AS HUMOUROUS AS IT GETS: Trish Slade’s style of comedy is anecdotal. She tells stories about her life, her friends and relatives infusing jokes in real-life or fictional events. Photo by Najeer Feroke
— Trish Slade, standup comedian
By Anand Holla
Drawing from her boundless energy, Trish Slade’s perpetually lit up eyes appear keen on telling much of the story. The way she talks nineteen to the dozen and smiles a whole lot more, it’s easy to guess that Slade is a smooth conversationalist partial to all things funny.
“I have never been the one to act in a Greek tragedy,” she clarifies though she doesn’t need to, “I have always been in the pantomimes, situational comedies, musicals; the fun stuff you know.”
The female standup comic of Qatar, an ultra-rare breed in a fledgling live comedy scene, often converses to temper her funnies. “Being an expat in Qatar, I get to meet people all the time. So I always get to tell stories about my life,” Slade says, “I have a handful of stories that I keep returning to. I notice that people laugh at certain bits of it, but not at the other bits. By doing so, in my head, I am always pruning my stories. So when it actually comes down to writing for comedy, it’s pretty easy.”
Seven years back, when the 41-year-old from Alberta, Canada, moved to Doha, she started off with theatre by joining Doha Players, Qatar’s longest running theatre group. As she found herself drifting towards the humourous, Slade took to an offshoot of Doha Players called LOL – an improv comedy troupe that follows in the footsteps of Whose Line is it Anyway? – and later Stand Up Comedy Qatar (SUCQ), in which she happens to be the first female comic.
“Becoming part of LOL was just a natural progression, and so is the transition from doing comedy theatre to improv theatre, and now standup,” Slade says. Around six months back, she made her standup debut during an intermission of one of LOL’s shows. A comedian from SUCQ liked her jokes and asked her to join them.
“In the last show I did with SUCQ, we had 10 comics of 10 different nationalities. What surprised me was that everyone’s humour was different, yet each one was funny. An Egyptian would talk about driving and a Qatari would talk about how rich Qataris are, and everybody in the crowd was laughing,” says Slade. “It was like the United Nations up there on stage, but nobody was fighting,” she says and smiles, “Even the audience response were heartening.”
In fact, Slade has taken a fancy to Qatar’s multi-ethnic crowd. “People warned me about the audience more than I needed to be warned,” she says, “The Qataris and the local audience have a really good sense of humour. Even Qatari comedians like to make fun of themselves and are nice people.”
So far, Slade’s standup gigs have been approved with hearty laughs in the crowd. “I have been lucky. I haven’t got the heckler in the back yelling at me yet,” she says. Chances of that happening in Qatar’s crowd are slim, but on a good day and venue, the crowd can certainly swell up in size. “I don’t mind a large gathering. People don’t scare me,” Slade says.
“The stage liberates me,” she explains, “When I am waiting for my turn to go up and even the first few moments, are nervous. But the minute I start talking and the first laugh pops out from the crowd, the anxiety dissipates.”
Given her propensity to rattle off funny stories at parties and hang outs, it’s little wonder that Slade’s style of comedy is story-telling, anecdotal. “I will tell stories about my friends, things that actually happen to me, and of course about my crazy brother or my loser aunt,” she says and then whispers, “I am so glad they don’t live here.”
Sample this: “My brother is unemployed all the time. Every once in a while, I like to phone him up and ask how he’s doing. This time, he tells me he’s a musician now. I tell him – I love musicians! What do you play? Did you write a song? He goes – No Trish, I don’t have a band, I don’t play an instrument, I don’t have a gig, and I don’t write songs, but I am a musician! Then I say – Okay Tim, I don’t have a country, or a throne or a crown or anything, but I am a Queen!”
She rightly points out that such a joke may not sound as funny on paper as it does by the sheer style of delivery – and it’s true. In her job though, Slade can’t afford too many grins. A surgical nurse at Qatar Veterinary Centre, Slade mostly handles cats and dogs, and an occasional exotic star like the cheetah too. “I make jokes about the situations I encounter with certain cases and how I deal with them,” she says.
Doing standup brings out her personality, feels Slade. “I have a big personality. If I had to be serious all day long, I would explode,” she admits, and confesses that she has always been like this.
From being the class clown to the funny one in the family, Slade didn’t leave any joke opportunity unturned during her growing up years, too. “I love making people laugh, whether at work or during random conversations. I grew up watching a lot of standup comedy. Canada is full of comedians,” she says. No surprise to hear that about the land of Jim Carrey.
“It’s easy to be funny when you grow up in Canada. We like to be sarcastic, not really mean, except when we joke about Americans,” she says and laughs. Slade sure has great taste as she counts Louis CK as one of her favourites. “I like comedians who tell stories. Louis CK takes you through his whole life story; you know getting married, getting divorced, and thereafter. It is relatable. If somebody has gone through that and is able to put a funny twist to it, then you feel – Okay, my life is not that bad.”
However, it’s watching female comedians like Rita Rudner, Tina Fey, and Sarah Silverman that have had Slade jumping with joy. This brings us to Slade’s biggest grouse with being a female comic – people assume you won’t be funny. “I remember, a lot of times, at gigs, a woman comic would come up. I would cheer but my friends would collectively groan – Aaah, women aren’t funny! That included some of my women friends,” she recalls.
Aware of this hurdle, Slade tackles it as a challenge. “Men have a different energy than women. It’s not that one is funnier than the other. It’s just really different styles and approaches, and people must warm up to that,” she says. Apart from being constantly referred to as “the only woman comedian,” another bane of being a female comic, Slade finds, is to be patronised. “I will finish my set and a male comic would walk up and exclaim – You did really good!”
Now, though, Slade feels she is using the woman card to her advantage. “Like SUCQ guys told me that you being the only woman comedian will make people want to listen to you more, not less,” she says. “My next set of jokes would be about motherhood. That’s another women-only subject that guys can’t do,” she says, referring to her four-year-old son Joseph.
When Slade moved to Doha, she caught standup comedy wherever they were on. “But it was always the imported comics from UK or the US. We enjoyed it but it was a lot of the same comic style. Here in Doha, we have different cultures and it’s amazing to see the humour in them all. Both the audience and performers are truly international. Not everyone looks the same, their comedy is different, and yet everyone in the audience is laughing. It’s like a world peace programme of comedy,” she says.
And that’s all that Slade seeks. “It’s the best feeling,” she says, “I think everybody wants to be seen, everybody wants someone to know that I see you, you are there, and you mean something to me. Some people are satisfied having that as your family. When I say something funny and someone is laughing, and I am making them happy as well. They go home happy and I go home happy, and there’s nothing better. So yeah, world peace… right there!”
