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ON WOODWARD
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11
82
FRIDAY, OCTOBER 5, 1990
RITA CHARLESTON
Special to The Jewish News
R
0 W I
:43: f
• +
Comedienne Rita Rudner:
An Absence Of Schtick
■ 11111.01#
ita Rudner's advice to
others who would con-
sider a career in com-
edy is simple: "Don't do it!"
The petite and fragile-
looking Ms. Rudner, who
switched from a career in
dance to a career in comedy a
decade ago, says the switch
was an obvious one for her at
the time since the dance field
was filled with competition
while comedy was a wide
open and virgin market.
"But now it looks like
everyone is doing comedy,"
Ms. Rudner says. "I think the
government is soon going to
pay people not to be come-
dians in the same way they
pay farmers not to grow
wheat because there are just
too many of us. And even
though there are more places
to work today, which is good
because you can earn a living,
it's much harder to get notic-
ed because the field is so glut-
ted. So to anyone who won't
take my advice and stay out
of the business, I say at least
be original and don't sound
like everyone else you've ever
heard before. If you do, you
may work; but you'll never
really progress beyond a cer-
tain point."
Ms. Rudner progressed
mainly by being open and
ready to meet a challenge
head on. Growing up in
Miami, she graduated from
high school at the age of 15
and convinced her father to
allow her to move to New
York to fulfill her dream of
becoming a dancer. Landing
her first professional job
within three months of her
arrival, Ms. Rudner appeared
in a half-dozen productions
before tiring of the constant
competition among hundreds
of young hopefuls for one role.
She began looking for
another outlet and found
stand-up comedy.
"When I started out, I was
really bad," Ms. Rudner says.
"My first time out people
laughed, but they didn't
laugh at anything I was say-
ing. They were laughing at
me between jokes because I
happened to amuse them
because I was so nervous. So
I told myself that at least they
were laughing. My next job
was to get them laughing for
the right reasons. It was a
slow process. Every day for
two years I asked myself what
a joke was. Finally I began to
Rita Rudner: Electronic comic.
get my own meanings and
that's really how I learned."
But don't ask Ms. Rudner to
explain her success. "I can't,"
she claims. "It's like asking a
doctor how to do an operation.
He can't either because there
are lots of different ways to do
it, depending on the patient
and the circumstances. It's
the same way with comedy.
There are different styles of
jokes and different ways peo-
ple use them. Actually, a joke
is basically a mini-explosion
in your mind that has to
create a mental image that
produces a shock of laughter
which comes out of your
mouth. That's how scientific
it can be."
But science aside, Ms.
Rudner's delivery on stage is
distinct. She gives the impres-
sion of being so fragile that a
heckler could drive her to
tears. Actually, in her own
quiet and wide-eyed way, her
insights into human behavior
are right on target. Starting
with a base of solid jokes that
build one upon another, Ms.
Rudner takes each premise to
its fullest, most absurd point.
At the age of 34, this female
Jewish comic has no apparent
ethnic gender or standard
stand-up comedy routine.
There's no theme to her
shows, no obvious structure,
no schtick of any kind, except
maybe, the absence of schtick.
Until her marriage two
years ago to writer-producer
Martin Bergman, some of Ms.
Rudner's observations focus-
ed on the single life. Thday
she prefers to talk about mar-
riage, the prospect of having
babies, decorating a home or
in-laws. But she could just as
easily concentrate her atten-
tion on house-training a dog
or the latest in high tech
equipment.
For example, Ms. Rudner
might explain why men with
pierced ears are best prepared
for marriage: "They've felt
pain and they've bought
jewelry!"
On the wonders of modern-
day technology, she says, "I
won't buy a CD player until
they put in writing that they
won't invent anything else!"
And on the subject of
motherhood, Ms. Rudner ad-
mits she's scared: "My friend
was in labor for 36 hours. I
don't even want to do
anything that feels good for
36 hours!"
Today, Ms. Rudner spends
less time on the road and
more time in her Beverly
Hills home with Mr. Bergman
working on new material.
The couple will have two new
films coming out soon. The
first, Medium Rare, is about
a woman who can talk to the
dead. The second, titled The
Mistake, is about a woman
who marries a man on death
row, thinking he will die in a
few days. Unfortunately, he is
set free and comes to live with
her.
Ms. Rudner's new HBO
comedy special is also due out
in December. ❑