An American expat doing comedy in Europe with Abigail Paul 🎙️ 🇪🇺

🇺🇸🇩🇪 Join us as we chat with Abigail Paul, a stand-up comedian who spent over 20 years in Frankfurt, Germany. From improv theatre to touring Europe with her comedy show, Abigail shares hilarious expat and comedy stories and insights. Get ready for laughs and life lessons in this comedic exploration of expat life in Europe!

Special thanks to Banca Cafe (@bancacafe) in Exarchia for the amazing recording spot ☕️ 🥰

Follow Abigail on 📲:
https://www.instagram.com/abby4laughs
https://abigailpaul.com

Transcript

[Music]
This is Expat Experts.
[Music]
Welcome to this episode of Expat Experts from my, actually my favorite, spot of
coffee here in the center of Athens called Banka Café in Exarchia. Today we
were talking about living abroad, living in a stand-up comedian that defines you
even yourself as a brash American I saw around. Did I say that? I wondered, did I say I'm a
brash American? I mean I am, did I say it? But currently you're touring around Europe.
Yes. You won a BBC Popcorn Writing Award. I was nominated, one of 20 people nominated. Wow, okay,
nice. With your, you are now doing a second show already but it was with Involuntary Moundslaught
or the previous show that you were having. So, yeah, actually it was kind of funny because you
contacted me because you are actually having a show this weekend here in Athens. That's correct.
Which I don't know if this, whenever this episode probably will already be gone. You're touring
around Europe so I don't only have listeners from Athens, I have listeners from everywhere.
Too right. I'll be in Barcelona soon as well. Yeah, exactly. Cool, so yeah, all the people from Barcelona,
that's a clear check the dates. But yeah, Abigail and Paul, thank you so much for accepting the
invitation or like for getting in contact and reconnecting after I don't know maybe two or three
years. So this is really weird because I contacted you and then you said, "Oh, I know you. We were,
we did stand-up comedy together and I didn't recognize you from your name because I just
didn't expect to contact someone in Athens and be like we're pals already but here here and here
that's what happened." Yeah, exactly. Actually like we did stand-up comedy together. We did, yeah. Not
stand-up in the sense of complete shows but some open mics actually organized by Eva. Yeah, exactly.
Who I organize shows with now in Frankfurt. Cool. Back in the day we were doing it in the Hesse-Nik
actually. We were, yes. It was a tough audience let's say like this. Yeah, yeah, it was a tough
audience. Yeah, but yeah. So it has been really funny that it was like the reconnection of like
saying, okay old people who know it. Here's my Spanish pal that I met in Frankfurt, Germany and
now I'm going to Athens and we're going to do a podcast together there. I think that's pretty fun.
Yeah. I think that speaks to the expat experience. Hopefully. Hopefully, yes. So yeah, just before we
start with the first part of the episode just remind to everyone who is listening to follow
ours our social media accounts Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, I don't know, and photolog and
MySpace and all of this that we don't even have anymore. I suppose I'm there yet still but yeah,
of course, the most important part is following Spotify and YouTube which is where I post the
contents and the videos and at the end it's where it's more important that I have a little bit of
like people if you want to listen to the new episode this way where you can need to be stay
tuned for knowing about them. But yeah, let's definitely dig into it. Yeah. The expat episode
2 with Abigail Paul. So just to put the audience as we said like we met like two or three years ago
when I was still living in Frankfurt probably pre-COVID times or I feel like it was in this like
medium COVID time. It was like after the big we were we did some before and then the big wave came
and then things opened up a little bit so it was like a little bit before and a little bit in the
medium space of where you were allowed to go places but wear masks and say distance and doors
had to be open and windows had to be open so it was like restricted and weird. And this thing of
putting a condom into the mics. Yeah we had a lot of light condoms and we would spray down the
microphone like that was gonna do anything. And promised to all the audience that we will not make
corona jokes back in the day. We really wanted to tell jokes. But we did all the time. So yeah like
actually you are originally from from United States. Correct. From Florida. That is correct. I'm
from Florida yeah. But you've lived quite some time already outside the United States. Yeah I've lived
in Frankfurt for 22 years. Oh wow. Yeah 22 years. Yeah okay that's a lot. Always in Frankfurt? Always
in Frankfurt yeah. People are like why? What brought you there? Yeah okay so um I always
say like I just came for fun which is true. I thought Frankfurt would be fun and it is.
Human rights are super fun in my opinion. But why specifically Frankfurt? I did have like a contact
friend there who had been living in Frankfurt with her boyfriend and so I kind of knew somebody and
then that helped me to be like see it as a destination I might go. But it was really like
a decision of I want to live somewhere else outside of the United States. Or you had the job or like-
No I had gotten the memo early that America was going down the tube you know. That Corby Bush
election that was enough for me. I was like this feels a lot like a car crash just about to happen.
So but I didn't intend to come forever you know. I was just gonna come for a year check out you
know living abroad. And then I think I just got really used to human rights very quickly. I enjoyed
health insurance and paid time off from work and things that other people get to have all the time.
I was like I would like to keep these things and so I could never find a good enough reason to go
back. Okay crazy like I mean makes sense in a lot of like you are saying the conditions of living
probably in Germany. Especially in Germany probably are like compared to the United States in terms of
insurances I don't know. If you are not a super rich person and these kind of things. Correct yeah.
It's probably easier alive in Germany than in the United States in that sense. Definitely. But at the
same time family wise and everything like you were leaving everyone behind or. Yeah okay so remember
that I was nominated for a prize by the BBC for a show called Involuntary Mom Slaughter. Yeah. Yeah so
I mean the family thing was for me not a big draw right. Right I was pretty comfortable being 4,400
miles away from my family. And I made a lot of great friends right away. So I've been you know
I've been in the city for a really long time and when you live the ex-pat lifestyle I'm sure you
can speak to this. Like it is very transient friends come and go so it can be really tough to
find like people that are kind of permanent. But even friends who've like moved away they often
come back or you know you do eventually get like what feels like family. So you kind of just get to
rebuild your own family. And I kind of prefer that method. No makes a lot of sense at the end like.
And actually in Frankfurt it happens that but still like easier like I don't know if you speak
German back in the day that you came. Not a word I think I learned "rufen sie bitte die Krockenwagen an"
which just means call the ambulance. So I wanted to have one key phrase sorted. Just in case actually.
It's a good one right. And then the rest was as they say here Greek to me I didn't speak any German
but I learned it eventually over time it in fits and starts it's not an easy language but I did
everything bad administration works which is still very complex thing for everyone who is not
native German. Even Germans don't like it to be fair. It's really not a great language for writing.
It's terminology that nobody fucking understands. It's correct. It's like I think that it's kind
of rude of English to be a global language sometimes but I'm also pretty pleased because
it's super simple compared to other languages. Let's face it. Yeah definitely. Totally agree.
So I already said you really never considered going back to the U.S. then? No. It was never in
your mind like... No that's not fair. I remember my first five years thinking I was definitely
gonna go back to the U.S. and felt like just a matter of time but then like I don't know
that feeling of having grown more comfortable in my new country and not really knowing how I could
go like once you have nicer things it's very hard to have them taken away from you and for me the
sense of comfort I know it's like you know people say a lot of jokes about it but the sense of
comfort of knowing that if I had been sick I could go to a hospital and no one would kick me out you
don't know what that's like isn't it unless you're American where you never have a sense of security.
I didn't have health insurance of any kind until I moved to Germany. Never even if a child. My mom
just winged it so you know I think I really enjoyed that stability and yeah I didn't want to
give it up. So there are many things that you could be like well there's some better stuff in
America but go visit America if you like that stuff you know what I mean like it's available
to you to live there to retire there to spend my life in worry of bankruptcy for medical things
no I don't think that was that fun yeah. And you ended in Frankfurt like the most international city
in Germany by the fact that you had friends over there already which it's always a help yeah you
start in a new place. They left about a year after I got there but that was still a good like it was
like seed friend seed that sounds like Frankfurt yeah exactly it is Frankfurt yeah and then I made
new friends and then they all left and then I had to make new friends and they all left yeah that
pattern really I had nobody in my mobile phone to call for a few periods of my Frankfurt life
I won't deny it. And over that time you have friends everywhere but in Frankfurt that happens
a lot. I just would go to an Irish pub and be like hi I'll be your friend tonight that's what I would
do yeah that's how you do it in Frankfurt remember yeah there's as you said it's a very
international city one third of the city is non-german so 66 percent Germans the rest of us
something else you know and that way we connect to each other and it's not just Americans and
Britons it's people who just aren't German and like to speak some English or get to make new
friends. Was it like this like 22 years ago or it hasn't raised like it's hard to say I mean I
noticed a massive difference in like Berlin for example because when I moved to Germany I first
made a couple trips to Berlin and you know you had to speak German there and like it was probably
international I guess but you didn't notice it so much and now Berlin is so international it's like
you can't get people to speak German to you everyone speaks English so it's really different
but Frankfurt always had because of the banks every single bank had at least one family or you
know group of people in the city so you always always have had this multiple countries food
cultures you know running around and when you compare cities and something that we discussed
a couple of times with with my girlfriend actually we she's she's from Frankfurt I think there is a
something in Frankfurt that they they made pretty well which is not doing this segregation in
in neighborhoods yeah when you live in Frankfurt if you don't live in the very very very expensive
parts of Frankfurt really poise next level thing and even with there like normally your neighbors
are a bunch of different nationalities like I mean it's like there is no neighbor for like let's say
for one culture and yeah neighbor for another and that there are some laws about that in Germany I
forget what they are but they really went out of their way to make sure you wouldn't have any kind
of ghettoization of any group or culture um so it's a very in Vienna they do it as well it's
like it's a very it's like a tactic it's not by chance people really don't want groups of people
to not kind of be diverse and merge together I think it works it does work yeah and in that sense like
you arrived to Frankfurt and you never said okay I would like to move somewhere else in Europe for
example yeah well uh there was like an opportunity as I said uh I've been to Berlin a few times and
I almost my husband I almost could have moved there and in fact he moved there for a year and
we kind of tried it out but it's not our town Frankfurt is very small like Athens is gorgeous
but it's very very big and I don't function that well in places that are very big so I ride my
bicycle everywhere if I have to take a train it's 10 minutes like things are pretty convenient and
close and um and green I have to say it's very parky the air is pretty clean especially for
a big city so yeah there's a lot of again just really basic quality of life things that maybe
tourists wouldn't be like oh look at Frankfurt but if you live there and it's your city it's great I
agree yeah it's one of the things that definitely we miss here like there's no parks in the city
it's a mass of concrete Athens it's a lot of concrete yeah I noticed it's gray as fuck it's
pretty great yeah yeah yeah and no parks well there is the botanical garden here in the center okay it
is the national park thing next to Syntagma next to the parliament and in the center I mean even the
the Acropolis Hill it's not green it's stone therefore it's not yeah everything is gorgeous
like there's a lot of marble everywhere but then it's like there's a lot of stone and marble and
gray and yeah I wonder how people I'm hearing it's March but in in summer that would be pretty tough
I mean it's like something in between and Frankfurt it's not the most of the one of
the most harsh temperatures in Germany that's for sure but the same time you're giving away
like the the fact of having two months here of extreme heat yes for not having a six months
of not seeing the sun in Frankfurt no yeah you don't see the sun in Frankfurt which is fine with me
because I got all sundowed by the time I would come from Florida I'm good on sun like I
racked it all up I banked it and I'm good for life I think for me winters in in in Frankfurt the most
difficult part was definitely like the fact of not seeing the sun not even the temperature or whatever
because of the animals German says if you have good clothes you can survive any kind of winter and all
let's say like this but not seeing the sun for a person from Barcelona I know that really bothers
people but for some reason I've just never had that gene where I give a shit if there's sun I
just don't care and in fact I just think like it's gonna give me skin cancer and I'd prefer to avoid
it and I wear hats and sunscreen so I'm not a like sun person I do notice when it's sunny I do notice
and it makes me happy of course I'm not like a crazy person but I don't like I don't something
about it doesn't intrinsically move me or not I'm just like I go about my day oh it's great fine you
know I just don't notice that much it's not in your first points on the exactly yeah so works for me
nice do you miss anything from America like that you would like to bring to Frankfurt actually
these are would bring to Frankfurt I mean there's when I go back and I visit America you know
there's ease of being in your own language and your own culture that you never leave as an expat
like there's just something like even if it's not here someone speaking American English I'll pick
it up and you just like you tune into your own thing so it doesn't matter how many years you
live abroad you'll still always be what your race to be in the culture you come from
the things I miss are not good for me so it's great that it didn't work out like I would bring
waffles and fried chicken I would I bring the worst stuff from America to enjoy it but it's not
good for me so it's probably better that you live in there and to live in Frankfurt where I cannot
get access to incredibly bad that's what I miss for America the junk cool cool um you said like you
went 22 years you lived in Frankfurt for 22 years like it was always like as a stand-up comedian you
were always pursuing this this dream or like no no no so I came really like very much like
thinking I would leave after a year and then that kind of switched to like two years three years five
years pretty quick and then at some point you know I studied theater so I'm a performance major and
I love to be on stage and there's no other way to say it it's just like I do really love that
and I kind of grew up in the stage and in the theater and a friend of mine he was doing some
amateur theater was like oh why don't you come do this with us and I was like no that's okay
and then I was like you know I kind of got my arm twisted and then I started doing some theater
stuff and then I wound up meeting a professional theater person from New York we hadn't known
each other she's also American and we kind of vibed and we both really like the same kind of
theater we like to keep it really simple but meaningful so we we said like three women in
three chairs it's all you need we don't love all the lights and the costumes and the flourish you
know and so we started working together and then we went up doing our own theater company in Frankfurt
so I did that for 10 years I ran a theater company in Frankfurt yeah yeah yeah yeah called
theater language studio Frankfurt which is a very poncy name upon reflection and does not work well
for SEO so I'm really glad I learned that lesson I just changed the name of the podcast because of
SEO reasons there you go exactly SEO is so important folks so I I but we love the work and we wound up
eventually kind of almost shifting not entirely but shifting a lot from theatrical productions
to improv and the reason for that is because well first of all it's fun it's a really lot of fun
it's a great art form and had quite a lot of training in it and Renee and I both got a lot
of training in it further when we started like really gaining a solid interest in it
and there was just something really lovely about teaching it so we taught for 10 years as well we
taught a lot of classes and workshops and you know there's something really beautiful about
improvisation because it really just it really just depends on listening and agreement and that's
all you have to do to make it beautiful and so we did that and it was like I was saying like we'd
have a like we'd have a class to be like our class for like a little United Nations group
you know someone from Sri Lanka someone from Frankfurt someone from Greece like Italy like
France everyone just didn't necessarily fit in to Frankfurt yet and they'd come take our improv
classes and they would have this incredible strong connectivity in this activity and so most of our
students were like not trying to be performers but they were just like you know worked in IT or banks
or whatever but they love we need to escape we need to escape from creative and something that
you know is really important to me as a creative person is that creativity doesn't belong to creative
people I think too many people think that creativity is like what artists do like as a painting artist
or or even performing artist but like I think everyone needs to keep creativity and art in
their lives so you know we did that as like again in a non-profit and then the pandemic came and that
was really tough and I had already transitioned to about a year before the pandemic starting with
stand-up comedy and when the pandemic came it just was like you know I really wanted I wanted to
pursue stand-up comedy I had wanted too many times but I knew how selfish and like hard it was like
selfish in the sense that you can't give your time to anyone else if you're gonna do this
you really have to just drill down on it and like write jokes and it's discipline and writing and
memorizing and that had never been like my skill set but I was like I've always wanted to do it
I'm gonna try it and then like I said it was kind of a perfect storm the pandemic came and it was a
much better time to be pursuing solo things than group things ensemble things where we could all
infect each other so I basically transitioned out of improv and theater into stand-up but I'm doing
a little improv again just you know to keep it alive because I love it. I went the other way around
I suppose like oh yeah because you're now doing improv and I'm now doing improv I actually I have
improv this afternoon. Excellent! Which is I mean I always like improv I never did it regularly like
I always did one worship here one worship you know in a little bit more like singing
and I and at the end I come from more the more traditional theater scene moved to musical stuff
then ended doing stand-up comedy because I always wanted to try it and whatever realizing that it's
not my thing at all I see okay I mean it's not that I'm not good it's just I thought you were good I
remember that I thought everything that guy's pretty good so yeah but it's it's the amount of
work it has been a lot of work to put inside of it that kicks me out because it's I mean one thing
is talking like in a podcast no sure when it's like a conversation that it can fluently go and
things nothing is incorrect and you don't need to have a punch line every two blocks or whatever
right um I stressed the fuck out to write the the whole like monologues and everything and I was like
okay and when I tried improv I was like okay this is where you say the things that comes to your head
and yeah they are funny it's okay if not next thing and that's all you know like yeah and I loved it
like you have to have a strong sense of what is funny I think to be a successful improviser
because I've met people who don't and that does not work but you can't try to be funny and that's
this beautiful place in improv where you're really just trying to co-create listen and build and make
something happen and recognize we found the funny thing let's get on this path together I mean that's
so beautiful but with stand-up it's a question of like it's technical writing it's putting one
thing before the other it's making sure there's a surprise it's not actually fun to sit down and do
the work whereas improv rehearsals and classes are always such a blast sitting down at your
computer to do fucking work on stand-up is not fun at all not at all so all the reward comes in the
10 minutes 20 minutes 30 minutes you're on stage when you did it if you are if you have 10 minutes
who has 10 minutes yeah right now I think like right now the common thing in open lines is having
three to five minutes three to five minutes well yeah that's in like a orc and pray for you know
we give people we give people seven to eight and then it's not that hard to get 10 not here
here's um yeah before we dig more into comedy and yeah stand up and all this because we can talk
about that probably for for quite some time we can annoy people a lot it's okay that's why they are
looking no if they are watching um just like these are that questions like sure in the sense of like
if you need to choose one or the other one would be before we close the x-pot part let's say like
this for perfect let's go for a tricky one american or german food but you already said that actually
american american food because i want to taste it german food so that i can live that's a good
response yeah same happened already with the second one american or european lifestyle in the sense
european lifestyle so that i can live it's everything about living yeah yeah and i think
the second the next one it's also about living probably cooking with olive oil or butter okay
for flavor butter for living olive oils yeah and the last but not least old people like retired
people in florida or in germany okay so this is complicated because i'm quite an old people expert
i grew up with a lot of grandmothers a lot of surrogate grandmothers in florida it's you know
it's it's the retirement place it's retirement yeah so my my home was a retirement community and i had
um a lot so i had a lot of but like they weren't always the nice little people because they're
still from florida you know what i mean they weren't like those grandmas who's gonna make you soup
they're the grandmas who like didn't quite finish up a spring break yet you know so like i think
i think it sounds like a retirement person in germany also i think the thing about getting older
which is why i try to keep myself active so that as i get older i don't like i don't turn to someone
who's bitter uh you you do tend to like i don't know there's a lot of studies that say getting
older and get happier right but i think that if you i think if you've had a happy life that's how
it goes but if you have um been bitter your whole life then you move to florida so yeah i'll take
the europeans on this one as well oh well okay because i i experience i mean coming from barcelona
normally the old people yes there is certain things that they do but in germany the complaining is next
level like okay but that's the thing about germans they do love a complaint yes but when when you do
everything bad you did in life worse so they can be a that's very extreme but i'm also good at
tuning them out you know what i mean like every time some germans have something to me i don't
like i'm like health insurance health insurance health insurance and i sat on my heels three times
and it's all gone they can complain because they have pictures they have pictures yeah well when
we arrive to pension we will see we will have that like an american i have some private investments
going i don't i don't trust anyone with my pensions makes sense so yeah if that's okay for you i would
say that we jump directly into to the second part of the episode the expert doing comedy in europe
so yeah as i already mentioned in the introduction you are one of these likeest kind of comedians that
actually are touring yeah they are not only doing open mics for 20 years um so you're living the
dream let's say like this i mean it's a choice right because you have to push to do those things
and uh i started soon up when i was 42 i want to say or 43 yeah 42 43 something like that uh so i
didn't feel like i had the time to dig around so i had to like take my skill set and just
exponentially make it go as fast as i possibly could so i got as quickly from like open mic
level to my own show levels i could possibly make myself do it how much that mean i still think now
is really when i've completely like after at least five years is when you're like oh yeah i
found my voice a bit i know exactly what makes me different from maybe other comedians or what's a
joke that falls into my you know skill set or persona um i think it takes a really long time
so i would say a minimum if you really want to do it it takes a minimum of five years to kind of
like know yourself know your jokes and it gets a lot easier to see the joke and things i go back to
old jokes and like why why wouldn't i have seen this as backwards right things like that so the
the writing skills are now catching up to the performance skills because i had performance
skills from previous things exactly and i had trained a comedy brain from mostly having a
terrible childhood because that's how you escape childhoods of my nature um so and then all the
performance stuff so yeah that's about how we're gonna take me i mean it's not a lot to be like
you started late in this concept of like i mean it's a cool thing that you are now having your
own shows and doing your own stuff and happy doing that and like even starting late it's not that
you start late actually because you were in stage all the rest of your life but yeah in different
scenarios exactly i never stopped being on stage i just changed what i was doing on stage yeah yeah
and and this change like did it really what happened like in the sense of like you you were
talking about like okay about pandemic comes i started doing stand-up comedy because it also
was easy to do solo things also probably affected the fact that and doing improv classes was not
possibility anymore right with the theater play and everything so it was not really a like a
conscious decision of of like i i like this stand-up comedian so much that i'm pursuing
doing something in that way i think it's a little combination of both um i had taken so i've taken a
lot of professional training in chicago at the second city and so i did uh i did uh two intensive
courses in stand-up comedy and in second city and that helps you with like getting a baseline for
like how to write a joke how to recognize jokes and things like that so that was kind of the
starting place and then i started dabbling and i was still very much doing other things but like
i said i just realized that if i really wanted to do stand-up it was going to take everything to do
it you can't do it halfway in my opinion i mean you can you absolutely can if it's a pleasure
for you to do it but i just kind of knew that i wanted to do it to a certain level and to do
it to a certain level it's going to take like intense focusing concentration extreme self-criticism
and self-awareness you're going to have to be like you know i'm sorry i hit the mic you have to like
you have to like really be willing to criticize yourself to take criticism to fail so badly but
i feel like improv was great for that because i had that mentality of every time i fail i'm
just getting further in what i really want to do you know and i feel like some people if they don't
have a performance or in particularly improv background you come up to the stage and you bomb
i remember famously not doing that well like in particular open mic and eva said to me she was
like it was great because you just kept talking and i was like yeah everyone wants to know what i have
to say don't but so i didn't ever have this mentality like my failure was a terrible thing
i knew that it was not as good as it needed to be but no one starts out in anything as good as
they're gonna get right so the exciting thing is drilling down and getting better and making
improvements and developing i think that's what we want to do with our lives so i found like this was
really exciting in a way that other things weren't exciting to me and it was special because my love
and dislike about improv is that it is an ensemble so you're only playing to the level of the people
around you and you don't you can't entirely control the situations i love to control situations so
with stand-up it's really your successor for failure out there you know what i mean it's
everything you did to get there and everything you didn't do and that's it there's no one else to blame
it's all on you but the angle shows also that you are able to handle the pressure of it like somehow
i remember he has like i literally drop a mic and run through the door in the third open mic
that we were there because i panic attack in the middle of the stage i can yeah i run away so
yeah i think there is stand-up comedians that are able to handle this pressure of like okay it's not
working too much but i'm i continue talking and something will pop up into that and then there is
other people like me that if we blog and we have something very structured that we wanted to do and
it's not really working then you are not able to and this comes with experience it comes with
experience but i also think improv is so great for that so i i recommend improv for basically
everyone to have some life skills but like you learn that um that that that moment that things
didn't go to plan is just an opportunity to shift i will say like marrying my improv brain to my
stand-up brain is also only coming nowish it's very hard to have both those skillsets going at
the same time where you're extremely loose and flowy and also extremely structured that is super
hard so i still feel like that's the goal every time i go out but it's it doesn't always happen
but i think that it's like anything it's experience you panic the third time but
by the 10th time or 15th time you won't panic anymore because it's like you know par for the
course that's how it goes it's fine so at the end it's it's for you it's this combination of like
you really prepare your stand-up uh the shows of course but even the open mics you you structure
yeah yeah i'm uh there are a thousand note cards in my house everywhere i have uh and like i have a
process where i keep notes in evernote and then i put them on cards and then i transfer the cards
into a script for a piece you know and then i try to use like i use titles to make sure that i have
like my set list so i'm very very structured in how i approach everything doesn't work for everybody
a lot of stand-ups have the luxury i can't go out every night you know i don't have the ability to
go out on stage every night so i work a lot at home to create what i want so that when i go out on
stage it's what i want to say because you know so at the end you have like your work i want i
wanted to ask about the process itself because you're right like what it could be a joke or a punch
and whatever i'm not you try to fit it in some kind of blog afterwards so category or my actual
process would be like i have a thought that's kind of funny right um like my thought on my way here
was some somebody stopped for me um to cross the street and that wouldn't happen in frankfurt if i
was illegally trying to cross the street i would get hunged at and they would hate me and so i
thought to myself oh i kind of like the sexism here it's nice now it might not have been sexism
it could have just been that's how things go here but i thought that's a funny joke no you were
really lucky that they don't run over you actually there you go lucky i did die but i assumed in my
little brain that perhaps it was because i was a lady wearing pink and the nice gentleman decided
let me go now that's a thought i had what i'll do is i'll write that thought down i'll tag it
with something like i don't know sexism or lady joke or something that i've got a category yeah i
have categories yeah yeah and then um later i go back and i um i i look through those and i write
those down on cards and then i start flipping through the cards and being like is this complete
is it done yet is it just an idea and then i start putting it into a script if it's going to go into
like my show yeah so i have big themes i tend to talk about the same things i want to work in
like how i moved to germany or i come from florida or american stuff you know there there there are
certain things about you that are just fundamental to who you are as a person that you're gonna hit
on my bad childhood you're gonna hit on over and over and over again um but you're gonna find new
ways hopefully to like unpack them and explore them and then yeah new punch lines so it rarely
starts with a punch line it almost always starts with a premise people aren't always so good at
temperating the two so it starts with the premise which is just like an idea and so like if i said
i'm really enjoying the sexism here i'd have to have a lot of punch lines to make that work as a
comedy you know routine it's not just like people just go on stage with them with a kind of a naked
idea and wait for the laughs to come and that's why they don't because you haven't actually dug in
so i also find that it's not like an immediate process sometimes i immediately think of a one
liner or a good joke but usually it's like this long process of like a thought here on the train
at two o'clock on the tuesday and then a year later it's a fully realized part of a whole piece
yeah makes sense i mean it's your it's very similar how how i used to write actually like i have a
topic idea i use notion and i have my structure like topics, tacks, comedy and then from that i
transform it into a script i don't flip cards but i flip nodes in the computer let's say like this
and then i say okay from that block i have enough to try to connect it to the other one and how i
connect that block to the other and and make it work in a whole script for for for show a potential
show at the end i was even preparing like if i had three minutes i'd prefer three minutes that's it
yeah yeah to that to that point like even preparing the open mics as if they were proper shows
right because i think i was more in the structural structured way of doing i know a lot of comedians
that just jump in stage yeah it just happens to me like five minutes ago and they are able to
structure it into it that i'm just like can they get it back though you know what i mean like so if
if i could if i could do that or like an improvised mic or i just kind of like throw something out
there and it's really fun i mean maybe but then will i remember it will i be able to be as funny
the next time you know so it's just it's all about how your process works there's nothing wrong with
being in the other way it's just i'm also a theater kid so that's why like uh people are
surprised maybe that i'm already on my second show and i haven't got ideas for my third one and i'm
like yeah but you see i think in pieces i think motif theme beginning middle and end so it's like
my last show definitely had a narrative a story but this show doesn't but it still has like
it's like a full it's a it's a full piece things shouldn't things shouldn't tie together and i can
do chunks of it and it's great you know i don't have to do the whole thing but i'm i like i'm
interested in building a whole thing that's the creative part of my brain wants to make a thing
which brings to the fact that you generally like in an open mic you can throw uh something like i
don't know this happened here when i was in greece and therefore i have an open mic and i can throw
a trial joke no because at the end mics are for that but this weekend for example that you have a
show even if this joke happened here and it will enter because probably there is greek audience
in here you will not try because your show it's close 100 percent how do you mean um so for
example the joke that you just said here the sexism joke i suppose that the greeks will relate with
yeah i might use that i haven't decided yeah if i can i can develop a little more yeah but are you
able like like from a process perspective even with shows like that normally are a little bit
more close you have your like thing that you repeat and to introduce things around it yeah i
mean like i was in bucarest a couple of weeks ago and um i read at least like three or four
jokes while i was there kind of like again opening one-liner type things so that the audience like
says like oh she sees me that i'm here because i think that's the thing about me i like thank you
for the podcast but i'm not like a medium person i'm a live stage person i like to be on stage i
like to be in a room with people um so if you are going into a room with only the things you have in
your head and you don't want to recognize these humans these greek people these people from
bucarest then you're probably not doing them or you any favors so you really have to be sensitive to
like bringing this room your jokes and adapting them so that that room can get there with you you
know that's your whole job is to get them to you know sort of see you and recognize you and when
you go i see you i recognize you then they get points whenever you want exactly so yeah
actually talking about rooms that's very interesting like now that you're touring
around europe maybe i think as far as i saw um how how did you notice very very deep difference
between audiences like because i know when i used to do a little bit of stand-up in barcelona people
react probably they are drunk uh compared to the germans that they stand a little bit more serious
or whatever like do you really realize this while doing this i think yeah for sure there's
differences but i mean if you're really good and you're doing what i said the idea of like uh you
know this is not saying i'm really good it's just if you are really good and you are good at getting
in a room with anybody i don't think there's any audience that isn't capable of laughing with you
that's one thing when when when things go wrong and people like it wasn't a good audience you're
like nah there were people who wanted to paid money to come laugh so they're probably okay you
know what i mean they pay to come to your house do their show exactly that's already a good start
you know now it were they have i had audiences that were genuinely too drunk yes and that's not
a good audience i will agree there um so there are there are better and worse audiences um germans
do tend to be very like um proud of you as opposed to like laughing out loud at you the way americans
or britains might um they're like look at you up there they're so intrigued so good yeah um it's
a little the german word suricum this little you know it's downplayed but it's still there and you
can feel their appreciation in a way i think they've been good for me because i don't have
huge expectations for megawatt laughter so when you get it you're like oh back from somewhere
where they laugh out loud this is delightful so yeah i think audiences are definitely different
when we went to bucaras um i really thought that they would let the audience know that we were not
you know romanian speaking before we walked out but in fact they were just like here's the light
go on out there and so we had to you know go up take a microphone with a crowd that expected
romanian words to come out to this romanian audience and it was all in english so i was like
surprised you know and that was really funny but then they were you know romanian people not unlike
young greeks i mean people speak english so it's not just about the language they know the words
right but you have to get them on board with your shtick and that you know that's a whole other
thing so yeah but they were very kind and warm and generous and they laughed you know they were like
a little confused at first but once they got past that they were very happy to laugh yeah i
did a couple of open mics here also in greek in greek like everyone in greek but me in english and
it was also a fun experience like also this extra laugh of people who are not clearly they you look
at them and they are not understanding the shit of what you're saying okay that's different when
they really don't understand the person next to them is laughing they need to like social pressure
of laughing also and that fills the room it's incredible like i was okay why is this working
with this person who clearly is not understanding anything what i'm saying um oh yeah it's funny
going to that like you analyze i suppose like how the performance has gone in that sense you record
yourself oh yeah always i think it's it's it's it's foolhardy not to record yourself every single
time first of all because i live in fear of saying the funniest thing i've ever said and not remembering
it my brain is you know hitting the menopause wish moments so i want to protect my my jokes and
thoughts but secondly because and i don't usually watch it right away although sometimes i'm excited
to see how it went but usually i wait a while after a performance and then i go back and try
to more clinically study it and go like okay you thought that you were going to get a laugh here
and you've got a sticker if at that so clearly you could work on that joke make it stronger put it
somewhere else so then you mark your own script saying okay this part worked this part not or
i mean i i can get that intense about it but it's more like just really sitting there watching it a
few times and learning from it and then usually yeah making quick adjustments cool do you watch
stand up comedy roles yeah i mean i do but i have to say the longer you do it the harder it is to
watch first so when i watch like netflix specials of communions i like i i mean i don't know if i
ever sat around and laughed out loud by myself because i think that's what's special about being
in a room is that the the way we all egg each other on to laugh so the laughter is louder
and it's a real experience when you're sitting at home in netflix even if it's your favorite
comedian it's very hard to be like i mean it happens but it's rare so i can watch a really
great special and i'm just studying it i'm not like i'm just quietly watching it and going like
oh that i see why that worked that's a good idea you know stuff like that so i i and then
when you come to open mics and you've been to a lot of it can be hard can be harder to watch
you know a lot of so i would absolutely like i saw daniel floss last year i mean any professional
comedian whom i like and respect i would love to see the live right and i will watch them on netflix
but i will not enjoy them as much even live i live live yeah absolutely i think live is the whole
thing right because being in a room with people and their personality and them responding to you it's
what gives you that feeling it's like you know you love a band and then you go to their concert you
know i don't listen to music but i assume that's why people go to concerts you know what i mean like
for that experience to see your group is a completely different thing than listening to
the radio or the album which is still enjoyable but it's a different vibe it's a different vibe
yeah that's very interesting like i think there is the analytical part no when you're dedicating
yourself to that at the end when you're watching someone else doing exactly the same thing that
you're doing true you tend to go to this kind of like more analytical of like i can use that i can
whatever or not it's you're learning you're studying yeah it's a profession now and it's the
dedication of your life so that's that's how it's transformed from being a hobby to a to a professional
thing probably it's also tough because i think you do compare yourself and that comparison is
necessary but i don't necessarily mean professionals it's very easy to compare yourself
professional to be like i'm not as good at them what can i learn when you compare yourself to
people on kind of your level it feels a bit mean but you have to do it you have to be like you know
what what is this person doing better than me what could i be doing better you have to be
constantly willing to take that feedback on board or you're not going to get better yeah um what
about the improv what about it i still love it um do you ever go to watch improv or ever go watch
improv i found it harder i was uh uh bad improv is really bad uh but comedy does oh but open
rights are really but something still kind of exciting about watching yeah because you can't
get drunk but besides that i don't know there's something about like watching
improv go down in flames that you're like you feel bad for people versus we're standing up you're
like hey you planned this this is your your whole thing you thought this is going to be great
um it's easier i don't know but like with improvisers it's such a soft gentle sweet art
form i don't really enjoy it if it's not people who are pretty experienced are pretty good you
know are well connected because i think that's what makes improv exciting is when you're watching a
group of people who rehearse like crazy and they're like you know locked in together and they
the the the magic comes from how did they know that was going to come next you know but they've just
been with each other for so long that together for so long they they know what it will come next they
know how the other person thinks what they know the flaws and everything yeah magic when the group
connects pretty well yeah it's the whole key i agree um now you were talking about like
bad stand-up in the sense of like sometimes bad improv happens it happens you fail it's part of
the process at the end totally um how do you handle failure in that sense as i said i think
you just see every time you know improv that fails um so you asked me if i enjoy watching it i think
it's different because i've just seen a lot of it if it's a group of people i care about i almost
enjoy it more if they fail i don't know like i it's not a problem for me i'm entertained you you can
still sit in the room and be like good job you know what i mean uh but what was the question how do
you handle failure how do i handle like uh failure uh like a decade and a half worth of improv lessons
are deep set in my mind that every time i fail i've moved my i've i've i've ticked closer to
doing better the next time so i don't tend to i don't like it you know like it's not fun for me
if i go out and i try to do 10 minutes of stand-up and it didn't go well you unblock yourself in the
sense of like i'm not doing stand-up for the next month no i would i mean like i i think i'm also a
tenacious person which you have to be i really don't like to give up you know so i won't let it
get me you know what i mean like you can't get me i'll get you so i have i have a pretty strong worth
work ethic and i just i just work harder and then usually that is enough because people can't expect
to not put in the work you have to put in the work for a grade in prop 2 you have to work
it's a different kind of work you have to rely on other people to do the work but you still have to
do the work and so i i'm usually just like well i guess i need to do more work you know but what
are we here for like on earth you know i mean like yeah to get better at something right to care about
something so this is what i care about that's true i i found something that is a little bit like
recurrent that it happened in open lights and these people that tries the same joke recurrently
and get trapped in this kind of thing like they internally think that this is a very very good joke
and i we see them failing recurrently with the same joke thousands of times because of the concept
of like the audience is different maybe this time enters have you had this situation ever like
where i tried a joke that just didn't work you are convinced this joke is good but at the end
it never fits into it what do you do with these jokes or these punchlines or i mean i think good
jokes and bad joke again i have a tendency to think in a piece sometimes there's a place where
i'm expecting more laughter and i get more of a you know and i don't always think that's bad
because as long as i'm making people think you know it's okay but when people are thinking they
can't be laughing so you don't want to over be thinking and they've come to a comedy show so if
it's if it's a moment of quietude for the sake of i've said something interesting and not really
really funny i'm pretty comfortable with that um but in terms of seeing somebody just like
you know try and try and try with a joke and not really get it there you know i tend to think that
person's either you know it's like an improv you have to be listening listening to the audience
listening to yourself you know if you're not trying to evaluate what you're doing up there
afterwards then it's probably not going to go great for you even if you have some good jokes
the whole experience isn't going to work unless you're really willing to be like
it is good but i could make it better right like you just have to constantly if you have good
jokes that are working you got to keep making them better you gotta you even got to cut those
good jokes make new good jokes like it's just it's just like a constant regrowth and some people have
resilience for that and other people would like to get a little bit of attention they've got some
jokes that work they're happy with that they go out there they tell those jokes and that's it for
them you know there's nothing necessarily wrong with that either it's not what i'm doing hopefully
but uh but you know i think everybody as i said creativity belongs to everybody and whatever part
of it you choose to get on board with i'm fine with that you know what i mean i might not want
to listen to that same five minutes of jokes over and over again but god bless yeah talking about
god blessed i was going to ask you god bless america or god bless you you know europe in sense
of comedians because i think there is a very clear line of difference between stand-up on a way of
doing it in in america versus the european way of doing it yeah and even there i mean is there a
european way i mean i i would european way it's not a european way because a british comedian
doesn't work in the same way as a spanish comedian correct correct yeah i think for example there is
a more an improv a more distinct style in improv so europe europeans have long-form improv tends to be
narratives in the story american improv tends to be a deconstruction so premise-based jokey uh uh
and then you know short form is kind of the same everywhere with stand-up i think that the art form
feels like it kind of originated there a little bit in america and the network is really strong
for doing it it's not necessarily always healthy because there's a lot of issues in and around
especially around gender roles and women getting places and all that kind of stuff so i wouldn't
say like that's a scene i'm desperate to be part of but in terms of cranking out a lot of really
amazing talented performers who've been able to go down the path learn that yeah i mean america
definitely has more you know and it's a huge country 335 million people 50 states you know
so all one language right even though you have different cultures in those 50 states they have
one language at least that kind of unites them together in one nationality so they're all on the
same page so like you said if you go to barcelona you're going to hear very different jokes both in
spanish than in english if you go to the uk even if you're parts of the uk it's very different so
we're just talking like english country to english country so yeah it it's more uniform in a sense
and it has a lot of opportunities and everybody kind of knows what it is there's a there's talk
of like there was a heyday with stand-up and i think it's gone down a lot it's heyday in the
let's say 80s but in a way that's good because that heyday was also probably not healthy it was
like a bit of a bubble a bubble you know so now but now what's left is like plenty of clubs and
places and open mics and people such that and this is something i really like about stand-up too
there's no gatekeeper in a way you just can be like i'm gonna do it you know i'm gonna go out there and
i'm gonna do it and no one can stop you you know what i mean you can sign up for an open mic no
that's why open mics are about at the end absolutely but if you're doing a play the director has to
pick you if you're in an improv group the coach has to put you on the team right so somebody has
to say yes to you it's also what i don't like about stand-up is because a lot of people maybe
shouldn't be doing stand-up you know and there's no one to stop them but i think it's beautiful in
the sense of the egalitarianism that anybody can kind of be like this is what i want to do and they
do it but at the end it's where it makes the cut no probably the difference between the people who
spends all their stand-up career in open mics it's probably because they are not refining their
jobs until a point of being able to do a show out of it and there is this threshold always in
stand-up comedy which is like it's clear i think for me like difference between doing open mics
regularly even whatever and never arriving to a show that's when it changes the whole scene like
if you're arriving to have your own shows and because that you need to sell it's not anymore
you're writing down a name in an email and saying i'm going to this exactly it's like putting the
effort of like hey i have this show i'm doing that especially going touring it's even more complex
probably yeah but you need to show yourself and sell that show to to people that's why i'm confident
that you have a product yeah absolutely i mean open mics should be for all comedians a tool to get
to the next step and there are a lot of people as you kind of mentioned that like want to stay on
that lower level because they enjoy the open mic scene and there's nothing wrong with that you
know maybe it's more a hobby like like i used to do like yeah and for me it wasn't going to be any
career or professional thing because it was just for me a way of like oh okay i have these punch
lines i have these jokes i structure it in a way and i go to an open mic because i had material
but i am not going to spend my life i have a job i i have the other things to do unfortunately that
fits my schedule too much to be able to dedicate myself into the show or maybe i don't want to throw
myself into there also because right it's not an easy life i assume no um
i think now it's growing a little bit more the idea that also like jam sessions can arrive to for
example something like theater here in essence there is a group actually that it's doing
improv jam oh yeah it's kind of cool um but it's true that stand-up it's very entry level like
thing you can enter to there very easily yeah finding the correct people inside of comedy it's
difficult i assume very hard yeah could you have some yeah it's super toxic i didn't want to bring
it up but you said it i mean that was another thing when i first got into stand-up that it
repelled me from stand-up and then it made me work even harder because there were a lot of mean boys
that's what i'll call them and uh it's not to put it all on boys but these people were mean and
they were boys so they were mean boys and they didn't particularly care for me coming in and
sort of felt like ruining their fun like they had established what they wanted to do and um i didn't
always laugh at their jokes because i didn't find them funny or frankly appropriate but that's not
the point i just wasn't going to give them the gift of laughter if it wasn't genuine if you want to
go up and do inappropriate jokes i guess that's up to you i'm going to do what i care about and
you do you but they hated me for like not getting on board with their thoughts and ideas so um yeah
that was really hard because here i was finally saying like you know i kind of wanted to do this
my whole life and i think i'm kind of a naturally funny person but it takes so much like it takes
everything you have to do a good job so i didn't i needed people to be supportive and be like yeah
come on girl you got this you know and it took like a couple of years of meeting eva finding other
people who we were like we just want to build each other up you know what i mean like that's
what you should get from your colleagues that's what i had an improv was people who loved each
other and wanted to build each other up and were like all about encouraging each other i still
enjoy so much experience for my like love for my improv community so i it was hard for me to accept
this lone wolf fuck you i'm a comedian get out of here kind of thing i think people and and
correcting is not like this but i always have the feeling that stand up in that sense as you are
doing it alone yeah in there people might understand that as a concept that you arrive there alone
which is not true at all no it's like work like jokes are refined through having someone who's
listening to that giving you feedback normally who is giving you feedback it's not the audience it's
the other comedians who are in the standard it can be yeah in that it can be the audience but
it can go the complete way around as you are saying like if the people who is around you're
doing comedy it's not supportive maybe they don't give you this gig maybe they don't give you the
option of like okay i'm doing this show maybe you can do the opener like the opening or this kind of
thing is when it starts flourishing and i always felt like that in in united states this kind of
circle it's very mench yeah unfortunately and some of the comedians that are there women are
making jokes that are also fitting into this male world yeah on the opposite in europe there is no
circle at all i don't know like it's not coordinated but i have to say i was in chicago
for a luncheon comedy two summers ago and i think that was a really great it's a great city i love
chicago and it just there was a lot of everything there was i mean i got some great shows from the
bro-iest of bros who were so sweet and sugary and supportive as well so again not to put it on men
or women but like you have kind of in in stand-up you have people who are also like very lone wolfy
and you have people who want to be part of a community and you know when you're dealing
with someone of any gender who's got your back i think pretty quick who wants you to be good so
that they can be good so we can all be good together it's pretty fast for me and there are
you know it's just a question of size again chicago is a comedy city where you can go to i did often
three to four mics a night you know you could you can test drugs ad nauseam you know it's you
have lots of opportunity and where you have opportunity you have every kind of person
where you have a very close situation and only one or two people are running the whole scene
what made those people want to run a comedy scene you know what i mean like
being there probably and i don't know everyone has their motivation yes of course yeah and i mean
english in europe you are you are the extra part of language in a city like athens right now there
is two open mics for example running very very regularly in english it's two open mics yeah exactly
they intercalate things and they happen whenever they happen and it's it's really like the end the
art where you're going to do the show this this weekend which is more like a month based things
which makes it really difficult to be consistent in here sure and then the other one which is
normally done in a in a metal sphere exodus café neo and that one generically happened to be because
a comedian who is wanted to have it more regularly start doing it but if he is not in the city this
doesn't happen exactly and and it's very difficult to be consistent if you don't build your own thing
in cities where the language is not if you would be doing stand-up comedy in greek there is nearly
every night weekly exactly yeah and that makes things very very difficult 100% so the organizers
either have to be coming from a place of total passion themselves and really want to make a
stand-up scene happen and really want to be usually stand-ups themselves or i don't know
something else so that's the best case scenario and then there's no that we need people out there
because what people terribly underestimate is the work you know not just the work of writing jokes
that part is already a lot and then you have the work of organizing and getting people to come on
your show and things like that you know we run the weekly open mic in crayford um ava really
works hard on it i i i support her more than anything these days uh but it's it's so much
work and people really underestimate that and one thing that's good is once you've kind of got it
established it becomes less work so once you've got it going and it's got a system that's pretty
good but it's just a lot and people don't and people aren't always appreciative you know what
i mean not the audience members not the comedians i mean usually yes 80 yes but when you have kind
of a couple of people coming in and ruining the fun like i just wanted to do comedy this is a lot
of extra work and now you're being a jerk to me right you know so it's like it's a whole lot of
factors that sometimes people don't think about so you know sometimes people don't get slots because
you just don't have any you know and sometimes people really misbehave and they should be aware
of the fact that hi this is a lot of work for the people who are organizing
and in the end they are organizing for you yeah i mean it's a service when you do an open mic you
are providing a service for comedians to practice um and you're also appreciating the fact that
they're being part of your show you know so they're doing something in return for you it's not
completely one way but you have to see it as a two-way street and you know if the organizers
need your help with something then you should probably be like sure you know what i mean yeah
i'd be happy to help cool i think close a little bit the the episode if you want yeah um
you are having a show this saturday sunday sunday sunday yeah in um here in athens but you are having
other dates already you say yeah so i think my next big one is going to be in brighton in may
okay yeah i'm doing the brighton fringe festival so four performances in my next solo show which
is called miscommunication and uh that's really like for me the kind of the beginning is where
we already done a couple previews but that's really the beginning of the journey for that show is it's
going to start there miscommunication and then i'm going to start looking i've got a couple things
going i've got one show happening in hamburg i'm doing barcelona so i'm looking now at other cities
i'd like to go to in europe for the summer and really kick that show off so i i hope to live
with that show for a while because my old show involuntary mom's letter had a lot of as well
like pictures and things it was it had storytelling and theatrical elements so this one's just stand
up you know it's just me and a mic okay and yeah so it'll grow and change a lot nice so it's more
like uh what you're planning to do for the next month is this yeah for for for a hot second i'm
going to really stick with this and really work it out and see what works what's exciting so that's
good so i think all the audience should check your instagram it's abby for loth pretty much everywhere
you you have a social media handle mine is abby a bb y for the number laughs and i think you have a
website with your website that's easier abigail paul dot com so yeah it will be all in the in the
description of the episode of course um so you can stay tuned and see if abby's coming to your city
then go for the show and maybe just after the show say something yes as a podcast listener
i came because of that do that i would be very excited about that the way i was so excited when
we knew each other and here we are now because all it just happened so hopefully some i bring some
audience the randomness of life is so beautiful so thank you so much thank you mark for accepting
this invitation and for bringing your experience in comedy and theater in general i guess and it
has been a really really good pleasure to to have you here besides that of course thanks to to uh to
banga cafe to let us this cool space to record today very good very good coffee so if you are
around exarchia just grab a coffee here because it's worth it and of course infinite thanks to
every listener who is around there don't forget to subscribe and follow to see this episode and the
next episodes that are coming uh again thanks a lot thank you mark this is expat experts
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