This is why so much poop is produced and why delusional people will swim against shit creek’s current. People are not asking for great anything.
General audiences are asking for…
- incomplete
- uneducated
- familiar
- comfortable
- average
- egocentric
- off-base
The customer’s always right & wrong
They are absolutely right from their perspective
The most impactful advice I got from Frank Olivier is “There’s no such thing as a bad crowd.” This has carried me through. It helped me understand that entertainment has an objective goal of entertain no matter what. This has helped me listen to audiences and understand that the thing I had planned might not work out.
The listening must include listening to their perspective. This is the part where your audience is wrong — I hope. I hope your perspective on entertainment is way different from your audience. You are a pro. You’re an expert. That’s your job.
When I go to the doctor with a broken nose, I want the pain to stop immediately. The doctor knows that there’s more to it than current pain. Gotta set the nose back in place first — which adds more pain. The pain killers that can take my comfort to 100% might be addictive or bad for my overall health, so the doctor recommends an over-the-counter remedy.
If your audience can choose what to do, it will be the most boring thing possible that they do every day. That’s why they come to you, Dr Feelgood.
Get Delusional
I like Oxford’s definition of “delusion”
| An idiosyncratic belief or impression that is firmly maintained despite being contradicted by what is generally accepted as reality or rational argument, typically a symptom of mental disorder. |
I wrote more about how to stick to your voice earlier. We as entertainers need to take a strong position that is not popular, defend it, and lead our audience to receive it.
Shift Creek
We can help people shift their perspective a little bit, but we will never bring them completely into our perspective. The doctor rebreaking my nose doesn’t have to explain to me all the literature and broken noses they’ve seen. I trust them and am open to being lead. Bringing audiences to the good stuff is a combination of clarification and leadership.
It’s hard
There are a bunch of difficult pieces to taking care of an audience the right way. You don’t have to do it. You can chicken out. You can go into reality. The hard pieces are…
- getting more educated in showbiz
- forming a new perspective that is delusional
- testing that perspective
- defending that perspective
- taking responsibility for an audience’s experience
- hearing criticism for not doing it the normal way
- becoming a more persuasive leader