Comedy is hard work. It is also very deceptive. The current success that it enjoys on the Guyanese stage, and the apparent lightheartedness of it all, the fun, the hilarity, the shooting nonsense to make people laugh, deceives everyone into believing that it is easy. However, many pretenders to the throne in this art form soon confront the reality that it is not all play. As has been stated before, it soon hits them that comedy is serious business. And that is a fitting irony.
Much of this came into focus again with the recent staging of Uncensored 5, produced by Lyndon Jones and Maria Benschop. This annual show has earned a high place as the foremost event in stand-up comedy with overwhelming box office pull.
Stand-up comedy now holds centre stage, and is the form of theatre most likely to fill the auditorium. It is popular theatre with compelling mass appeal, but it is not as simple as that might suggest. There are different forms of comic performance, and stand-up comedy is just one. Many actors, and of course, audiences, are drawn to it because of the
