I've heard that the life of a road comic is a lot like the life of a wrestler. Travel all the time. Work shit venues. May or may not get paid as promised. Suck hard when you first start. Alone most of the time. A lot of the people who do it are totally fucked up. Drugs, suicide, etc. If you screw up in comedy, you don't break your neck though. So that's a difference.
I found a YouTube Channel where a road comic talks about their career. Maybe he's just a more successful comedian than I am a wrestler, but it didn't seem that similar to me. All his videos have the format of, I went to this city, I stayed at this hotel, I ate at this restaurant, and here's how the show went. His hotel is always paid for. He eats at real restaurants. He goes to coffee places. He has a story about getting confused doing the math trying to leave a tip for a $100 bill at a burger place.
On the other hand, if I used his format I would say "Slept in car, ate what I grabbed out of the dumpster at Burger King at closing time." The only thing that was the same was the shows. He'll write "I worked in Waterbury for 30 people last night, crowd was shitty". Now that sounds familiar.
At first I couldn't understand why a comedy show with 30 people at it could have so much more money to throw at the worker than a wrestling show. I figured out that they don't. If you have a bar or other venue and you want to have comedy, all you need is a guy, maybe two, and that's it. You can cover that one guy's hotel and pay them $50 burger money.
Even the smallest crappiest wrestling show has at least five matches. That means you have 10 people to pay right there. Plus a referee and a couple crew guys. Maybe a sound guy. And you have to pay to rent a ring and insurance and in some places they make you get a license like it's a real sport.
So you have the same money as that comedy show being split 15-20 ways instead of all that 30-person crowd cash going to one performer. You can pay for a road comic to stay at the Hilton Garden Inn. 20 wrestlers not so much.
There are some similarities between stand-up and wrestling but one of them not only doesn't break your bones and scramble you brains, it's also more lucrative.
Too bad I'm not funny.
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