Gaurav Kapoor weaves stories out of things that he sees and experiences and has a funny take on almost all of them – his school, college, office, Royal Enfield, Mumbai flats, Nano – everything under the sun that catches his eyes.

Kapoor credits Zakir Khan for the sudden interest in Hindi stand-up, and admits that he is a fan of Vipul Goyal’s comedy. However he just wants to be like himself, and we are glad!

Here are some quick facts about Gaurav Kapoor:

• Has a journalism degree from Delhi University
• Post Graduate in Fashion Management from National Institute of Fashion Technology
• Worked in the retail sector post qualification
• Won every open mic competition on the Mumbai circuit including Big Mic, Canvas Laugh Club, Chalta Hai and Buzz Off in his early years as a comic
• Opened for Russel Brand on his India Tour
• Recently changed his name from Kapur to Kapoor – neurologically at play here
• Does Saturday ki Rasoi with wife Shreya Sharma

 

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The post Know Your Comic: Gaurav Kapoor appeared first on Humour Sapiens.

Pronoy is amongst the few comics from the Northeast and was recently reminded of his origin by the CAA/NRC fiasco. And that’s precisely what triggered him to out his new video – CAA, NRC and Assam.

Highlights of the video:

• Talks about how the northeast never gets covered in the news and when this CAA/NRC fiasco gave them some limelight, the attention seekers of Delhi couldn’t bear it and took it all away with their protests.
• Jokes about how he would be tagged as an illegal immigrant if his family got to know about him taking a dig on this serious issue
• Adds that he’s pretty happy with the way govt is working for them and making new homes – called Detention Centres
• Nevertheless, there’s someone he can completely rely on – who won’t ever abandon him. Want to know who? Watch his video!

Packed with dotes and anecdotes, and funny self-induced slurs, Pronoy has done a great job.

Pronoy Chowdury’s CAA, NRC and Assam for you:

The post Pronoy Chowdury’s CAA, NRC and Assam appeared first on Humour Sapiens.

After carrying out his graduation, he went on to work with a few private companies. In 2009 and 2010, he worked as an intern with ‘Ranbaxy,’ Gurgaon and ‘Engineers India Limited,’ New Delhi respectively. He later went on to work with ‘HPCL-Mittal Energy Ltd,’ Bhatinda in 2011 and ‘Grail Research’ as a research analyst. After leaving ‘Bain & Company,’ in 2013, he pursued his career in stand-up comedy and joined ‘On Air with AIB;’ as a writer in 2015.

In 2016, he uploaded his first video on his YouTube Channel with the title ‘Indian Insults & Comebacks.’

His two comedy shows- ‘Thoda Saaf Bol’ and ‘Jealous of Sabjiwala’ were immensely popular. Since then, he has performed on various national and international platforms.

This Delhi boy is amongst the finest young comedians in the country. He represents fresh new talent and is known to kill it on stage, all credit to his superfast delivery and unmatched observational skills.

Abhishek now lives in Mumbai and scaling new heights of success every day.

Also Read: 7 times Abhishek Upmanyu was at his funniest best

Check Out his Video:

Lesser Known Things About Abhishek Upmanyu

• He is fond of playing the guitar and travelling.
• He loves cats and owns one named, Mitch Hedberg.

• His favourite comics are Vinay Sharma, Aditi Mittal, Zakir Khan, and Bridget Christie.
• He has a tattoo inked of his favourite Indian dish, in his own handwriting – Dal Makhani

The post Know Your Comic: Abhishek Upmanyu appeared first on Humour Sapiens.

Humour Sapiens got into a Tête-à-Tête with Harsh Gujral. Read more about the boy next door here!

1. How did you develop interest in stand-up comedy? What was your first stage experience like?

Comedy always interested me. During school too, I was one of the mischievous kids and made my friends laugh. When I first visited London; yes, I got a chance to stay there for a year *insert ahem ahem*. It was there that I saw stand-up comedy live for the first time. That made me sit up and look for comedy videos, and it was the videos of Jeeveshu bhai that I saw first. Instantly, I marked him an email and I told him that I was keen on performing with him. To which he responded saying, “write your comedy material and start performing at open mics to start with.” When I searched for places that host open mics, Canvas Laugh Club came up and I looked more about it. After calling them up, I got to know what open mic really was. But I didn’t start immediately. I went to watch an open mic and checked out how was it done. It was an entirely different ambiance, I realised. Completely baffling. I waited for a week, wrote content and then performed at an open mic. Now you know how talented I am. I had to Win and I Won. *insert another ahem ahem* As I won that open mic, my first open mic, it gave me some confidence that yes, I can do this and maybe this was something I always wanted to do. So, yea, I was always interested in comedy, but Canvas gave me a platform to kickstart this as a career.

My first stage experience was mind-blowing. Any and every dirty joke I could think of, I did them all in under 4 mins, and Delhi audience was having a great time, undoubtedly! They thoroughly enjoyed the non-veg kind of jokes and were applauding endlessly. It left me wondering…what’s the matter with these guys. But I was enjoying too.

I still have that snippet video of my first performence that I got filmed secretly. It wasn’t that great in comparison to how I perform now. But that’s how a stage works. The more you perform, the better to become. But all in all, it was a great experience.

2. How has the journey been so far? Were there any challenges that you had to face?

Up till now, my journey has been quite satisfactory. And I am very thankful to God almighty for it. I used to watch other artists’ videos on YouTube and wondered how those people could be so talented and creative to carry out such a difficult art form in front of so many people. Now that I share stage with them, I feel happy about how far I have come. It has been great till now and if god willing, it will be such in future too!

If I talk about challenges, in my opinion stand-up is an individual challenge that you face every time you get on to that stage to perform. You have to create jokes and keep the audience entertained. Though there are phases when you can’t think of anything and you begin to feel that it is over, but it is not! No one helps you in that moment and says, “okay buddy, I can perform on your behalf.” You have to pull yourself together and keep the show going. It’s a continuous challenge for you; an everyday challenge. You fall back, you lose, you get up and try again. Just keep doing your bit, things will automatically fall into place.

3. What was the reaction of your family when they got to know about your encounter with stand-up comedy?

My parents were not able to understand initially as to what I was actually doing. Whenever I told them I am going to perform at an open mic, they seemed clueless about it. Eventually, they understood that I perform on stage and do comedy. But weren’t quite sure as to what do I do. They felt, I go and perform everyday but never come back with any money. This was an alien concept to them.

It was quite funny that they didn’t understand that why did they have to send me money while I was in college and even when I was working.

My mom used to ask me every day after shows if I got some money, and when I responded saying that I had to spend a few hundred, she used to laugh at me saying, “you are the first comic who pays to perform.” Things were different back then; she had a hard time understanding the concept of open mics. The situation is different now, she feels better. Earlier when I used to say, I will quit my job, they discouraged saying, “you shouldn’t let go off a fixed monthly salary amount.” But now parents are happy and supportive of what I am doing. Now they say, “do whatever you love. Don’t do job if you don’t like.” Things have changed with time.

4. Any take on regional comedy?

Regional comedy is definitely good for India, because most of us do comedy in Hindi and can cater to a wide set of audience pan India. But regional comedy allows people to have references from their colloquial language in the jokes, and that immediately becomes a connecting factor. Regional comedy has a bright future. Slowly you will see people performing more and more in their local dialects. But I will still be doing Hindi comedy. Whenever anyone asks me to even say a punch in English, I say no! But I don’t deny, regional comedy is good for the scene, good for the art form. When people will do regional comedy, more people will get attracted to this art form, more audience will be seen appreciating it.

5. Any experience with annoying audience member?

The audience cannot really annoy you if you are annoying enough, right? When it comes to my shows, I am more annoying than the people who come to see my shows. I try my best that none of them leaves the premises alive.

See, the logic is simple, if they cannot breathe, they cannot annoy! Up till now, I have been pretty successful in sucking up the last straw of life in them.

But it happens. Like, in one of the shows I did for doctors, really aged doctors – the kind who would need doctors to accompany them to ensure their well-being. It was hard to make them understand any kind of jokes.

One of the aged doctors, started walking, real slow, and kept walking until he reached me. I was oblivious to the fact that the tortoise had me as the target. He came towards me, snatched my mic and said, “this pretention of jokes and mimicry must end right now. Now I will tell the jokes.” (Ye chutkule sunaane ka jo dhong kiya jaa raha hai, usey abhi samapt kiya jaye. Ab hum chutkule sunayenge.) I was stunned. The next thing he did left me speechless…

He took his phone out from his pocket and started reading whatsapp forwards. It wasn’t that he memorised those jokes. If he’d done that, I would have let him tell jokes. But you cannot really mess with oldies. They are the kings in their own sweet world. They can do whatever they wish.

So, yes, apart from this, there has hardly been a case where anyone other than me has been so annoying, be it at school, college or office. I take pride in it.

6. Any bombing moment you’d like to share?

Bombing is inevitable. Everyone bombs.

By the blessing of the god, there have been extremely insignificant bombing moments in my life. There hasn’t been any such moment where I destroyed my act beyond repair. So, when the jokes aren’t working, I switch to talking to the audience. Because I know, once I talk, I will find something to joke about from it and then return to my original pace and carry on with jokes from there on. There are times when jokes fall flat, but I manage then! Isn’t that what we call experience?

The day you try everything and attempts to make them laugh by hook or crook are not working…understand that day…It’s the audience that’s bad.

7. Who is your favourite comic?

My favourite comic from India has to be Kapil Sharma. When I used to see him perform on TV and say certain lines, I realised, some of the lines were what I had already used in my life, and now I saw him saying those on TV which people seemed to like. I was able to relate and found that my style is similar to his. I feel he is the legend in the TV comedy scene.

When it comes to YouTube and other stand-up comics in the scene, I really like Anubhav Bassi. We have performed together, and I have seen him become a star from the start of his journey. When you see someone rise up, their journey, you appreciate their efforts even more. I like other comics too…I like Zakir Khan. Recently, I shared the stage with him and realised that this man was meant to be a success.

I like myself too, I like my comedy as well. “Mai apna favourite hun” This is the lesson I have learnt from girls. You should better be your favourite, don’t care if anyone else likes you or not.

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Hop on & Seat belt on, because…Nishant Tanwar is back with his new special ‘Gaadi Tera Bhai Chalayega’. This Hinglish special from Nishant is a face to face with reality. He talks about weddings; his China visit as a third wheel and his corporate stint. He establishes a pattern with the first shot of the special when he comes up on stage and totally owns it.

Outlandish Addiction

Nishant spends a considerable time telling how he is addicted to attending weddings and so begins the tale. He gets to attend a cousin’s wedding, deals with a couple of relatives who still are not able to wrap their head around the fact that stand-up comedy is a serious business. The horrid turn of events doesn’t end there. He narrates how he made his cousin wear a ‘lungi’ with a tux, and how he had to do third wheeling on his cousin’s honeymoon. He details his China and Dubai visit, the food, the orgasmic feel you have when you meet a fellow Indian or mere Hindi-speaking person abroad, the dessert safari and the real-belly-dancing experience he had.

The Times of Corporate

A lot of his material revolves around his experiences from his corporate stint, and how his boss considered him for not thinking out of the boss. He subtly explains the thin line between buttering and ass-licking, and how these traits can help you get good increments. His tale of adversity is a confessional style of storytelling, wherein he gets laughs almost matter-of-factly. This bit was where Tanwar was the brightest. He effortlessly motivates while describing how doing comedy costed him his job. He, at the same time, doesn’t make us feel bad for laughing at these incidents.

In his last bit, he describes meeting his former boss who laid him off a few years ago, and then comes the high point of the special, when he gives it back to his ex-boss that Tanwar’s time is more valuable now!

Though, Gaadi Tera Bhai Chalayega has a few moments where it falters and the whole thing takes a while to get going, but you sure can overlook those. His tone and energy help support the material, till he drops the mic with a motivating message about steering your life your way!

He is seen driving off a BMW in the end, which sure gives us goose bumps. We are proud, Nishant!

Watch Gaadi Tera Bhai Chalayega Amazon Prime Video, here.

The post Review: Nishant Tanwar’s Gaadi Tera Bhai Chalayega appeared first on Humour Sapiens.

Humour Sapiens got into a Tête-à-Tête with Subhashish Bharuka. Read more about the man right here!

1. How did you develop interest in stand-up comedy?

I was 8 years old when I got on stage in a fancy dress competition in my school, dressed as a scarecrow. I thought, everyone would make fun of me. Instead, all the kids found it hilarious and I won the first prize. That’s when I developed the love for stage and to perform in front of an audience. Post that, I did theater in school and later on went on to do it professionally. I wrote scripts for the plays in which I would play the protagonist. (Self obsession you see. Lol.)

Cut to 2008, I went to see a show of Papa CJ in Delhi and instantly realised that’s what I’d like to do. I tried a few open mics in Delhi but dropped and went on to pursue my masters in Leeds University. At the summer ball for my batch, I performed a 20-minute set which everyone loved except the Chinese students, because I had made fun of them.

After returning to India, I moved to Bangalore in 2015. That’s when I found out about the open mics happening in the city. My first open mic was at Urban Solace. Since then, it’s been a continual journey to keep writing and working to improve my art.

2. What was your first stage experience like?

Most first timers have a stage fear, I was sort of used to being in the spot. I went to watch an open mic at Urban Solace and back then there were open mic spots available easily. I registered to perform for the same gig. It was an instant high, though my thoughts were raw and totally unstructured as a first time open micer.

3. How has the journey been so far? Were there any challenges that you had to face?

To say the least, it’s been extremely fulfilling. I’ve produced 22 shows in Bangalore with WEDx being the show that would be house-full every time. I have been doing open mics as regularly I can. There are challenges in every field. Stand-up being one of the most challenging performing art forms. It takes a hell lot of patience and practice to perfect the art, and can even take a decade or more. It’s an ongoing process and I hope to continue it for as long as it takes to get somewhere in the circuit.

4. Your key achievements?

I had the opportunity to open for Jeeveshu, Atul Sir, Kunal Kamra and the latest sensation Anubhav Singh Bassi. In addition to the these, Comedy Barrel is a small stand-up comedy production company, under which I’ve produced WEDx and Let’s Do the 90s show across packed rooms and the audiences simply loved the line up and the show concept.

5. Any experience with annoying audience member?

Not particularly. Thankfully, I’ve had no hecklers to deal with yet. Hopefully, when I do record a couple videos and release it online, there’s going to be online heckling for sure.

6. Any bombing moment you’d like to share?

Oh. Bombing is very close to my heart and mind. Haha. I have bombed so much, it’s not even funny. And it’s a good thing because I had a full time corporate job and my writing time would not be more than half an hour a day. To hash out content was the toughest part of it. I feel comics who are younger and have no responsibilities are the luckiest. They can pursue this full time and can attend all mics happening.

Thankfully, I’ve been able to put together a 30 minutes set now which has been tested with multiple audiences. But without bombing a comedian cannot grow on comedy.

With so much done & dusted, and a lot yet to be tasted, Subhashish rocks everything he does. We wish him luck! Connect with him on facebook.

The post Tête-à-Tête with Subhashish Bharuka appeared first on Humour Sapiens.

Prasad Bhat’s new stand-up on Indian Nightie aka Maxi talks about his married life and how frustrated he is with his wife’s love for Indian nighties. But you can’t really blame her, it is comfortable.

Here are the highlights of Prasad Bhat’s new video: Indian Nightie aka Maxi

Things you do when you no more want to impress your husband

What to do when you want to annoy your husband

Seducing is an art, cannot be done right wearing a Maxi

No more spoilers! Watch the complete video and know what happens next!

Here’s Indian Nightie aka Maxi in *full* (pun intended)

His previous video – Smokers, Delhi & Brahmins has everything about what the title says. Check out!

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He mostly talks of things that are related to love, religion and politics, in a way only he can. His narration style is as funny as his content. Parvez uses satire and a politically accurate way to take a dig at the societal norms in practice for ages. His stories are inspired from his personal experiences and pretty much relatable. Parvez Hassan’s new video Delhi Metro & Love Jihaad is not in support of people who blatantly force others to change themselves or their religion for the sake of love. He says, “Love is a beautiful thing, it goes beyond religion/caste/gender, please don’t let it die.”

Here are the highlights of his video:

Things to do when you are stuck with creepy #Sanskaari uncles in a metro

What to do when you get involved in the eternal love affair

Challenges faced at Rajiv Chowk metro station in Delhi

It’s time you take a stand

There’s more to it than just this!

Watch Parvez Hassan’s Delhi Metro & Love Jihaad here:

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He has lots of interesting stuff to share about both the locations. In this video, he talks about precisely those. This video describes funny incidents from his life in Delhi NCR. Since Laxmi Nagar is recognised as a place where people come for CA preparation. It can be referred to as Kota for CA aspirants. There are more funny inferences about the place.

Highlights of Gaurav Gupta’s video on Delhi NCR

On getting the cabs stuck

Introducing the concept of earthing

Counting the number of ways in which you can die in East Delhi…aka Final Destination script

On sorted lives of South Delhi peeps

There’s more to it. Watch the full video here:

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Devesh writes his own jokes and has been performing as a stand-up comic for over 4 years now. His acts mostly revolve around his life. This Delhi-based comic has been called a ‘level 3’ comic by a few comics in the circle. Though he doesn’t know what it means, but assumes it is something good.

Here we share the 3 Hilarious Deliveries by Stand-up Comic Devesh Dixit

Road Rage & Getting Married

This is his first video and explicitly mentions road rage and getting married were two separate incidents. Herein, he talks about his experience of a really terrible road rage and his family’s apprehension of getting him hitched to his Bengali girlfriend, because Kolkata is too far, you know!

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Wiz Khalifa & Radio Ads

Stand-up Comic Devesh Dixit talks about how someone thugged Wiz Khalifa, and sheds some light on the rubber stamping, which is a common marketing trend in India, especially on Radio. He mentions how advertisers think it would make their audience crazy af. Dixit also touches upon how All India Radio anchors are different from the private radio channel anchors, because government job!

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Which College You From?

In this video, stand-up Comic Devesh Dixit, targets Amity University, and states that he is yet to gain confidence on some doctor or lawyer from Amity. However, he appreciates their placement system. This one is pretty relatable, for we all know, how watered down the edification is getting in India.

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