The Mehran, title character of
The Mehran Show at Mottley's
The Mehran Show usually happens the third Thursday of every month at Mottley’s. This month, that’s getting pre-empted by a St. Patrick’s Day party being thrown by the club’s host bar, Trinity, who will be using all three floors, including Mottley’s basement space, for the drunken revelry. That means The Mehran Show will happen tonight instead, with a line-up made up of comedians practicing for two auditions happening next week at The Comedy Studio.
On Tuesday, Eddie Brill will be in town. Brill will be looking for talent for the Great American Comedy Festival, but he also books the comics for Letterman. Thursday, talent agency Mosaic will be looking at local talent to add to their roster. Tonight’s line-up includes Matt D. (both), Tony Moschetto (Mosaic), Bethany Van Delft (Mosaic), Kyle Ploof (Brill), Andrew Mayer (Brill), Raj Sivaraman (Brill), and Jenny Zigrino (Brill), with a couple of more comics possibly jumping in late.
Mehran, who is on the bill for the Mosaic show, says he has done somewhere between ten and fifteen auditions, which doesn’t necessarily make him feel like a veteran of the process. "It's not like I'm one of these battle-scarred road comics who can tell you about the Vegas cattle-call of '02,” he says. “From the relatively short list of audition showcases I've been on, I can say that the trick is probably not to get too trapped in your head about it, don't forget to stay in the moment and have fun and do your strongest material that sums you up the best but you're also feeling the happiest with on that particular day."
“These auditions are based on a cumulative preparedness,” he adds. “It's not like we got a script that morning or had to write new material to suit the fancies of a particular booker (at least not that day.) These agents come to see what we already do.”
Neither of these auditions is likely to make or break any comedians career. But it could mean a significant step up and open doors for them eventually, to future festival appearances, or even a Letterman spot. What you see tonight at Mottley’s could be the very beginning of a career path toward New York City or LA.
It’s a well trod story in the comedy world, how women have often had to work just a bit harder than men – sometimes much harder – to get the same results. There’s a scene in Fran Solomita’s documentary on Boston comedy When Stand Up Stood Out where Janeane Garofalo talks about female comics getting booked. The attitude, she explained, was that, we had a woman on last week, we can’t have a woman on this week. Gender was a specialty, like a prop comic.
To some extent, that still happens. “I get that in any show, if you add two or more chicks it's becomes labeled a chick night, add three blacks comics it's black night,” says San Francisco native and current Boston comic Chantal Carrere. “I think it is what is and it's my job to be seen regardless.”
“Most shows are sausage fest,” she adds. “All men, and they don't say, ‘Hey come to the all mens show.”
Which brings us to tonight’s Mehran Show at Mottley’s. The name of the show is Bitch, and it’s an all female lineup. Usually, Mehran picks a kind of silly theme, like Boozebag (the comics get drunk) or Dude Looks Like A Lady (male comics in drag). This one is a bit more pointed.
Mehran has been in the Boston comedy scene for a bit over three years. In that time, he has been drawn to a lot of female comics. And he’s noticed they’re not included in the social scene that is the supportive tissue surrounding the scene.
“What I'd discovered in my own personal experience was that I wasn't seeing women taken into the fold the way men take each other into the fold,” he says. “I was noticing that women who showed/show tremendous potential, be they natural performers or writers, weren't getting acknowledged or invited to writing groups or asked to perform on shows booked by other comics. Meanwhile, I watched male comics come into the scene, show half the natural funny and get carried out on the shoulders of other male comics like they were Sean Astin in Rudy.”
Bitch, then, is a way to bring that to light. And also bring lightness to it. “I like alcohol and I put on Boozebag,” says Mehran. “I like weed and I put on Weed, I like men in dresses and I did Dude Looks Like A Lady. Funny bitches are better for me than black tar heroin and I packed a show with some of my favorites ever.”
That list includes Carrere, Myka Fox, Shane Webb, Erin Judge, Bethany Van Delft, Jessica Delfino, Maria Ciampa, Phoebe Robinson, and Sarah Heggan. And while they focus on the comedy, Mehran can bring up the gender issue.
“I think I have a bit of a luxury to be biting and bitter about it on their behest. It's like that saying-- you never want to be your own broker. This is my opportunity to fight and say the bitter stuff so they don't have to. They can maintain their dignity and I get to be publicly incredulous. It's a win-win.”
What makes an issue like this difficult is that it comes down to perhaps the single most subjective criteria – are you funny? Not everyone will find you funny, regardless of gender, and that’s hard to argue. The only way to dispute it is to get out onstage and make a crowd laugh.
“I think at the end of the day you must be funny and I am so I get paid,” says Carrere. “If I was some chick trying to play off her looks or cheap female jokes then yes, I might have a different answer but I have been blessed.”
Sometimes, that means breaking a bit of new ground. “I am in the Boston Comedy Festival and I just realized not one women has ever won,” says Carrere. “I plan on changing that this year.”
Mehran wanted to make a statement booking the first edition of The Mehran Show for Thursday at Mottley’s Comedy Club. So he called it "The Mehran Show presents: Legendary," and asked a host of comics that often headline their own shows – Shane Mauss, Kelly MacFarland, Tim McIntire, Maggie MacDonald, Dave McDonough, Tom Dustin, Lamont Price, Ira Proctor, Dan Boulger, and Ken Reid.
“It’s the launch show,” he says. “I wanted it to be ridiculous.”
TMS marks Mehran’s second monthly show, including Deviant, which he stages at Tommy’s Comedy Lounge. Each show will have its own identity, established both through the booking and the themes. “What I'm discovering that's different about them is that The Mehran Show will be episodic,” he says. “Each month, the show will work around a different theme. That will either be coordinated with the comics or evident in the lineup. It's really pretty self-indulgent, really, but it's the kind of show that will constantly adapt.”
“Deviant is more about the audience it's speaking to,” he adds. “It's a shore to crash on from the mainstream. Sort of a statement night about comics who are ‘different’ and who I think are amazing, in a sense presenting the possibility of being a deviant and being awesome. ‘Alternative’ feels like a vegetarian option. Deviant says ‘fuck that mainstream shit.’"
Booking is a new experience for Mehran, who now not only has to worry about his own set, but how the other comics on the bill go over, as well. That’s why he’s setting the bar high from the beginning. “The fact of the matter is that I'm not trying to foster new talent with these shows,” he says. “There are other mics for that. Neither one is an open mic or a newcomers night or an amateur night. I'm not trying to put people up who I've seen have a good night here or there. I want superstars. I want my audiences to be able to trust me that I'm not politicking or scratching backs. I'm producing a show that I feel lucky to watch.”
Mehran says he will be following his instincts, trying to find comics that audiences will remember and talk about. That may mean that good friends in the comedy community may not make the cut, a prospect Mehran admits worries him. “There's some nervousness here, because I'm an active comedian in the Boston comedy community – professionally and socially,” he says. “And so many people have been good to me.”
While Mehran expects a lot from the comics he books, he plans on holding himself to the same standard. “I'm hosting these rooms,” he says. “And I don't plan on mailing it in.”
