Ask stand-up comedian Sharul Channa how she wants to be remembered and she immediately responds that she wants to pave the way for more women to join the comedy scene. This stems from the fact that she had to work extra hard to prove herself in a male-dominated field.
She recalled not being able to get show slots in the early years of her career, or was bumped off after she was booked to perform.
“I knew my rights so I was a difficult person sometimes,” she said. “I would ask the promoter why I wasn’t getting spots or why I was bumped.
“We were dealing with promoters who were very masculine, in a scene that was booming – and I was the only woman. There were a lot of male egos to please, which I was not willing to do.
“I’ve had drunk texts from a promoter and there was an open mic-er who sexually harassed me by grabbing me from the back and told me to leave my then-boyfriend,” she added. “But I also had male comedians who were very protective of me – when they found out, they told him to back off.”
Comedy wasn’t in Channa’s plans when she graduated with a diploma in performance arts (acting) from LASALLE College of the Arts in 2006.
She moved to India to try out for television and theatre roles because “at that time, there were very few roles for women of colour in Singapore”. After three months, she realised it wasn’t the right time and returned to Singapore.
Comedian Rishi Budhrani, her boyfriend at the time, whom she married, had just started doing open mic nights. Often held at bars or comedy clubs, open mic nights allow audience members to do a short set on stage, regardless of whether they are amateurs or professionals.
It was during one of his performances that Channa stumbled upon her future career path.
“The owner of the club told me no women in Singapore were doing comedy and they needed some female energy,” she told CNA Women. “He asked if I could get on stage and do a three-minute set. So I did it and people were laughing and I thought, wow, this is really liberating.
“The next time I didn’t do well, so I thought there has to be a skill behind this, I can’t just rock up and do the same thing,” she added. “So I started writing jokes. That was 14 years ago.”
Channa joked that her comedic heroes – Louis CK, Bill Cosby, Jerry Seinfeld – have all been “cancelled”. She is also a huge fan of local comedy legend Kumar and Malaysian comedian and actor Ronnie Chieng.
In fact, Kumar was instrumental in giving her a break when she was a struggling new comedian.
“I met Kumar outside a club during his performance break and said, ‘Hi, I’m a female comedian and I would love to get a spot. If you’re ever looking for an opening act, please let me know,” she recalled.
“He said yes and that really helped me. I still do opening slots for him because we’re friends now. We bounce jokes off each other.”
The middle of three girls, Channa described herself as “an awkward child” who enjoyed making her family laugh by imitating her relatives.
The 38-year-old admitted she didn’t grow up with “typical gender roles”. Her mother is a teacher and her father is a chef at culinary school Palate Sensations.
Her dad cooked meals for the family during his breaks while her mother was in school, so Channa grew up seeing household chores being shared between both parents. The siblings didn’t understand gender roles until they stepped out to work, she said.
Although her parents are very supportive of her career, she had to explain to them that being in the limelight meant she would be exposed to constant opinions: “I told them, people are going to say a lot of things. You have to make peace with the fact that my profession comes with its fair share of not only accolades but also brickbats.”
Channa said she is the only full-time female stand-up comedian in Singapore and feels “very lucky” to be able to do this as a career.
“You aim to turn something you’re really passionate about into your career, especially when it’s in the arts,” she said. “It was really hard work in the first five years or so, to prove myself as a female artiste – and that too an Indian in Singapore. It was an uphill task to prove that women are funny.”
Channa didn’t grow up with “typical gender roles” and warned her parents that being in the limelight meant she would be exposed to constant opinions. (Photo: Sharul Channa)
Channa said that, as a female performer, audiences judge you “on everything”, such as what you’re wearing on stage and whether you’re being very sexual.
It took her time to realise that, if you’re a good comedy writer, your gender – or your race – won’t matter anymore.
“After doing stand-up comedy for six or seven years, I realised that audiences will be with you as long as you hone your craft,” she said. “I am my race but that’s not my card. I am my gender but that’s not my card. I have to be a good writer.”
Channa draws from her daily life as well as the news for her material. She enjoys observing people in cafes, for example, and strives to find the joke in topical issues – “what do you find absurd about this?”. When she does female-centric jokes, she keeps them personal.
“I can only speak about things I’ve experienced so I can’t do pregnancy jokes but I can talk about how I don’t want to have kids. And eventually when I hit menopause, I’ll talk about menopause too,” she laughed.
While she has a successful career of her own, Channa sometimes does shows with her husband Budhrani, such as one coming up at Esplanade – their third joint show in Singapore.
They perform separate sets and go on stage together at the end to take audience questions, which include how they deal with cracking jokes about each other’s family members and whether they get offended.
Even though they are in the same industry, she said that there’s no rivalry in their marriage as they’re not vying for the same audience.
“Very early on, we made peace with the fact that we are two different fruits in the same aisle,” she said.
“If Rishi is a mango, I’m a durian. People are going to eat us in different ways. He’s very good at doing a very clean corporate set and while I can do clean jokes, I’m not that person who’s a hundred per cent clean.”
Channa’s material is more than just dirty jokes, though. She has written shows with serious messages, such as two for the Association of Women for Action and Research (AWARE). Crazy Poor Sita (2019) was a one-woman monologue about people below the poverty line and the process they have to go through to do a means test. Am I Old (2020) touched on how women tend to be caregivers to their elderly parents and are often left with little or no funds by the time they are elderly themselves.
She has also amassed an audience outside Singapore – in Malaysia, Indonesia and India – and performed in Australia, South Africa and the Philippines. Channa completed her first north India tour in February and intends to tour Europe in July or August this year, before returning to India for another tour later in the year.
“You can be very comfortable doing shows in Singapore but if you don’t leave, you don’t grow,” she said. “I’m consciously moving my base half in Singapore and half in India, so it’s really completing that dream that I had many years ago but in a different realm.”
What does she think makes her so popular? It’s how her writing is able to strike a chord with audiences, she said.
“I think I make them feel comfortable that they are in a safe space,” she said. “Over the years, I’ve learnt how to break the awkward Singaporean mould faster because they’re scared to laugh so I have to get to them faster.”
Watch Sharul Channa perform in The Rishi & Sharul Show 3, on Mar 21, at Esplanade Concert Hall. Tickets from S$38.
CNA Women is a section on CNA Lifestyle that seeks to inform, empower and inspire the modern woman. If you have women-related news, issues and ideas to share with us, email CNAWomen [at] mediacorp.com.sg.
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She recalled not being able to get show slots in the early years of her career, or was bumped off after she was booked to perform.
“I knew my rights so I was a difficult person sometimes,” she said. “I would ask the promoter why I wasn’t getting spots or why I was bumped.
“We were dealing with promoters who were very masculine, in a scene that was booming – and I was the only woman. There were a lot of male egos to please, which I was not willing to do.
“I’ve had drunk texts from a promoter and there was an open mic-er who sexually harassed me by grabbing me from the back and told me to leave my then-boyfriend,” she added. “But I also had male comedians who were very protective of me – when they found out, they told him to back off.”
Comedy wasn’t in Channa’s plans when she graduated with a diploma in performance arts (acting) from LASALLE College of the Arts in 2006.
She moved to India to try out for television and theatre roles because “at that time, there were very few roles for women of colour in Singapore”. After three months, she realised it wasn’t the right time and returned to Singapore.
Comedian Rishi Budhrani, her boyfriend at the time, whom she married, had just started doing open mic nights. Often held at bars or comedy clubs, open mic nights allow audience members to do a short set on stage, regardless of whether they are amateurs or professionals.
It was during one of his performances that Channa stumbled upon her future career path.
“The owner of the club told me no women in Singapore were doing comedy and they needed some female energy,” she told CNA Women. “He asked if I could get on stage and do a three-minute set. So I did it and people were laughing and I thought, wow, this is really liberating.
“The next time I didn’t do well, so I thought there has to be a skill behind this, I can’t just rock up and do the same thing,” she added. “So I started writing jokes. That was 14 years ago.”
Channa joked that her comedic heroes – Louis CK, Bill Cosby, Jerry Seinfeld – have all been “cancelled”. She is also a huge fan of local comedy legend Kumar and Malaysian comedian and actor Ronnie Chieng.
In fact, Kumar was instrumental in giving her a break when she was a struggling new comedian.
“I met Kumar outside a club during his performance break and said, ‘Hi, I’m a female comedian and I would love to get a spot. If you’re ever looking for an opening act, please let me know,” she recalled.
“He said yes and that really helped me. I still do opening slots for him because we’re friends now. We bounce jokes off each other.”
SINGAPORE’S ONLY FULL-TIME FEMALE STAND-UP COMEDIAN
The middle of three girls, Channa described herself as “an awkward child” who enjoyed making her family laugh by imitating her relatives.
The 38-year-old admitted she didn’t grow up with “typical gender roles”. Her mother is a teacher and her father is a chef at culinary school Palate Sensations.
Her dad cooked meals for the family during his breaks while her mother was in school, so Channa grew up seeing household chores being shared between both parents. The siblings didn’t understand gender roles until they stepped out to work, she said.
Although her parents are very supportive of her career, she had to explain to them that being in the limelight meant she would be exposed to constant opinions: “I told them, people are going to say a lot of things. You have to make peace with the fact that my profession comes with its fair share of not only accolades but also brickbats.”
Channa said she is the only full-time female stand-up comedian in Singapore and feels “very lucky” to be able to do this as a career.
“You aim to turn something you’re really passionate about into your career, especially when it’s in the arts,” she said. “It was really hard work in the first five years or so, to prove myself as a female artiste – and that too an Indian in Singapore. It was an uphill task to prove that women are funny.”
Channa didn’t grow up with “typical gender roles” and warned her parents that being in the limelight meant she would be exposed to constant opinions. (Photo: Sharul Channa)
Channa said that, as a female performer, audiences judge you “on everything”, such as what you’re wearing on stage and whether you’re being very sexual.
It took her time to realise that, if you’re a good comedy writer, your gender – or your race – won’t matter anymore.
“After doing stand-up comedy for six or seven years, I realised that audiences will be with you as long as you hone your craft,” she said. “I am my race but that’s not my card. I am my gender but that’s not my card. I have to be a good writer.”
STRIKING A CHORD WITH AUDIENCES
Channa draws from her daily life as well as the news for her material. She enjoys observing people in cafes, for example, and strives to find the joke in topical issues – “what do you find absurd about this?”. When she does female-centric jokes, she keeps them personal.
“I can only speak about things I’ve experienced so I can’t do pregnancy jokes but I can talk about how I don’t want to have kids. And eventually when I hit menopause, I’ll talk about menopause too,” she laughed.
While she has a successful career of her own, Channa sometimes does shows with her husband Budhrani, such as one coming up at Esplanade – their third joint show in Singapore.
They perform separate sets and go on stage together at the end to take audience questions, which include how they deal with cracking jokes about each other’s family members and whether they get offended.
Even though they are in the same industry, she said that there’s no rivalry in their marriage as they’re not vying for the same audience.
“Very early on, we made peace with the fact that we are two different fruits in the same aisle,” she said.
“If Rishi is a mango, I’m a durian. People are going to eat us in different ways. He’s very good at doing a very clean corporate set and while I can do clean jokes, I’m not that person who’s a hundred per cent clean.”
Channa’s material is more than just dirty jokes, though. She has written shows with serious messages, such as two for the Association of Women for Action and Research (AWARE). Crazy Poor Sita (2019) was a one-woman monologue about people below the poverty line and the process they have to go through to do a means test. Am I Old (2020) touched on how women tend to be caregivers to their elderly parents and are often left with little or no funds by the time they are elderly themselves.
She has also amassed an audience outside Singapore – in Malaysia, Indonesia and India – and performed in Australia, South Africa and the Philippines. Channa completed her first north India tour in February and intends to tour Europe in July or August this year, before returning to India for another tour later in the year.
“You can be very comfortable doing shows in Singapore but if you don’t leave, you don’t grow,” she said. “I’m consciously moving my base half in Singapore and half in India, so it’s really completing that dream that I had many years ago but in a different realm.”
What does she think makes her so popular? It’s how her writing is able to strike a chord with audiences, she said.
“I think I make them feel comfortable that they are in a safe space,” she said. “Over the years, I’ve learnt how to break the awkward Singaporean mould faster because they’re scared to laugh so I have to get to them faster.”
Watch Sharul Channa perform in The Rishi & Sharul Show 3, on Mar 21, at Esplanade Concert Hall. Tickets from S$38.
CNA Women is a section on CNA Lifestyle that seeks to inform, empower and inspire the modern woman. If you have women-related news, issues and ideas to share with us, email CNAWomen [at] mediacorp.com.sg.
Continue reading...