I was, uh, a feature comedian. So I wasn't even the headliner yet. I was just doing 20 minutes before the headliner. And I will never forget. It was just a bunch of, a bunch of just large black women who were in the front. Uh, and they were so gregariously joyful.

[00:09:50] Their laugh was so amazing that I, sometimes when things weren't going well, you know, cause that's when you're in the struggle period, like you're good enough to headline, but you're, you're, you're not well known enough to get all the work you want to get. And so some, anytime I would have a struggle, I would play the recording cause I record all my sets to listen back to. I would play the recording of that set and those women laughing and, and it's so it's, they brought me so much more joy than I brought them.

[00:10:20] And if you were in the room, you're like, there's no way anybody's had more joy than these women. Um, but they, they have since that day for a full decade brought me more joy than I brought them at all that night. Uh, and that's the, that's the great part of it. Uh, and then I performed in Afghanistan, uh, to a, to a, uh, a base where someone had been killed. One of their, one of their, uh, uh, soldiers at that base had been killed.

[00:10:48] And we performed for them like a day later and it was, there was almost no laughter and it was crazy how uncomfortable it felt that you're just trying, you're like, I'm a professional. I'm, I'm keeping my, I'm still putting out the joy and I'll never forget walking out of there. More than one guy came up to me and said, thank you so much. We needed this so much. And I'm like, I don't know what you felt, but it wasn't out loud. And I'm, you know, and sometimes,

[00:11:17] and sometimes you realize the joy you bring some people is just releasing them from pain for, you know, 10 minutes. And, and so it was, so on both sides of that, but I will never forget either one of those sets and I will never forget either one of those conversations or, or, uh, audience interactions. I can imagine that, that has to be quite powerful for you. I, it takes a lot of strength to even do that. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it takes a lot of strength to go and sacrifice your life conceivably for your country

[00:11:45] and, and, and to be able to go over there and sacrifice 10 minutes of comfort for myself to give those guys, those guys 10 minutes of release from pain is, you know, that's, that's not half the sacrifice they were giving. So, you know, it's, it, it, it, it fulfills you in a way because you feel like I'm giving something. I'm, I'm, you know, allow, allowing them some reward for what they've sacrificed for me. For sure.

[00:12:14] And it's wonderful that you guys go over there and do that. You know, uh, musicians, I, my friend, he was stationed over in Afghanistan for years, it seemed like, and he was just so depressed, but he would get so happy when anybody would come over and perform. It would just make a day. Yeah. Yeah. And it, and, and they told us, and that was, that was beautiful. It was, it was a great thing to be a part of. I did. Afghanistan was, I've done multiple trips abroad and Afghanistan was the only one I've ever done in a, in an active war zone. And I, that was the most rewarding of all of them. It was the most exhausting.

[00:12:44] Uh, it was the most, uh, sleep deprived, you know, chaotic situation, but by far the best of all of them. I can see that. Um, so I've spoken with a couple of comedians and they're going to say that, you know, comedy has evolved a lot since they first got into it. Have you noticed a shift, especially within the last half decade or so? Uh, I would say, uh, probably in the last half decade, you're dealing with COVID shifted a lot of things

[00:13:14] because COVID shifted. I mean, comedy clubs were the worst possible constructs for COVID because COVID needs ventilation and space and distancing and comedy needs compression and lack of space and walls that things bounce off. Oh, so, um, so there, there was a big, uh, shift

[00:13:40] in understanding the nuances of the structure of the thing. Uh, I think comedy itself, uh, split a little bit because you had people who were very sort of, uh, libertarian centric, sort of like freedom first above everything. And then there were others who were like community first above everything. And, and so you did sort of split off into these things. I think that's the motivating factor.

[00:14:08] I mean, you can, you can designate it in a lot of different political ways and all these other things, but that it was like, we all love freedom and we all love community, but some, but it was like the, the, the, uh, prioritizing of the two, uh, that sort of separated comedy. And I, I think it's interesting because you, you ended up getting some meaner comedy. Uh, you ended up getting some, uh, uh, more, uh, aggressive comedy. And then you ended up getting some kinder comedy, I think.

[00:14:38] Uh, and, and some more, uh, aware comedy, you know, where we're curious comedy and judgmental comedy. That's probably a good way to split it up. Um, and I, and I think both of those can be very fun. Um, you know, I, I would, I would posit that every comedian has curiosity and judgment is a huge part. That's how you form a joke. You know, you make a, uh, you know, you, you ask a question and then you go, but why?

[00:15:05] You know, um, and I, I, so I, I think there, there was sort of a split, uh, but I, I think the curiosity is always at the middle of it. And so it's interesting because I'll talk to comedians who tend to be one side or the other side and curiosity is always the, that's, that's the thread. And that's what, that's why I love talking to comedians because you find out more things than you do talking to normal people because, because we're all thinking it. We're like, what about this? What about this?

[00:15:34] I have this and people have strong opinions. There's nothing like a debate between two people who think they know the exact answer. There's a lot of that out there. I see that's why I stay off social media as much as possible. I see a lot of that. Yes. It's better to do in a comedy club where you're looking another human in the eye and you can tell when you've crossed the line. Uh, everybody's capable of doing it online in a comment section. Uh, do it to a person's face. That's, that's, that's a real conversation.

[00:16:03] That's, that's worth, worth still pursuing. Oh yeah, absolutely. So you said you're doing a tour. Do you have an active one right now? Yes. Yeah. I call it the make laugh, not war tour. Um, uh, um, yeah, uh, my following, my following is a little bit politically driven. Uh, so I do a little bit of politics in my shows at the beginning, but ultimately I would say whatever your politics are by the end of the show,

[00:16:31] I would venture you've had a good time no matter what. And I also explain when I'm making fun of politicians, I'm like, none of us are politicians. We're all the people who suffer from the choices of politicians. So yeah, look, if you have a problem with gas prices, you're my audience. Period. Period. Um, so I, I don't think that's as divisive as, as politicians want us to believe it is. Um, but yeah, I, I'm, I'm touring all over.

[00:17:00] I'm going to be, um, doing a Father's Day weekend in Detroit and Cleveland. And, and, um, I'm all up in the Northwest and, uh, I've got on my, on my website, I've got all the lists, but yeah, I've got about, uh, I think, uh, 60 something dates. Wow. Yeah. So it's, uh, it's been a busy year so far and, uh, it's going to be a busy, yeah, it's continuing to be busy. Yeah. You're going to be tired. I am tired right now.

[00:17:29] So where can the audience find you? Uh, my, uh, social media is the easiest place to find my, to, as a starting point. And that's J Solomon comedy. And my last name's Solomon, but it's spelled like salmon. Uh, so it's, uh, J Solomon comedy. Uh, and that's on all of the social media. Uh, although YouTube, I'm at Jason Solomon for whatever reason. Uh, but, uh, uh, and then Jason-Solman.com. That's my website.

[00:17:57] That's got all my tour dates and ticket links. And, um, yeah, those, that's the easiest place to find me. Very cool. Well, I will have all the links in the show notes and thank you so much for joining me. Absolutely. Thank you for having me. I appreciate it.