After more than a decade of interviewing comedians, I have worked out that:
1) They are hardly ever funny in private.
2) When they crack a joke, they are performing, so remember to say thank you.
Every comedian I've met has said that people expect them to be funny on command. They're nudged in the ribs at airports and dinner parties and told "Tell us a joke, then", as if it is something they owe the public, instead of their livelihood.
Offstage, they are often quiet, observant, analytical and sometimes sombre. Being funny requires looking at life with stark honesty.
Many comedians, both local and international, have revealed their struggles with mental health issues, including the late Robin Williams, Ellen DeGeneres, Larry David and Jim Carrey.
The younger generation is no different. In South Africa, Ebenhaezer Dibakwane is a 24-year-old with a millennial's awareness of sexism, homophobia, racism and everything in between. Proving that good comedy often comes from dark places, Dibakwane thinks he did his best comedy while he was homeless.Nobody would have guessed that when he took home a Waldo (the Savanna Comics' Choice award) for newcomer in 2016, Dibakwane was living on the streets.
The story emerged when he appeared on Dancing with the Stars earlier this year. He was voted out first, one of the few slips on an otherwise upward climb in his career.
He finds it hard to explain how, despite a subsidised private school education at the school where his dad taught, and a bursary to study teaching, he ended up homeless. He runs his fingers through his crown of dreads while seeking a good answer.
"At the time I was in a space where I didn't want to justify the choices I had made. I hurt a lot of people and damaged relationships. I'm only able to say this now, but I felt like I needed to prove I could make it without help. Actually, I couldn't."
MATHS WHIZ
Dibakwane was a maths whiz at high school in Mbombela. Both his parents are academics; when Dibakwane snr retired, he started a tutoring centre called Ebenhaezer's Maths and Science Academy, named after his gifted son.
Dibakwane was also a committed Christian, who taught Sunday-school classes, where his ability to entertain came to the fore. "I used humour to entertain the kids. I loved Jim Carrey in The Mask and I did those impressions. I always wanted to make people laugh. To alleviate pain was a gift."After matriculating he joined the evangelical organisations Scripture Union and J-Life, with which he travelled to KwaZulu-Natal for a year of preaching the Christian faith.
"But something happened when I evangelised. My religious views changed dramatically and I started questioning what I was saying. So I went on a journey to seek truth.
"I was reading about other spiritual ideas. I came across new concepts, like Hanuman, the Hindu ape god with superhuman strength. I saw in Chatsworth how devotees climbed bamboo poles while they were entranced. It was a show of spiritual and physical strength and I thought, everything in our own power is in our minds.
"If I am a likeness of God, I shouldn't only look up and pray. I should be an agent of change when I see people in need, instead of praying for them later."
ACADEMIC GOALS
After a year of evangelising, he went to the University of Johannesburg in 2014, but again something fell short of the mark for him.
"I was 20. I tried, I really tried at university. But I had existential problems. Then I lied. I took the year off, I didn't go to lectures. The sad thing is my dad paid the rent and I had a bursary, which is a shame.
"I thought I could live on the streets. For a while I lived on the UJ grounds. I'd wake up and walk to a friend's house and they'd ask if I had eaten and I'd lie that I had, but they knew.
"My parents had no idea. I didn't want to explain that I was running away from responsibilities. I felt as if it was all worthless, futile. I would not even say I was suicidal because if you feel futile it's too much effort to even plan a suicide."
Paradoxically, it was in this darkest of times that Dibakwane's comedic talent began to shine."It's the funniest thing," he says. "I was the funniest when I was homeless. I would sit on a bench and write great stuff and perform every evening. After shows I'd get drinks from friends. The venues close at 2am or 4am, then I'd go to a shelter or sleep outside. I was drinking too much. The drink helped me sleep. I got robbed a lot. I broke a lot of a teeth. I lost everything, but the comedy was great."
How long this could have lasted is debatable, but Dibakwane was rescued by his friend, Palesa.
"She took me in, helped me and fed me. She forced me to be in a space. She believed in me the most."
In his open mic sessions at various comedy clubs, Dibakwane caught the attention of established South African comics Mpho Popps, Nik Rabinowitz, Chris Forrest and Riaad Moosa. They complimented him and some began booking him for gigs. Forrest signed him up to his agency, Pickled Ginger, and he began writing and acting. A big break came when he joined the writing team for Kagiso Lediga's Bantu Hour with Hugh Masekela."In 2014, I said I'd give myself four years to crack it in comedy. By the graces that are, I won the Savanna competition in my second year. But I was still engaging in reckless behaviour. Then other comics started seeing something in me and helped me get my act together. My heroes were enjoying my work. That, combined with the love from my parents, made me realise I was winning, but I was still neglecting the people I wanted to make happy."
He sobered up and started working hard. With this came corporate bookings, which comedians rely on for income.
"When I finally paid rent for the first time, four months in advance, I wept for a week. I stayed in my room and wept. I left to get food and go to the bathroom but otherwise I just cried. I got my own place, from comedy, in two years."
He still finds this hard to believe, even though he has since built on that success. He won the intermediate category at the comics awards in 2017. And with work stability came a return of his early faith."We are not alone. I cannot remove myself from everything I come from. My parents who prayed for me, they helped me arrive here. I worked out that what is important for us as Christians to do, is to use our hands, not only in prayer but as agents of change."
This change, he believes, has a platform in comedy, where he uses incisive humour to tackle sexism and other forms of prejudice. The same ideology underpins the TV shows he has been writing, including one he is busy with on the day we meet at Poppy's, in Melville, one of his regular haunts and an institution for Monday-night improvised comedy.
LYRICS FOR MALEMA
Dibakwane and four mates are throwing around ideas for a TV pilot. They are speculating about how Julius Malema would write a struggle song in different musical genres. Bongani Dube is in stitches as Dibakwane paints a picture of an R&B song, with Jacob Zuma in the cold outside, looking through the window sadly while Malema and Thabo Mbeki feed each other inside.
They brainstorm a character who was abandoned by his father. They work out if he is going to be a feminist or a patriarch, and Dibakwane says: "No, he grew up without his dad so is closer to his mom; he respects women."He explains later that his aim is always to have a woman in a strong lead and a "pride" character, LGBTQ or I, as a way to change the narrative in local TV.
One of his journeys has been to become multilingual. "I was a coconut, I couldn't speak vernac. I had to learn and now I can speak three languages."
This year, he was asked to mentor young comics for the Savanna awards.
"That was great, but it's also weird. It's difficult to coach in comedy, because it is such a personal thing. And we were working in WhatsApp groups. For someone to speak about their pain in a group, it is a little insensitive and violent to do that. Humour and jokes are rooted in pain."
This year Dibakwane has appeared in adverts for burgers and insurance, he has opened for his "heroes", as he calls them, and starred in Lediga's film Catching Feelings. The rest of the year looks equally busy.
Comedy might come from painful places but it also comes from a generosity of spirit. Dibakwane believes in sharing his gift of comedic insight.
"My story is, let's stop being selfish. If you have something, don't hold onto it and be greedy. If we don't do that, we are going nowhere as a country."TWERKING GOGOS
One of Dibakwane's popular stand-up routines is about lascivious gogos in taxis. In a recent stage performance, he said: "I came here by taxi. I don't mind taxis, I'll even collect the money. But haai, my problem is those perverted grannies. You know that gogo, she acts like she wants to pass ... [he demonstrates with a rolling twerk how the gogo bumps her derrière against other passengers]. Those gogos, with the 'Sorry, ntwana yam [my children], sorry' ... we know what you are doing."
His physical comedy is interspersed with topical one-liners like: "I would share a joke about land. But I don't have any."..