American Assholes is three American comics on one Edinburgh bill. Danielle Slaughter, Lauren LoGiudice and Wayne Charles II share it. The show opens with a trio segment under that title. Then each of them performs an individual standup set. The through-line is identity politics, dissected from three directions. The working premise is that Americans might in fact be the worst.
They did not assemble the show by fitting themselves into a format. They went through each other’s sets first and built outward from there. That took months rather than a rehearsal weekend. LoGiudice trained with Gaulier in France, and spent three years performing as Melania Trump. Charles grew up on Chris Rock, watched beside his father. Slaughter has listened to Eddie Murphy’s Raw perhaps a hundred times. She was listening for the formulas. None of them stay behind the microphone stand. It runs every night at ten past ten.
We caught up with all three to talk about bombing, clown school and Roseanne Barr. We also covered why the title is doing deliberate work at the door.
How three sets become one show
The structure is simple enough to explain in a sentence. The trio segment opens, and then they split into individual sets. What holds it together is a shared preoccupation rather than a format.
One of the things that attracted us to working together was the natural through-line of dissecting identity politics.
— Danielle Slaughter
The other half of that through-line is the show’s premise about Americans. Slaughter says they never tried to fit themselves into a box. They went deep into each other’s sets and let the shape emerge.
It helps that we all actually get along.
— Wayne Charles II
Charles is clear that this took time rather than luck. Months in front of each other, learning the nuances and the quirks. Only then did any of it get applied to a stage.
Three first laughs
Asked about the first laugh, each of them describes a different sensation.
The first laugh was like a cool drug — a high you can’t quite explain, but you know you wanna chase it again and again.
— Wayne Charles II
Slaughter locates hers earlier than the stage. Her point is that the material precedes the performance of it.
The funny is already there — it’s the lens, the way you look at things.
— Danielle Slaughter
LoGiudice remembers a specific room and a specific size.
For me it was being at the first bigger show, more than 20 people in the audience, feeling like bombs going off.
— Lauren LoGiudice
She describes the laugh going on long enough to sit inside. That extra length is the thing she still chases.
The title is not an accident
The obvious question about a show called American Assholes is how carefully they write. Slaughter’s answer is that the question is upside down.
Serving the laugh is the biggest thing. Everything’s in service of the laugh.
— Danielle Slaughter
Being offensive is not something the show is running from. Her argument is practical rather than defiant.
When you dive into the hard stuff, there’s just more funny there.
— Danielle Slaughter
The harder material is where the density is. Avoiding it would cost them jokes.
Taking the room with you
Pushing hard only works if the audience stays. LoGiudice describes that as a distinct skill they have worked on.
We’re really good at taking care of the audience.
— Lauren LoGiudice
The method is to build the world first and bring people into it. Only then do they bring the room to the argument.
We’re after the laugh, but just as important is connecting with people.
— Danielle Slaughter
Those two goals are treated as one goal. The connection is what makes the harder jokes survivable.
How you know you went too far
Every comic gets asked where the line is. Slaughter rejects the framing of the question entirely.
When you lose the audience, you lost.
— Danielle Slaughter
There is no abstract threshold in her account. There is only the room, and whether you still have it.
It’s not about too far — it’s just you f***ed up. You lost the audience.
— Danielle Slaughter
That makes the standard empirical rather than moral. You find out in real time, every night.
Loving the bomb
All three are relaxed about failure, in different registers. Charles treats it as the mechanism of improvement.
The bomb, the failure, is actually what makes you stronger.
— Wayne Charles II
He is honest about the recovery process. You fall, you get up, and sometimes there is bourbon and crying in between.
You’re always a bomb away.
— Lauren LoGiudice
LoGiudice learned the doctrine at Gaulier in France, where loving the bomb is the curriculum. She describes it as improv on steroids, built around embracing failure.
There’s no bomb unless you bomb yourself. If you connect with the audience, you can’t bomb.
— Lauren LoGiudice
Slaughter is less mystical about it and says she has definitely bombed. Her defence is a matter of scheduling.
But the most important set is the next set.
— Danielle Slaughter
A kill and a bomb are equally past tense. There is always another audience waiting.
Openers and headliners
LoGiudice has a theory about where careers stall. It has nothing to do with talent and everything to do with fear.
There are headliners who champion their openers because they know it’ll make them better.
— Lauren LoGiudice
The other kind, she says, plateau. They are worried the act before them will be funnier. On a bill where all three perform, the distinction is not academic.
Clown school, and using the whole stage
LoGiudice credits clown training with removing the barrier to the audience. She is vivid about what that training involved.
There’s nothing like an angry French man sitting with a drum telling you he’d rather kill himself than hear another one of your stupid words.
— Lauren LoGiudice
The result is visible in how the show occupies its room.
We all use the whole stage.
— Wayne Charles II
Charles is specific about the expectation being overturned. Nobody plants their feet behind a mic stand for an hour.
Three years as Melania
The clown school came after a specific and punishing period of work. LoGiudice performed standup in character as Melania Trump.
I did stand-up in character as Melania Trump for three years.
— Lauren LoGiudice
It attracted a steady stream of abuse from strangers. It also left her, by her own assessment, with a lot of bad habits. Clown was how she got out of them.
Rock, Roseanne, and the aunties
Charles goes first, and his answer has not changed since childhood.
That was the first comic I was able to watch with my father.
— Wayne Charles II
He remembers looking right and finding his father genuinely laughing. Rock passed the test, which settled the matter. He notes the cartoonish voice attached to material about race and being a Black man in America.
Slaughter’s first memory is Roseanne Barr doing standup on Late Night.
I loved that she seemed like someone I would be related to.
— Danielle Slaughter
Her family had no money, which made Barr feel reachable. After that came Lily Tomlin, George Carlin and Eddie Murphy. She estimates a hundred listens to Raw, studying the formulas. Chappelle’s Show was an obsession, and her father was a Saturday Night Live man. Currently she rates Jay Jurden as a joke machine, and Bill Burr as impassioned rather than angry.
LoGiudice did not watch comedy growing up, and explains why. Every club visit produced a man on stage making the room feel bad. Racist, homophobic, misogynistic, and to her simply unwatchable.
The people I loved to laugh at were my aunties being crazy, arguing with each other.
— Lauren LoGiudice
The vendettas and the gossip were the funny thing. She came to comedy by performing first and studying comedians afterwards. Maria Bamford is her favourite, alongside Jeanne Achery and Marc Maron.
What the room is actually like
There is crowd interaction, and Slaughter is emphatic about what kind. Nobody will be asked where they are from or what they do for work. She has no interest in that species of crowd work.
It’s like hanging out in the pub.
— Wayne Charles II
Charles is looking forward to testing his perspective abroad. His framing is about scale, and finding out whether he reads as regional, national or international.
LoGiudice has material about the British being arrogant. She has been waiting to deliver it to British faces. Slaughter says her favourite part is watching the other two work.
The intimacy of knowing someone else’s set is really fun for me.
— Danielle Slaughter
Knowing a set that well changes what you notice in it. She says she learns something new every night.
The title is doing deliberate work at the door. People arrive with a fixed idea of what this will be. LoGiudice says they leave having found more common ground than not. That is the actual structure underneath the provocation. Slaughter’s rule is that losing the audience is the only real failure. Everything else is a matter of degree. Charles compares the whole thing to hanging out in a pub. There is crowd interaction, but nobody will ask your job. Three comics, one bill, and a title that dares you. It is on every night, and you can pay what you want.
American Assholes plays Just The Tonic at the Smash House, Bottle Room. It is on every night at 22:10. Entry is pay what you want, or £12 for a secured seat. Find them at @AmericanAssholesComedy.