Desiree Burch

Today I am interviewing Desiree Burch, a comedian born in Diamond Bar, CA who has been doing comedy for ?? years. To find out more about Desiree, please visit her website.

Why did you start doing stand-up comedy?

Because there were too many people in the world pissing me off. I think I felt like there was something in me that was silenced being silenced in my regular life. I was a little fat girl, and a middle child, and a nerd. You see a lot from the other side of that, and you're typically not supposed to say it.

I also realized that I had a talent for comedy. I remember being in the kindergarten fenced playground while the kids were running around doing stuff, and I was goofing and entertaining the second and third graders. They liked me. They really liked me. I was hooked. Sad, I know. I watched too much tv growing up as well. That was our family's sole method of communion, so I had an affinity for entertaining.

How do you write your material?

Well, shit pisses me off and I write it down. Comedy is just violence. From the act of laughing and making someone laugh to the force with which you are working to get something across while attacking certain ideas. It's good to make someone recognize what you are saying enough to laugh. It's even better when they know you are talking about them and they can anyway.

I write on the train a lot. I think a lot of my comedy is very NY-centric because a lot of my experiences and observations come from encounters with a certain breed of absurdity that is specific to this environment and the kind of person it creates.

My material tends to write itself, in that, the certainty of the idea comes to you strongly, and the process of writing it down is trying to figure why it's resonant to you, and presumably/hopefully other human beings.

What is the one thing you would have done differently if you started doing comedy today?

Would have gone up more and fucked up more. You don't get good until you start fucking up and fucking around. The money comes when you are all about the comedy. It doesn't come as quick, but it comes. There is a lot of observation/critiquing/picking apart in the act of comedy. You have to make sure you are loving it. Otherwise you back yourself into a corner and you wind up being someone you are not, and feeling obliged to be that person for a room full of strangers. That sucks.