Alternative Comedy

Alternative comedy is a term coined in the 1980s for a style of comedy that makes a conscious break with the mainstream comedic style of an era. The phrase has had different connotations in different contexts: in the UK, it was used to describe content that was an "alternative" to the mainstream of live comedy, which often involved racist and sexist material. In other contexts, it is the nature of the form that is "alternative", avoiding reliance on a standardised structure of a sequence of jokes with punch lines. Patton Oswalt has defined it as "comedy where the audience has no pre-set expectations about the crowd, and vice versa. In comedy clubs, there tends to be a certain vibe—alternative comedy explores different types of material."

In an interview with ''The A.V. Club'' after his performance in the 2011 comedy-drama film ''Young Adult'', Oswalt stated:

I had come up out of that whole alternative scene, which was all about, "Don’t try it, man. Just go up and wing it." I think a lot of that comes from insecurity. It's that fashion of improv and amateurism that comes from the insecurity of saying to the audience, "Well, it doesn't matter if it doesn't go well, because I didn’t even try that hard to begin with." It's like, "Oh, that's why you're not rying If you actually tried hard and it sucked, then you've got to blame yourself." So that's what makes it hard for some people to sit down and actually just do the fucking work, because doing the work means you're making a commitment.

United Kingdom

Alternative comedy had a number of influences. It was a reaction against the mainstream stand-up of the day which took place in working men's clubs, and was characterised by unoriginal gags often containing elements of sexism and racism. Positive influences include American 'sick' comedians of the 1950s and 1960s, like Mort Sahl and Lenny Bruce; the punk scene of the late 1970s; poets like John Cooper Clarke; and less conventional earlier comedians like Billy Connolly and John Dowie.

Comedy Store

The beginning of alternative comedy is commonly associated with the opening of the Comedy Store club in London on 19 May 1979, initially a weekly gong show-style comedy night in a room above a strip club in Soho. The official history of the club credits comedian and author Tony Allen with coining the term. However, in his autobiography, the late Malcolm Hardee claims to have coined the term in 1978.

Alternative comedy came to describe an approach to stand-up comedy that was neither racist nor sexist, defining itself against more traditional comedians playing the Northern working men's clubs who often relied on jokes targeting women and minorities in a form of comedy "civil war". (This divide was not absolute, with some performers from that circuit performing at the Comedy Store from its opening in May 1979.) What developed from these clashes was, in Arthur Smith's words, "comedy's version of punk".

Alexei Sayle, the Comedy Store's first MC, provided angry character comedy satirising the left. Arnold Brown, an older stand-up comic noted for his quick-witted, observational style, was revered by several alternative comedians, and would become a regular fixture at The Comedy Store. Fellow MC Tony Allen broke the taboos of personal and sexual politics, while Keith Allen confronted audiences in a fearless series of "put-ons" and was a big influence on the early cabaret scene that was about to emerge. As these newer comics grew in confidence, Tony Allen and Alexei Sayle founded Alternative Cabaret, with other Comedy Store regulars. Their aim was to establish several alternative comedy clubs in London in addition to their flagship venue at the Elgin, Ladbroke Grove, from August 1979. Its core members were Jim Barclay, Andy De La Tour, and Pauline Melville, stand-ups who shared a background in radical fringe theatre. The pair also brought alternative stand-up to the Edinburgh Festival for the first time in August 1980 with "Late Night Alternative" at the Heriot-Watt Theatre. Returning with a full show in 1981, "Alternative Cabaret" was the critical comedy hit of that year.

Alternative Cabaret

The Comedy Store now advertised itself as "The Home of Alternative Comedy" in London's weekly Entertainment Guide, '' Time Out'', listing "Alternative Cabaret" as its main show. Their tours established the idea of running comedy shows in small venues around London, and sowed the seeds of the network of pub-based gigs that grew in the capital and across the UK throughout the 1980s. The new comedy got its own section, "Cabaret", in Listings magazines, first in '' City Limits'' followed by ''Time Out'' on 21 January 1983. Other organisations, comics, and entrepreneurs—including Maria Kempinska's Jongleurs and Roland and Clare Muldoon's CAST/New Variety—added more regular venues, bringing the number of gigs per week from 24 in 1983 to 69 by 1987.

The Comic Strip

Meanwhile, another group of comics left the Comedy Store with Peter Richardson to form The Comic Strip and run their own "Comedy Cabaret" shows at the Boulevard Theatre, Walkers Court, Soho in October 1980. The Comic Strip, featuring double acts and sketch comedy, consisted of Manchester University and Royal Central School graduates Ade Edmondson, Rik Mayall, Nigel Planer, Dawn French, and Jennifer Saunders, who began to aim their talents at television. As ''The Comic Strip Presents'', the group made over 40 television films for both Channel 4 and BBC
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