The archetype of the tragic clown is well etched into our collective conscious and unconscious. You probably heard of new study from the Australian Catholic University recently that has reinforced this notion by reporting that stand-up comedians do die younger than comedic actors or dramatic actors. This attention grabbing headline was widely reported but what was less emphasised in the reportage, but of greater importance, is why this is so.
Let’s look at the headline study findings first. The study involved retrospective data from 200 stand-up comedians (87 per cent of these were men), 114 comedic actors (82.5 per cent men), and 184 dramatic actors (70.7 per cent men). Subjects were drawn from the top 200 of a crowd-ranking website which ranked how funny these people were regarded as being.
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The results showed that stand up comedians die at an average age of 67.1 years compared to 68.9 years for comedy actors and 70.7 years for dramatic actors. Rates of “premature deaths” among stand-up comedians were 38.9 per cent compared to 27.3 per cent for comedy actors and lastly, 19.6 per cent for dramatic actors. Lastly, non-natural deaths occurred at a rate of 19.4 per cent for stand-up comedians, 9.1 per cent for comedy actors, and 10.7 per cent for dramatic actors.
All in all, stand-up comedy isn’t good for your health but the question is, “why?”
The researchers believe that the answer is multifactorial. Stand-up comedy is low paid and has low job security and even when people become successful, years of having worked under these conditions may have resulted in cumulative stress that has damaged their health. Additionally, dramatic actors are often considered role models and are pressured to maintain respectable behaviour by their management teams. By contrast, comedians are rewarded for crazy and outlandish behaviour. Whereas actors have to get up early to be on set and are in one spot for weeks at a time, stand-up comedians are likely to spend long periods of time travelling from place to place generally working in the evenings in bars and clubs. This lends itself to poor nutrition, disturbed sleep, more drinking, more smoking, and potentially more drugs. On top of all of this stand-up comedians may be more likely to have psychotic traits like manic-depression and schizophrenia.
As the brilliant Steve Martin said, “Comedy is not pretty.”
