Jami Gong is the founder of TakeOut Comedy Club, the premier stand-up comedy venue in Hong Kong if not Asia, open since early 2007. In this video he talks about why he decided to take the leap and launch the club, and the cultural difficulties of performing stand-up in Asia.
Check out the video below:
Gong’s explains his theory on why stand-up comedy has yet to take over China: “Chinese people, they’re so obedient. They’re bred and educated to follow rules. That’s why it’s also hard to get Chinese comedians. [… ] Once they fail, they’ve lost face, they don’t come back, they’re so embarrassed. They’re taught not to fail.”
We also talk to Vivek Mahbubani, the first-ever winner of both the Cantonese and English categories for the Hong Kong Comedy Competition. Mahbubani is a hilarious comedian from Hong Kong of Indian descent, and his comedy is inspired by his identity, a mixture of Hong Kong, Indian and gweilo culture. You can imagine the comical situations he gets into as a Cantonese-speaking brown guy in Hong Kong…
Take Out Comedy Club has weekly open mics on Tuesdays with weekly shows on Thursday, Friday and Saturday. All shows are in English.
Don’t miss the 8th Annual HK International Comedy Festival, running from September 4th to October 5th. More details here.
Takeout Comedy: 34 Elgin Street, Soho, Central, 6220 4436.
