Lily Blumkin on how comedy characters and improv were more honest than stand-up

‘That didn’t sound like me at all,’ I thought when the recording finished. I had been listening to the first stand-up set I did in Brooklyn, performed at my friend’s all-queer variety show (a redundant phrase). I could hear the strain in my voice, the desperation to seem cool and detached. In real life, I was the exact opposite: a chronic overthinker, a diligent plan-maker, a woman with clinical anxiety. 

I had been doing stand-up all throughout college and figured I would continue when I moved to New York. But after hearing this recording, something didn’t sit right. Had I always sounded like this?

I scurried back to my new adult apartment and rewatched old videos of my college stand-up sets. There, I saw it again, that same desperation. How had I not noticed this before? I was putting on an act – or struggling to put one on – in which I was the kind of girl I thought people would like: nonchalant, carefree, effortless. I didn’t notice this dissonance in any other performance I did at that time. 

When I watched myself in sketches and plays, it seemed like a further extension of who I was as a person. It was only during stand-up, an art form that’s supposed to be about expressing yourself as honestly as possible, that I completely transformed into someone new.

Part of it was my own fault. I was in my early twenties and constantly seeking approval from the aloof Brooklyn comics surrounding me. But part of it was the style of comedy itself. I would drive myself crazy trying to figure out who exactly I was trying to be on stage. Neurotic? Confident? Crass? Absurdist? Did any of those words even describe who I was? Should they?? I would spiral for hours about what it meant for me to be writing as myself when I didn’t have a clear idea of what my voice was.

So, I decided to take a break from stand-up, and check out a form of comedy I’d always been intrigued by but never had the guts (or foolishness) to try: improv. I signed up for classes at the UCB Comedy Theatre and instantly, I noticed a difference. 

When I was forced to make split-second decisions in a scene, I didn’t have time to worry about how I was coming across or what kind of person I thought I should be. I needed to fully commit to whatever wacky character I was playing or else the entire reality of the scene would collapse. In improv, weirdness was rewarded, and for the first time in comedy, I was forced to get out of my own way and trust my instincts. The more I did that, the easier I found it to get laughs.

Improv was where I rediscovered the joy that drew me to comedy in the first place. It was where I learned that being the funniest version of myself meant not holding back. It meant taking big swings and not overthinking my choices. I wanted to take these lessons back to solo performing, but still, stand-up remained daunting to me. The task of writing about my own life brought back the same uncertainty I felt before. How honest should I be? Is my real life that funny? Do I even have anything interesting to say?

I wanted to find a way to combine the liberated feeling I had when I improvised with my love of solo performance, so I started writing material not as myself, but as entirely new personas. I created Sheila, The Morbid Mom, who guilted her daughter at every opportunity about how little time they spent together. Coach Ricky, the gym teacher who just wanted respect from the other staff members. A Bully Wart, about the wart on my foot who treated me like my high school bully. 

In the voices of these characters, my writing flowed. Since I knew their exact POV and how they would respond to any given situation, I found it much easier to write jokes. I also found opportunities for bits that I wouldn’t have ordinarily thought of if I was writing as myself. I played with my environment more, I leaned into physicality, and my pieces became more scenic.

Interestingly, writing as a slew of different people was what helped me discover my own comedic voice. I wrote the bits that I found funny and discovered just how goofy and ridiculous I could get. I liked to go big, make faux pas, and have lovable idiots say stupid things on purpose. Before writing characters, I didn’t understand why I was uncomfortable performing as myself on stage. It turns out it was because there were many (often unhinged) people struggling for space in my brain.

From that point on, I fell in love with performing characters. I took the entire character curriculum at UCB, then hosted an open mic where I wrote a new character a week. Eventually, I had enough to turn into the hour-long show I’m performing this year at Fringe. 

I took the best of my characters, tweaked and rehearsed them for a year, then debuted a full show to a sold-out crowd in New York this January. This entire process brought me closer to myself than any other creative endeavour, and I can’t wait to see what else I discover about myself this month at Fringe.

Some people assume that character comedy is a crutch, like bowling with the bumpers on. But for me, it taught me everything about who I am as a writer and a performer. Now hopefully, when I look back at recordings of these performances, I won’t have the experience I had in college. I’ll instead be able to watch them and say Yup, that sounds exactly like me.

• Lily Blumkin’s  character comedy hour Nice Try is at the Gilded Balloon Patter House at 5.40pm for the duration of the Edinburgh Fringe.

Published: 12 Aug 2025