We can thank the digital medium for giving us a chance to sit, scroll and laugh out loud watching new stand up specials almost every single day, not just from Indian comics but from artists around the world.
Over the past decade, while the general cheer for comedians has skyrocketed in India, we have also become used to stand up gigs now more than ever. For a quick check, try and name some stand up comics you can recall immediately.
With a number of comedy specials and short videos increasingly finding place on YouTube and other streaming platforms, there is a good chance that five to ten names, from a longlist of comics, will find mention. But how many of them were of female comics?
While stand up comedy is still attempting to gain a foothold in India, female led stand up acts are still very numbered. Without a doubt, there has been an upward trend in consumption of stand up specials on digital platforms, but sadly only a handful of them feature comics who are women.
Before Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced the complete lockdown in the country to curb the spread of coronavirus, News18 interacted with Niveditha Prakasam, Prashasti Singh, Supriya Joshi and Kaneez Surka for their series Ladies Up on Netflix. In our conversation, the four women took a sledgehammer to stereotypes that claim “women aren’t supposed to be funny."
“I just think women haven't been in the scene (of stand up) as much. I don't think it is ‘women aren’t funny’. It's just that women haven't been around. So they didn't really notice,” said Niveditha.
Standing by her fellow comedienne, Kaneez said, “With more women coming, we're not seeing people for their gender anymore. We're just like, 'oh, that person's funny'. We're normalising, neutralising and getting judged on how funny we are now not whether we're men or women, and that's going to happen when more women come in.”
However, Prashasti and Supriya don’t agree completely to this line of thought. While they believe most men still think they're not funny, they agree that things will normalise once more women join the stand up space. But it is a time-taking process, they insist.
With an array of witty female stand ups coming in, it can be said that the comics themselves have become more brave in their approach towards the form. While most men joke about political crises, take potshots at their gold-digging girlfriends and overtly possessive mothers, women tend to smack down patriarchy with the weapon of humour.
Attacking everything, starting from body-shaming to existing gender inequalities in our society to looking down upon women, female comics are bold, often raunchy but all while being excruciatingly funny.
“You know, there shouldn’t be any restrictions in comedy,” Nivedhitha quips. “People think if it's too sexist you shouldn’t say it. I say, you should, otherwise, people won't know it exists. I really believe that comedy is the only place you get to say the truth. Your truth. It doesn't mean that it has to be the truth of the world, it just means you believe in this certain thing.”
Here, Prashasthi shares her trick to mirror the abnormalities of the person being joke about. “It is very difficult for me to do insult comedy. So, if I have to talk about something ill, I become the person first. I will narrate all the bad putting it upon me. So, as an audience you see a reflection of what is around.”
Of course, we all know women were funny, but somehow, it took time for everybody to notice it.
Comparing the audience response during her previous live shows to the present, Kaneez said that she has been receiving positive reviews, which has made her more confident about her content and art in recent times. “Five years ago, when I used to do jokes, the audience would have weird expressions making 'tch-tch’ noises. But now when I do them, people are laughing. They're not reacting with like, ‘How could you say that’, they're actually laughing. And I think two things could be the reason. One the audiences have evolved and secondly, more women have come in talking about stuff.”
Adding to it, Kaneez said, “I personally know, when I'm being mean, and when I'm trying to just give a slice of truth. It's not about attacking that person. It's about showing the truth about that situation.”
“I think it has given us the strength to ask for what we want now and we don't feel like we owe anyone anything. We believe that we deserve what we're getting.”
Supriya, after listening to everybody carefully while assessing the line between being funny and offensive, shared her ordeal too. She said that being obese due to PCOD, she has been the center of too many jokes for too many people. “In the beginning,” she began, “It feels bad because it feels personal. It feels like someone's going to tell you to not speak about it essentially," she said.
"But from what I have learned so far, the key is to speak about it and not feel bad. Accept who you are and start to love yourself. In my appearance, I could look like a micro-organism and it doesn’t matter, only thing that matters is what you're putting out into the world. If you know you're funny, you can master your craft with practice and everybody will eventually share a laugh,” she added.
While they are still inching up to evolve the gender parity in the Indian stand up comedy scenario, the four ladies feel they’re killing the game right now. It wouldn't be wrong to say that in the same spirit as Ali Wong and Hannah Gadsby, these Indian women comics are fearless in raising their voices and championing change in the national stand up comedy scene.
In the conclusion of our conversation, all they asked from their audiences is a chance to prove they’re absolutely hilarious.
Their Netflix special, ‘Ladies up’ is now streaming on Netflix.
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