Charles Telerant Schools Laugh Factory Owner Jamie Masada - PART 1

Frank Sinatra was well-known for doing benevolent acts of kindness on
the condition that no one would know. The polar opposite was the guy
you see in this video w me, Jamie Masada The owner of The Laugh
Factory in Hollywood who, if he helped an old lady across the street ,
would make sure it was plastered on the cover of the L.A. Times the
next morning (Thanksgiving and Xmas dinners for the homeless, blah
blah blah).Based on a dare of sorts, I started doing stand up comedy
in 1996 In LA, at what was considered to be the premier open mic at
the time, at his club. . After waiting all day since 6.a.m. you would
try and be one of the first 20 people camped out there to get on a
list, and after all manner of arguments and fistfights concerning
people cutting in line, etc (he never bothered to have someone, not
even an intern out there to regulate it) you would get three minutes
with this wretch. Once when I was number 20, an eighty year old
grandmother who had flown in from Denver the night before exclusivly
to do the showcase thought she might get to talk to him because she
had missed the list by one,, but no go. She actually did it again,
months later, only to be told to "come back in three weeks". (She was
actually quite good). I think the last straw for me was when I
Actually did get my showcase and I attempted to talk to him about the
music for my act : he wouldn't look at me , as if I wasn't there. I
couldn't get anyone to run the board, and though I had invited people,
was forced to scrap the entire act I had prepared and did it on the
fly (not too good).
When I found out my friend, acadamy nominated documentary director
Peter Spirer (The Life and Times Of Sally Mann, The Show(w Biggie
Smalls) Resurrection: Tupac Shakur) was making a documentary
depicting this miserable process at this club exclusivly, I rang him
up . Since I had pretty much quit by that time (2000), I had no
aspirations of ever playing there unlike the other comics, I had
nothing to lose., We agreed I would do it and call him on his sh-t on
camera. There were perhaps a dozen or so comics waiting behind me here
in this video. They were the voices you hear laughing in the
background. Basically the drill was you would do your three minute
set, then wait in line for another hour or so, then he would meet
with you for a few minutes or so (nice looking girls got longer
meetings) and he would give you "advice", promise you a showcase that
#1) either never materialized, or #2) if it ever did, he made sure to
make no effort to bar your experience from being so miserable you
would never bug him for a showcase again. So sit back, relax and join
me as we take a foray into the murky underbelly of the reality of what
we know as "Showbiz". This project was never completed as the funding
for it dried up. He actually finally did give me a showcase after this
video (the first Monday after 9/11) so, not too many people in the
club on that day and didn't do anything else after that. Big Ralphie
whateve his name was was doing his act at the time of this interview
.Enjoy