He is young; he is funny; and he has his timing right — a perfect mix for a standup comedian. In fact, his timing is so perfect that he did his first solo standup show in December last year at the age of 21 just to become popular as the youngest standup comedian in Chennai. He nailed it, of course. Following which, he uploaded a video on YouTube that went viral. We recommend you watch the video to know why (it’s titled Pooja).
Today, with more than 32,000 followers on Instagram, Nesan David is a sought after comedian. And this Sunday, he is bringing the audience his fun-filled comic set titled Bad Decisions. “It’s a story about dating and breakups. I will be telling the audience how I broke up with someone, and then how I hated being single; and then how I got into another relationship through a dating app; the problems I faced with the dating app; and how I got back to being single again. Then comes a twist, which I don’t want to reveal,” says Nesan, who also does not want to confirm if Bad Decisions is his personal story. “I want the audience to keep guessing. That’s the thing about standup comedy — you will never know when I’m telling you the truth, and when I’m not,” he adds.
Another interesting aspect about Nesan is that he is a musical comedian, which means he sings and plays the guitar as a part of his performance. “I’m actually one of the very few musical comedians,” he says.
Nesan tells us that the idea of a comic set about new-age dating came to him after his first open mic show in Bengaluru where he was given the topic ‘Bumble’. “I thought that I cannot really write about Bumble if I don’t have the experience. So I installed the dating app to get my content. That’s how it started.”
It was about four years ago when Nesan, at 18, decided to take up standup comedy. But he isn’t a full-time comedian. “I just finished college. I studied BA Psychology; then for my PG, I did Public Administration. I started with open mics, and today, I am the youngest comedian in Chennai to do a tour in South India.”
We ask him what has made him connect with the audience for him to gain a huge fanbase, and he humbly replies, “Around three to four months back, I had only 2,000 followers on Instagram. Then I started posting the videos from my shows — around five or six videos which didn’t really get a good reach. But after that, there was one specific video called Pooja where I joked about a girl named Pooja. There was never a Pooja in my life by the way, but according to the story, there is someone called Pooja. And this is the first video of mine that went viral. It hit almost 2 million views!” he shares excitedly.
We prod him to tell us what Pooja is about, and after he does, he says “I will give you two minutes to process that!” Watch it on his account to know why he said what he said.
“Some people also found it controversial, because of the name Pooja,” he adds. And herein lies the irony of comedy. The video that made Nesan popular also invited trouble for him. But he has moved on. “My followers who saw that viral video, also saw my other comedy videos, and they realised that I am just a standup comedian. And then some of my other videos also started getting viral, like the one about being a fan of RCB and how it is the benchmark of loyalty. That hit almost 4 million views on Instagram.”
Nesan has a very organic way of approaching jokes. “I pick up jokes as and when something strikes me. And then I make my notes and improvise a little. Mine is mostly just observational comedy,” Nesan says, who also shares that his goal is to do international shows. However, he believes it’s too early for him to think of taking up standup comedy full-time because “it’s kind of a very risky field for you to just jump into full time. It’s not about the followers; I’m just not ready to take that leap of faith and jump into standup comedy full time yet. Maybe in the future, if I get more viral and believe that people would come and watch me, then I would definitely go for it,” he says, signing off.
Rs 399.Tickets available online.
August 6. 4 pm onwards.
At Medai — The Stage, Alwarpet.
rupam@newindianexpress.com
@rupsjain