If you’re a comedian in LA, there are several subjects that have become completely generic. Some are okay if you need to pass a few minutes while waiting for a conference call, but if you actually want to say something important, try digging a little deeper. Here are five tired topics.
1. The traffic. Everyone has to get around somehow, so there’s a ton of people noticing the same things you are when you’re driving. Yes, the traffic in LA is as terrible as the subway in New York City is smelly. People drive like maniacs, there’s so much construction and the 405 is the worst! These topics are so hacky that I feel hacky talking about how hacky they are.
2. Hipsters suck. There are few things more ridiculous than a grown adult with a mustache and a unicycle who wants to be taken seriously. But hipsters are also the foot-soldiers of the middle class. Hipsters go into neighborhoods that were terrible and then transform them into places with cafes and art galleries and apartments that aren’t so murdery. What they did to Silverlake and Culver City, they will eventually do to East LA and Compton. Okay, maybe not either of those places, but you get my point. If you think hipsters suck, you don’t remember what Echo Park and Hollywood used to look like.
3. Everyone is gluten-free. I know that some people go overboard, but mocking everyone that cuts out gluten includes the people who need to. Cutting out gluten is trendy, but there’s science behind why it works for some people. You know what’s also trendy? Mocking people who cut out gluten without researching it at all. Remember how everyone used to think that eating half a pig was a healthy way to start the day? Sometimes we learn stuff.
4. Tinder. Yes, technology is amazing. Before Tinder, it was Facebook and MySpace and cell phones and car phones and house phones and electricity. "What’s with these kids today and their telegrams?" When a piece of technology first comes out, it’s amazing to talk about. But if it then becomes so popular that morning news anchors know what it is, it's time to move on.
5. Rent. It’s expensive to live here because it's worth it to live here. You know what $1,000 a month could get you in Kansas? An address in Kansas. Real estate is the epitome of a supply and demand market place. And I will happily pay a surcharge to live in a place where people pronounce the word “epitome” correctly, and where there’s more to discuss than these five things.
On that note, remember that time we had some comedians describe Downtown Los Angeles in 5 words or less?