Stand Up for the Comedians, Love Your Liebman

WENDY LIEBMAN

At the Comedy Central

Feb. 12-14

Wendy Liebman may look sweet and innocent on stage, but hiding behind her huge smile is quite a punch. Line.

Liebman, who won the 1997 American Comedy Award for Best Female Stand-up, is lauded for her deadpan style of joke-telling. After talking for a moment about something, she delivers the one-line joke. The audience laughs. She delivers a shorter, sharper, even funnier line. The audience roars. She looks out at the crowd with surprise and shock, as if she's wondering how on earth that outrageous comment could have come from her mouth. And the audience loves her for it.

An example: Liebman, conversing with the crowd about Valentine's Day in the Comedy Connection last weekend, asked if there were any high-school sweethearts in the audience. A few people applauded. She smiled and tucked a lock of hair behind her ear. "I had a high-school sweetheart too," she confessed. "It was a typical relationship. I was a cheerleader, and he was on the faculty." She jumped up and down and did a high kick. "It was like, 'Go, Mr. Jameson!"" She smiled again and looked away. "Before the cops catch you."

Another example: Liebman happily raved about how great it is to find money. "I found $20. It was just sitting there." She looked toward the ground. "In the tip jar at Starbucks."

One more example: Liebman recently went to Alaska. "I stayed at a really nice hotel. The One Season." She smiled as everyone laughed, then added, "For two days and six nights."

That night, Liebman's long-time fans may have been slightly disappointed to discover that much of her material has not changed over the last couple of years. However, it was great to see that she could still deliver her jokes with the same energy and fresh distinctiveness that brought her fame.

The Harvard Crimson: You involved the audience a lot in your show tonight.

Wendy Liebman: I think it's important that the audience sees you can be funny spontaneously. It's really hard to do, and I'm not that comfortable with doing it yet, but I'm trying it more and more, so that's probably what you saw.

THC: You've been doing stand-up for, about how long now?

WL: I've been doing it for 14 years.

THC: Where do you get inspiration for your jokes from? Are Ex-boyfriends and your parents really pissed off?

WL: None of it is true. I did a joke tonight [where] I said I had three older sisters, and my father always wanted a boyfriend; but then I said I had a brother. I forgot that I forgot to tell [the audience]. I like things to stay in people's minds because they don't know why it doesn't work exactly that I don't have a brother. I think some are thinking, "But she only has three sisters." If I'm going to lie, I have to be consistent. But I think you can lie in art, right? Or you can not lie in art. And you don't have to distinguish [between them] in art, right? So that's my prerogative on stage, to make this shit up. But you shouldn't lie in politics.

THC: How do you feel about being a woman in an [artistic] genre like this? Do you find that people treat you differently because you are a woman, or maybe that people are nicer to you because you're a woman? How do you think that affects your job?

WL: You know, I never know how to answer that question, but I'll tell you how I feel. I've never been a man in this. I think it's been easier in some ways and harder in others [to be a woman]. I think the more preserverance I have, the easier it gets, because there are fewer who have been doing it this long.

A lot of people who are at this level are big stars. I'm just not there yet, although I did get a deal with Columbia-TriStar to do an animated half-hour. I've had other deals made. That's the way Hollywood works--you get a deal and they pay you, and you never get to the next level. But this one I think is going fly, [In it,] I'm a flight attendant, so I think that'll be, like, a perfect character. I'm in first class, so I can talk to people, and have guest stars on. The other day, for real, I sat next to Roger Ebert, and I wanted to say to him, "Should I watch the movie?," but there was no movie [on the flight].

It's very aggressive what I do. I think humor is aggressive. It's not that feminine. When I started, I was very un-feminine on stage. I tried to hide my body on-stage. But as the years went by, I wanted to be more feminine. I don't know what you can make of that. I've been doing this thing called the Alexander technique. Have you ever heard of that? It's an alignment of the spine, and I've been doing it for almost three years. So since I started doing stand-up, I've literally learned how to stand up. I think the audience is more responsive when I'm standing like that. It's a very old technique. John Dewey, the educator, was a prophetizer of it. It's getting a little more popular now. It's not new-agey.

THC: Did you always want to be in stand-up?

WL: I don't believe in coincidences. I really think it's all a clue...I sort of believe that I'm meant to do this. But if I could be anything now, I think I'd be a rock singer. A lot of comics want to be rock signers.

THC: I just have one more question. I'm a senior, and I'm going to be graduating in a few months.

WL: "Can I have a job?" That's what you want to ask me.

THC: No. But do you have any advice for Harvard students who may really want to go into a medium like stand-up comedy that is a path less taken?

WL: I think it's really hard to know what you want to do, especially at Harvard. There must be a lot of pressure to know what you're going to do when you're leaving. You have to plan; I guess that's what they say. My parents were always like, "We don't care what you do, as long as it makes you money." If somebody is like secretly interested in this--in stand-up, or in any art--I think everybody has to explore their alternative side. I had a day job, and then I did this at night.

If you have a passion, if you have a curiousity, it's not going to stop bothering you until go for it once. When I first started doing stand-up, I thought, "Okay, everybody in this room is going to be dead in a 100 years, and it's just ten minutes of my life, so why not?" So my advice would be to try...I travel so much, and I see thousand of people, and I realize not how meaningless I am, but that anything I decide to do is just for me. I want my friends and family to love me, but [you should do] whatever makes you happy. And also when I feel so little, it makes me feel skinnier.