Godrej Properties and Bulchee Comedia dell Arte present PMS featuring Neeti Palta, Maheep Singh and Kenneth Sebastian) in two nights of stand up comedy of which Bangalore based Kenneth Sebastian has been a part of the comedy community or over two years. His journey began at a stand up competition at Mood Indigo, the fest at IIT Mumbai. When he won it, he then tracked down the Polished Bottoms and Sanjay Manaktala invited him to participate in open mic events. “I like making people have a good time, I like to see them enjoying themselves,” says the 22-year-old. “Of course I have had bad shows; there have been times when there were two people in the audience. And then there was a time when I made a joke about religion and offended a woman in the audience. I said, ‘No, aunty not like that’.” He says he added insult to injury by calling her aunty. “I have had good shows also, but it is the bad shows that make you grow as a performer,” says Kenneth.
Kenneth’s interests include theatre, film making and music and his stand up is an amalgam, “I adopt the film approach where I tell a story that could be about a man and woman or a dog who goes to a job interview. The humour is more observational with very few punch lines.” In his day job Kenneth freelances as a film maker and graphic designer. Stand-up is merely a hobby. “If you are really serious about it there is immense scope and if you start early you can get through all your bad shows much quicker,” he laughs. Kenneth is now hoping to include stand up as a source of income.
Comedy is a natural reaction for Kenneth who also does a lot of improvisational comedy, “Improv I do on the spot, it’s a spontaneous reaction to situations and that comes to me more naturally than stand up. In stand up I have to write my jokes and perform them, they need to be clever and intelligent and demand a lot of work,” says Kenneth. “Oh! I also do guitar stand up... music, humour... improv music… Well I basically make music on the spot and all the heckles I get are converted into a song that I make and sing on the spot.”
The comic is very excited about the show and says that he is looking forward to performing with Maheep Singh who he claims to have fallen in love with on first sight, “I have never met him but have been looking forward to doing a show with him.” And to the audience he says, “Be nice, laugh and don’t heckle a young boy.”
PMS will be hosted on March 15 at The Park Hotel, MG Road and on March 16 at Alila Hotel and Residence, Whitefield. For tickets log on to www.bookmyshow.com or www.buzzintown.com. Call 9845034406.
