Saturday,
October 07, 2006
Comedian Joe Avati
Celebrates Being Italian
The
ANNOTICO Report
Comedian
Joe Avati, born in
During
performances, he always wears a suit. His act is clean; he uses no profanity.
Your parents, your grandparents,
your kids can all sit in the front row and enjoy.
COMIC
UNITES ITALIANS THROUGH HIS STAND-UP ACT
News
Live Times
By
Robin DeMerell
October 6, 2006
Comedian
Joe Avati says his performance -- where hundreds,
sometimes thousands of people laugh at the antics of his Italian family --
unites the Italian community by celebrating being Italian.
But the
32-year-old Australian-born Avati said you don't have
to be Italian to enjoy his act -- it's for anyone who's lived next door to an
Italian family or gone to school with an Italian -- and it's especially for IBMer's -- Italian By Marriage.
"They really
get the show," he said, of those marrying into Italian families.
Now living in
Avati said he grew up in a very
serious Italian household where there was little laughter.
"My father
wanted us to be grown men -- no joking," he said. "It was very, very
serious. I was extremely shy as a child. But in my mind, I was talking to
myself."
And it didn't
stop the little comedian from gathering up all his material to be used years
later.
"I would be
brutally honest about every observation I made," he said. "I trained
myself to do that."
As he got older,
he remembered certain things as being typically Italian, he said. "That
now forms part of my shows."
He talks about
his "Nonna" (grandmother) trying to get a
discount after sneaking into the "eight items or less" aisle with a
cart full of groceries. And his mother storing olives in the butter tub.
"My
observations are very accurate. I use facial and hand gestures," he said.
"People say 'You must have grown up in the same house I did' and 'How did
you know what my family is like?'"
When Avati went to college on an honors scholarship, he made his
friends laugh during lunchtime while he made fun of all the lecturers -- from
the way they walked to how they wrote on the blackboard.
Then he knew he
was ready to take his act to the big stage, so he went to The Comedy Store in
"I went to
try it out and got laughs," he said. "Within six months they offered
me a spot for pay."
While it takes
many comedians four years of practice to actually get a real gig, Avati said within four years he was pulling in 1,000 people
a show.
During
performances, he always wears a suit. His act is clean; he uses no profanity.
"I don't
need to. Your parents, your grandparents, your kids can all sit in the front
row and get something out of it," he said.
His style, Avati said, like comedian Jerry Seinfeld, is putting an
emphasis on words.
"It's the
way you speak," he said, and it comes very naturally to him.
Perhaps his early
success at a young age prepared him for the uproarious road ahead, because Avati is not at all overwhelmed by performing in front of
thousands of people.
"I have a
better time now than I ever did. I'm very comfortable, very relaxed," he
said. "It brings people together, makes them proud of their heritage --
they want to be more Italian now. I've been credited around the world for doing
that and that's nice. It's those things that make it worthwhile."
Joe Avati will be at The Bushnell in
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