My Guest spot for Theo Von

AND MY FRIENd who heckled him

written by: Todd Marcel Doram

Todd Doram performing at Dont tell comedy — **After my friend Sean Leary vouched for me, Theo Von let me open for him in Portland, OR.**

On February 9, 2018 Theo Von allowed me to do guest spots on both of his Friday night shows at Harvey's Comedy Club in Portland, Oregon. This was a MASSIVE step forward, from a time when I had to follow Theo a few months earlier at Pancho's, which is a weekly bar show in Manhattan Beach. At that point, I was fairly new comic, and Theo. . . well Theo was (and is,) a MONSTER COMIC. He has a joke about meeting Brad Pitt that is so funny, and crushes so hard, that he didn't do it at most shows out of fairness to the remaining comics on the lineup. The joke left the audience in such hysteria, that it was simply impossible to follow. Much to my misfortune, the host Pancho's is a guy named Danno Carter, who told me I'm following Theo. Then he shouts at Theo a request for him to the Brad Pitt joke. To that point I'd never heard it, and Theo tried to decline, but Danno insisted, and Theo ultimately tells the joke. As Danno expected, the audience ERUPTS in flames. . . leaves them in stitches, and then Danno introduces me to stage.

I was cooked.

Completely HELPLESS doesn't begin to describe my stage presence following Theo Von at Pancho's

That was an early lesson in the reality that there are such things as "tough acts to follow," and Theo is absolutely one of those. The good news is that over the next few months/years, Theo got to know my on a few shows we were on together, and one that I booked him on, so he knew who I was. Although we were on some of the same shows, he was routinely running from spot to spot, so he didn't exactly have time to see my act. One night after a show at The Comedy Store, I told Theo the story of having to follow his Brad Pitt joke at Pancho's, and he looked at me with a sincere tone of apology and said "oh I'm sorry man." The joke crushed so hard he authentically knew what kind of hole he put me in, and felt bad enough to apologize. What a nice guy!

I had the honor of doing some pretty cool shows with Theo

Fast forward a few months and itTheo was on a club tour, and one of his spots was Harvey's Comedy Club in Portland Oregon. At this time, my day job was working in Communications for a non-profit, which paid me just enough money to not have any, but I did have flexibility to take off for comedy or entertainment gigs when they the popped up. So a friend of mine in Portland Oregon calls me one day to tell me Theo Von was coming to town, and that he would fly me up if Theo gave me a guest spot on his show. What a friend. This is the same guy who hired me to do private comedy show for his wife's 30th birthday party, at a winery. Two pretty cool road gigs early in my career? I'll take it! Now to get sign on off from Theo.

This is the very much homemade flier I created to "entice" my friends to come to the show

With this offer on the table, I sent Theo a text asking if a guest spot (10 minute set) on one of his shows was possible. Once again, he hadn't seen much of my act to that point, so he crossed referenced with a fellow comic, Sean Leary, who vouched for me, Theo said yes and I was booked! Now to promote the show!

The obvious first call was my friend who booked my plane ticket, then I got some of my old college friends in the area to attend, some buddies I grew up with in LA who lived there now, and even my favorite college instructor, Professor Peter Christensen. It was nice having friendly faces in the crowd, as I was not yet used to road gigs, and was quite nervous to perform for this audience, and so I resorted to something YOU ARE NOT SUPPOSED TO DO while having a guest spot on a headliners show. . . crowd work. Oh yeah, I was green enough to not know the rules, and so excited to be there, that I got VERY familiar with the crowd in my 10-12min set, and they got familiar right back. In fact, the crowd got so comfortable talking to me during my set, that it carried over into Theo's 1hr headlining act. IMAGINE THIS. . . a headliner is nice enough to invite a guest comic, said guest comic decides to work up the crowd, and now headliner has to spend his 1hr set picking up the pieces. This next part, I wish was a joke.

The crowd got so rowdy and incorrigible, that Theo asked club security multiple times to monitor them and kick out the people behaving the worst. He made this request into the microphone from stage, interrupting his own set. Somehow it gets worse. There was only one person who was kicked out of that first show, the main heckler, who was a close friend of mine and invited guest. Because of my actions, the first show was a lot more difficult on Theo than it needed to be Now here is what separates the pros (Theo) from the amateurs (Me.) Following the early show, Theo pulled me aside in the green room and gave me the advice that guests on shows aren't supposed to do crowd work, gave me a few other pointers, and we collectively re-grouped for the second show of the night. Even though I only had a 12min set, I was already kind of worn out from the nerves, but Theo had ANOTHER hour set to deliver. . . and DELIVER HE DID. Like a complete pro, Theo grabbed the microphone and ripped the room to shreds from the first minute of his set until the end.

That night I learned a valuable lesson; there are levels to standup comedy, and Theo had reached the highest, but thanks to his guest spot, I took another step on my way there. Thank you again Theo!