Tonight’s show was my second time hosting and the first time since my disastrous hosting debut a while back (when I overwhelmed myself by both producing and hosting a show for the first time). Tonight I was much more composed and prepared for the show, and I think it showed.

I’m not going to say that I love hosting or anything, but I’m definitely much more comfortable with it now.

Downlinke.com's One Night Stand at Great American Music Hall for MTV Logo Network

I’m super excited to announce that I am headed down to San Francisco on Thursday, April 8, 2010, to tape a live performance to apear on MTV Logo Network called Downlinke.com’s One Night Stand Up. This will be my very first American performance, and it’ll appear on television no less! The show will also feature Rebecca Donohue, Sapna Kumar, Cathy Lewis, Ali Mafi and D.J. Pierce.

It all started a few weeks back when I was surfing the internet on my computer while updating my website. I had been wanting to implement a contact me form on my website for a while to give people a way to contact me, and I was determined to finish the form before I went to bed. Thankfully I was able to finish on time and get a good night’s sleep.

The next day, I received my very first notification that someone had left me a message using my contact form. The person so happened to be Andrea Meyerson, President of All Out Films, the production company that had produced the memorable Laughing Matters documentary a few years back. I can’t believe the timing of it all; it was too good to be true. If I had waited another day to finish my contact form, who knows what would have happened or what opportunities would have passed me by.

The poster for the show is attached at the top of this post, and I’m trying my best to hold in my nervous excitement long enough to prepare for the show. I have 20 minutes on stage and haven’t decided on the material I will be performing. I’m sure I’ll include Super Power Bottoms as the central piece, but that leaves me with another 10 minutes of stage time. I have a few weeks to come up with the material, so I’m not too worried.

Another strange coincidence is that I downloaded Lonely Planet’s San Francisco Guide for my iPhone a few months back because they had a sale on it for just $1.99. I had no intention of going to San Francisco, but I thought it would be neat to check out what Lonely Planet’s applications had to offer before I bought one at full price for a city I would actually visit. Who knew that I would end up going to San Francisco a few months later.

I’ll definitely let you know how it all went, so stay tuned for updates!

Related Outbound Links
Great American Music Hall Ticket Purchase
All Out Films homepage

I just completed phase one of the upcoming updates: fixing broken links. All YouTube links across all stories are now working again. I started working on a discussion forum, though I don’t think I’ll be launching that anytime soon, as I need to set aside time to write a theme that matches the rest of this website.

I’ve taken away some old features like the photo section. I’ll be redesigning and upgrading this component with full Flickr integration (below is an example of some Flickr integration). In addition to that, I’ll be adding a Press Kit section that will include my bio, headshots and more for members of the press or for fans who are interested.

I’ve also added a Facebook Fan Box, which will hopefully help more people click on Become A Fan on my Facebook page. My goal before the end of the year is to reach 500 fans.

The biggest new addition is the More On This Topic widget at the bottom of this page. The content is syndicated from around the internet and will help add context to my blog posts.

The big decision for me coming up is my coverage of television shows. Last year I covered America’s Next Top Model and American Idol to great success. I just don’t think I have the time this year to cover serialized shows. I may switch to reviewing pilot episodes, as this will be on a case-by-case basis as opposed to a weekly commitment.

[flickr album=72157622295762084 num=5 size=Thumbnail]

This year’s show was hosted by the always hilarious Richard Ryder, gay comedian extraordinaire. He did a wonderful job of running the show and keeping the energy of the crowd high. I was up first and was definitely nervous. I don’t get so much nervous for the occasion as much as I get nervous for the material I am performing.

The general rule in stand-up comedy is to start with your second-best joke and end with your best and never never never start with new material. Well, I don’t have much choice in the matter since my comedy style is storytelling. I can’t start with something old since all my sets are minimum five minutes long. The set I performed at Homo Night in Canada 2009 was basically ten minutes of all-new material from beginning to end (barring the last 30 seconds of the set, which I borrowed the ending from my Ugly People set).

Anyhow, here’s the video clip, so you can judge for yourselves:

Vong Sundara performs Super Power Bottoms during Homo Night in Canada 2009 at Buddies in Bad Times Theatre
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13sBHm6M4Og

www.youtube.com/watch?v=13sBHm6M4Og

The crowd as absolutely amazing. The crowd's reactions definitely added to the performance and helped me feel a rhythm. Overall, I was very happy with the performance. A bigger surprise to me is that the performance taped even better than it played live. After reviewing the tape, I was pleasantly surprised at some of what I missed while on the stage. Sometimes you never know unless you review the tape. I had the reverse happen when reviewing the tape for my performance of The Ghetto Truth at Spirits a few weeks back, so it was good to see the opposite happen with this performance.

I had a couple of audience members come up to me after to mention that they thought I had crossed the line a couple of times during the performance. I wasn't too upset, though, because it's always my goal to offend five percent of the crowd. Any more than five per cent means that I probably went too far, but anything less than five per cent usually means that I didn't say anything with substance that was worth thinking about.

Another quick note before I go: Mae Martin. Last year, Mae absolutely came away as the breakout star of Homo Night in Canada 2008 (at least for me anyways). I was really excited that she came back this year and performed, this time closing the show. Below is a clip of her song Showers:

Mae Martin performs Showers during Homo Night in Canada 2009 at Buddies in Bad Times Theatre
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OXhrr2txcog

www.youtube.com/watch?v=OXhrr2txcog

There are many, many great classes and courses to take in Toronto, especially with Second City in town along with many great acting studios like Sears and Switzer. I definitely believe in taking classes, and I have gotten a lot out of each and every class I have taken, though I do have to watch out for how much money I have been spending lately. It’s definitely a difficult balance at times.

The Second City classes have definitely helped me improve my comedic range. Coming from a stand-up background, my character skills were definitely lacking. At least now I feel more comfortable going forward with different types of comedy outside of stand-up such as improv and sketch, making me much more well rounded and marketable.

My next seminar revolves around personal publicity. This is definitely the most important seminar for me in a while. If there’s one thing I need to learn before opening my one-man show early next year, it’s going to be how to promote the show and get people in the seats. Otherwise, I’ll just be performing in front of an empty audience.

I think I can manage my expenses for the time being, and hopefully the dollars coming in from performing will start to balance the expenses going out. Luckily for me, I’ve kept my day job, which is allowing me to overspend a little bit on the comedy side.

I cooled off on supercute.ca for a while due to expenses, as maintaining a website cost a lot more back in the day, averaging around $50 a month, whereas now I pay closer to $5 a month and am paid off for the entire year already. To combat this, I went with some free services, which ended up being a disastrous decision. My readership went down from 3000 views to almost zero. I ended up lacking motivation in updating the website since there was no one reading it.

Zoom a few years into the future and now I’m newly moved to Toronto in October 2008 and have re-dedicated myself to my comedy career. I ended up taking almost an entire week off to learn the ins and outs of website design, seeing as my original training came five years earlier. My readership definitely went up, but it was difficult convincing my past readers to come back and trust that my website wouldn’t just disappear again.

During this time, I pushed hard on marketing with Facebook, MySpace and Twitter. Using paid advertising is always a recipe for long-term disaster, as you should never have to pay for traffic, but I must admit that especially the Facebook advertising worked really well for me. Being able to target people who specifically marked down stand-up comedy as one of their hobbies allowed me to gain a bunch of new fans. The best part was that the advertising came free with my website hosting. During my advertising campaign, I averaged about 50 visits a day, which isn’t too bad at all. After the campaign ended, I went back to averaging around 20 visits a day.

In February 2009, I decided it was time to learn more about the ins and outs of search engine optimization. Strangely enough, I’ve ended up spending more time on optimizing my website for search engines than I have actually building the website. I was lucky to have an account at lynda.com from my dayjob, and I went through their entire video series. Luckily, I had enough vacation time left and took an entire week off to learn some more.

There were a bunch of techniques that I tried to implement, but I honestly have to say that almost none of them worked. I think the main component that helped me out was to actually put focus on optimizing for search engines. The tips themselves didn’t really help me out, and I was frustrated for a while. I built landing pages, submitted to directories, basically everything they asked. Being a little bit removed, I now realize that most of these suggestions will help me in the long term but not so much in the short term.

I finally had an ah-ha moment after writing an article about Charice Pempengco. In fact, it’s still my most popular article with over 30 comments. It’s the first article I wrote that really gained traction among other bloggers and message boards.

What I realized was most important was to write articles that I was passionate about because quality wins out at the end. For all the tips and tricks I learned, the one that actually worked was to write an article that I was passionate about. I actually was so enamored with Charice that I wrote the article without getting any sleep and went straight to work the next day.

Since the Charice article, I’ve learned to write more and more about subjects that I’m really passionate about. My series on America’s Next Top Model and American Idol have been huge successes for me, as I’m really passionate about photography and singing.

I still can’t believe that I’ve not only passed 10,000 pageviews a month but have now also passed 11,000+ pageviews. Hopefully the lessons I’ve learned will help others learn more about how to be successful in the onilne world.

There is definitely more for me learn in terms of online metrics, as pageviews aren’t the be-all end-all of statistics. My bounce rate seems awfully high at nearly 80 per cent, though my pages per visit and time spent have both increased dramatically in the right direction lately. I’m also starting to get more and more comments on each of my articles, so that’s always a nice sign of reader loyalty.

Official Poster: Ricky Gervais in HBO Out of London The Stand-Up Comedy Special

It’s interesting to note that Ricky Gervais did not start out as a stand-up comedian. In fact, he considers stand-up as the final frontier to his comedy. It’s kind of like me in reverse, where stand-up was my first style and I’m venturing into improv. Because Ricky Gervais comes more from a writing background, his style of comedy is very different from most stand-up comedians. I definitely relate to Ricky’s style, as I come from a writing background as well.

Ricky is definitely brilliant, and I can learn a lot from his style. Let’s delve into what I feel makes Ricky Gervais a great stand-up comedian beginning with his stage attire and then going deeper into his mechanics.

How To Stand-Up Comedy: Simple Stage Attire

Ricky Gervais chose a simple black top and bottom for this HBO special. At first glance, it seems a little bit plain, but it certainly gets the job done by slimming him down. In the end, his simple look gave him the freedom he needed to gesture with his entire body, and it all came off as very casual and conversational.

How To Stand-Up Comedy: Establishing Yourself Early

Ricky definitely came out of the gates swinging, taking shots at Americans and establishing his tone very early. This is definitely something that I agree with, as I can relate to why Ricky did this. Ricky is a foreigner, which is made painfully obvious by his accent. He might as well point it out and get it out of the way early and then move on.

I like to use a similar technique when I first come out of the gates mentioning that I’m gay and Asian and then moving on quickly. It’s definitely better than having the audience wonder whether you’re gay throughout the entire audience (although I’m not sure anyone wonders whether I’m Asian).

How To Stand-Up Comedy: Playing Stupid to Tackle Difficult Topics

For a comedian who doesn’t consider himself political, Ricky Gervais definitely went after some very touchy topics: cancer, AIDs, Rosa Parks, slavery and war (among others). In fact, I’d say that Ricky went after more touchy topics than any other comedian on HBO in the last few years, including self-proclaimed edgy comedians.

Ricky accomplishes this task by basically playing stupid, lovably stupid. He pushes his persona enough that you know that underneath, he doesn’t really mean what he says, but it’s cute that he’s tackling such difficult subjects as an ignorant person. It’s kind of the Archie Bunker effect all over again.

How To Stand-Up Comedy: Vocal Intonation

Ricky is a definitely a man of my heart. The way he squeaks and squeals his voice in clever ways is very entertaining. I naturally squeak and play with my falsetto during my comedy, so it’s nice to see another comedian successfully execute a similar style.

How To Stand-Up Comedy: Acting Out

Ricky’s background as an actor helps greatly when he has to act out his stories. This is definitely my biggest weakness that I hope my adventure into improv will help correct. Ricky’s style is especially interesting to me.

Ricky has a way of acting out what he says without going over the top, which is something I am afraid of as I move more into improv. The last thing I want to be is an over-the-top comedian who loses the conversational tone with the audience. Thankfully, Ricky’s acting out feels natural, like how somebody would naturally act out while telling a story to a friend.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Haeb5vjbiPk

Live Review, Micro-Blogging Transcript

# Wow, what a bizarre opening, almost like a wrestling entrance.
# The production values are definitely really high for this special.
# I can’t believe he actually came out with a crown and cape. Haha. I thought that outfit was just for the promotional materials.
# Good choice in wearing all black, Ricky. It’s very slimming.
# Haha: “I keep all the money.”
# The audio isn’t that great for this production, which is unfortunate.
# I have to admit that I’ve got a bit of a crush on Ricky Gervais. He’s not my usual type, but there’s something about his accent and his confidence on stage.
# Ooh, I didn’t know that Ricky Gervais swore. Good use of swearing, though. Not overdone.
# Ricky speaks quickly, and I’m not catching everything he’s saying.
# Wow, Ricky’s going after cancer early and often.
# Ricky’s almost in constant motion. He’s walking around the stage and being really animated but not in an overdone kind of way.
# Hmm, there’s a weird sweat stain in the centre of his shirt that’s a little distracting.
# Wow, these fat jokes are hilarious, and I’ve heard a lot of fat jokes.
# Ricky is talking about fat people from the point of view that he doesn’t see himself as a fat person. It’s an interesting idea.
# I like how Ricky goes into his falsetto for certain phrases. At least I know I’m not the only one.
# Ricky is going after some hardcore topics, moreso than any other comedy special I have ever seen.
# Overall a very enjoyable stand-up routine. I was lost after halfway through, but the first half was dazzling. It was a very different type of stand-up, which says a lot.

Review Score: ★★★★☆ 

Maybe I’m being too hard on myself. I’m used to single takes being perfect, because in stand-up comedy you only get one take. You can’t hit rewind when you’re on stage.

At first I thought it should be easy to record a video since I should be able to do single takes the entire way through the same way I do it on stage. I even resisted using the teleprompter for the first few takes because I didn’t know if I would come off as too robotic. Strangely, the opposite happened.

Minus the teleprompter, I had zero personality as I was trying to remember my lines. Once we switched over to the teleprompter, I at least showed some signs of life. Hopefully it was enough.

The other trouble I felt now that I think about it, is that I didn’t have the right timing on my delivery. I spoke quite a bit quicker than I normally do in stand-up. I haven’t watched the video back yet, so I’m not sure how easily my words will be understood.

I’m not really sure why I had so much trouble today, but I’ll chalk it down as a learning experience. Hopefully next time, I can be a little bit smoother.

Now comes the second part of the video, the actual production. I’ve got to decide how I want to take the video footage and make it into a complete package with sound and images. I went with my video producer because I believe in his talent, so I don’t want to step on his creativity too much, but I think he may be looking for some direction given the subject matter is a bit specific to me.

I’m really excited to show everyone the video once it’s ready, so please stay tuned.

The big news of the week, though, is that I have found my own comedy muse: hot blonde actress and improv student Holly. While doing improv, I discovered how much I love collaboration which isn’t something I get to do at all in stand-up. While brainstorming with my muse, I’ve decided to try something off-the-wall and maybe even against the rules.

I’m going to write a stand-up for someone else. I will be the Tina Fey to her Amy Poehler (check Saturday Night Live). Writing stand-up for Holly is actually kind of exciting because of her great acting ability. She has a uniqueness to her look and great timing on her delivery, but at this point in time she is more of a performance artist than a writer. Writing for Holly will allow me to really push myself creatively. I’ve written for my own stand-up persona for so long, that I think writing from the perspective of a young, hot blonde will be very interesting.

The end goal for this writing project is to have Holly perform her material as an opening act when my one-man show debuts (now with a bonus woman!) at the end of this year or early next year. The fact that I’ll be writing both acts will lend itself to some great continuity and some comedy tricks that I’ve been meaning to try and which I don’t think have been done before, as a headliner generally doesn’t write material for their opening act.

Anyhow, with my two current projects progressing well, I’m getting excited and more inspired than ever. It feels great to be pushing the boundaries of an art form that I love so dearly.

I have studio time booked with my video producer for this Thursday. The final video will consist of me performing one of my stand-up sets that will then be enhanced with animation and sound effects. It’s difficult to describe, but I’m excited that the project is moving forward.

The biggest difficulty for me is deciding which set will work best in a video format accompanied by graphics and sound effects. Some of my sets definitely lend themselves more to a visual format but may not be the best for a debut video, as I’d like the first video to skew more mainstream (otherwise I’d start the first video off on a skit about the SuperPowerBottoms volleyball team).

I think I’m down to two choices: the set about my sister Anne, which has never yet been performed, and the set about my time as an obituary writer, which has never been filmed or uploaded online. Both sets of their merit for sure.

The set about my sister Anne would probably be the clear choice in terms of what would work for this project, but it is in an unfinished state and hasn’t really been tested for kinks. The obituary skit works well too but isn’t as representative of my comedy style as a whole.

I’ll think about it some more tonight, and I’ll have to make up my mind by Tuesday, as I’ll need all of Wednesday to rehearse and memorise.