CEBU, Philippines — Becoming a famous stand-up comedian does not happen overnight. Take it from Red Ollero who spent years developing his craft.
“Stand-up comedy is about making people laugh with your own experiences and observations. It’s a skill I had to hone for a long time,” he told The FREEMAN in an online interview.
“I started in 2007, and I don’t think I was as funny that time as I am now. It’s one thing to be funny around your friends or officemates, but it’s another thing to be funny to a general audience.”
With topics ranging from his experiences as a plus-sized man to observations about society and politics, Ollero said that “authenticity” plays a factor in why his material is a hit.
“The craft is grounded in your individuality. My stand-up, in particular, is me being unapologetically myself. I think there are a lot of people who are entertained and can relate to my experiences and agree with my observations,” said Ollero, whose own Netflix comedy special “Mabuhay is a Lie” was released last March.
Ollero, along with his fellow Comedy Manila talents Victor Anastacio, James Caraan, and GB Labrador, will bring their humor to the Queen City of the South this Saturday, August 3, as part of their “Absolute Mega Best of Comedy Manila” tour.
Show times are at 4 pm and 8 pm, taking place at the SM Prime Theater of Marcelo Fernan Cebu Press Center, in Cebu City. Tickets are available at ComedyManila.PH for P1,800 until August 2, while same-day tickets cost P2,500. The FREEMAN readers can avail of an exclusive coupon code (FREEMANCEBU150) for P150 discount.
The Cebu crowd can expect new material from Ollero. “If you watched my Netflix special, I don’t use any of those jokes anymore. This is a great opportunity for me to develop new material and see how people react,” he said.
The comedians will also interact with the audience and are prepared to handle hecklers.
“Hecklers are actually fun, especially the incoherent ones because they are drunk and have no sense of what they’re talking about,” he said.
Influences
Ollero’s influences are the likes of actor Will Ferrell and former late-night host Conan O’Brien.
“If you are a Pinoy comedian, you’re supposed to do it Pinoy style. If you do the Western kind, people will say that I am copying Jo Koy, which is weird because I think we should acknowledge that a lot of people grew to enjoy Western stuff,” he continued.
“A lot of people enjoy Korean stuff or anime. To say that’s not very Filipino or unpatriotic is kinda false. You are Filipinos who enjoy these kinds of things. That’s valid, right?”
If he had to cite local influences, it would be comic strip artist Pol Medina Jr. and Fil-Am comedian Rex Navarrete. “They are the two that show Pinoys can be funny this way,” he remarked.
“Medina molded my sense of humor and sense of wonder by reading his comic books because he’s very adventurous with his stories,” he explained. “Navarrete, he was talking about a Halloween R2-D2 costume that looks like a rice cooker. That’s Pinoy geeky core humor that nobody talks about.”
On the big screen
Aside from his Netflix special, Ollero was also seen in two R-rated comedy movies released this year. He played Enrique Gil’s best friend in “I Am Not Big Bird,” directed by Cebuano filmmaker Victor Villanueva, and a voiceover artist in “Marupok A+” starring Maris Racal.
“They’ve seen some of my stand-up shows, so if you watch me in those movies where I did well, that’s because they have seen my work and they allowed me to play the role the way I wanted to,” he said.
If there’s a genre that Ollero would love to dabble in next, it would be action-comedy, since he is a big fan of the movies “John Wick”, “The Matrix”, and “The Fast and the Furious” franchises.
“That’s cinema for me. When you go watch and turn off your mind to be entertained, that’s the kind of entertainment I wanna bring in someday,” he said.
Correctness, exaggeration
There have been much discussion about political correctness in comedy, with the likes of Jerry Seinfeld who blames leftists for forcing comedians to walk on eggshells, while his “Seinfeld” co-star Julia Louis-Dreyfus has said that sensitivity towards the feelings of others doesn’t derail humor.
Ollero is empathetic towards both sides of the debate, as long as comedians from either camp can still be funny.
“If you’re that kind of person who is politically correct, you can make things funny and it’s valid. You don’t have to step on people’s toes or offend to do comedy,” he said. “At the same time, if your brand of comedy is edgy or politically incorrect, it’s still valid as long as you intend to make people laugh and not offend them. We have to respect each other’s bounds and limitations.”
Pointing out which topics are off-limits for him as a comedian, he said, “I grew up with a friend who is paraplegic, so I cannot make jokes about disabled people. I am close with my grandma, so I cannot joke about the elderly that much. I also can’t joke about illnesses because I lost a lot of loved ones to various illnesses,” he added.
“But if I hear a joke about paraplegia or illness and I laugh, I wouldn’t stop that guy from joking. That’s their point of view.”
One thing Ollero agrees with is that comedians do exaggerate their own stories, as pointed out by actress Regina Hall in a 2019 interview when she commented about her “Girls’ Trip” co-star Tiffany Haddish who told a story about an actress who bit Beyonce’s cheek at a party, which prompted widespread tabloid speculation.
“I could tap your leg with my foot, and Tiffany would re-tell it as me kicking you. She’s a comedian. She can make a story, know what I mean? That whole thing took on a life of its own,” Hall had told The New York Times.
“One of the tools of comedy is to exaggerate,” Ollero said, citing one of the rules indicated in Judy Carter’s “The Comedy Bible.”
“If I made a joke about an elevator that had a buzzing sound and I had to depart, I could word it as if I was rejected by a non-living thing. It could be worded differently but still grounded in truth. I doubt that the elevator rejected me because I was fat; it was about having a weight limit.”
He added, “There are situations in life that give you something on a silver platter. You just have to present it properly. Word it differently, exaggerate it, blow it up, or make it smaller than it is. That’s basic comedy technique.”
Real, hard work
His advice for aspiring comedians? Keep writing, attend comedy gigs, and be patient.
“I came out of a mental block, and I was writing horrendous s--t that will not gather laughs. Just keep writing, even if it’s s----y,” he said. “When you try, it’s a real hard try, like around two or three years. Stand-up comedy is basically a trial and error process.”
“Don’t stop if you’re serious about stand-up comedy. You can’t do stand-up without going to gigs or open mics. Do it consistently, write, perform what you wrote, adjust what you performed, come back the next week, and perform it again. There’s no secret formula. It’s real hard work.”