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My New Favorite Thing:
Mike Dobbins

by Charles Star | Issue #24

Nobody who knows a comedian (or has seen Comedian) has any illusions that there is something romantic about trying to make people laugh for a living. Surviving as a comic means two things: meeting a lot of bitter people and seeing a lot of bad comedy. Many of the former produce much of the latter, which is a special breed of sad. It isn't all bad, though. As a comic myself, I see my share of excellent performers, and sometimes--rarely--I get to see someone so revolutionary that I am forced to reconsider whether what I am doing is even worth the effort. Mike Dobbins is one of those people.

Each of Dobbin's performances is a highly charged expression of an id without reins. He sells each bit with passion, whether stepping into the audience to heckle himself, adopting a Rastaman accent to imitate his Jamaican roommates, or going down on all fours to play a beat-boxing pig. His style makes it all seem so improvisational--no sane person would script these spasms of mayhem--that when he checks his set list in between scenes, the audience goes wild.

Dobbins moved from Daytona Beach to Flatbush, where he lives with a West Indian family. The ring of truth in his crazy stories--told without a hint of condescension--washes away the guilt of listening to his horrible Jamaican accent. To convert one of his bits to text would rob it of its power. When he really lets loose, audiences howl and comics are rapt. But don't take my word for it; go see him yourself: mikedobbinscomedy.com.