The Rise of Crowd Work Comedy Clips on Social Media
Brandon Potter cracked 'em up at the Laugh & Wine "Gayliens" Comedy Show.
If you’re a comedy fan and love to watch comedy clips on Instagram or TikTok, you might have noticed that the majority of the clips, especially the viral ones, are comedians doing crowd work.
This is a trend that popped off and seems to have stuck, the longer the video social media platforms have been around. It’s likely here to stay for a bit more.
So why are you seeing all the comedians posting crowd work clips?
The Algorithm Likes Crowd Work Clips
Not every comedian is posting crowd work clips, but you’re probably seeing a lot of them because the algorithm does push those clips further than regular jokes. They are more likely to go “viral” and have a greater reach on the platforms.
Crowd work tends to perform better on social media platforms than core jokes from a comedian’s set for a few reasons.
1. Social media has a short attention span.
That means clips have to have a good hook in the first 3 seconds to keep most viewers on the video. Crowd work clips tend to rope people in faster because the “setup” to the joke is an outburst from the crowd or the comedian asking someone a question.
Things like this get the attention of your “lizard brain” quicker and are more likely to hold attention, so you’re less likely to keep scrolling. That tells the algorithm that you and others like this clip, so it pushes it further out to more people.
2. Some jokes require more context to fully appreciate the punchline.
Speaking from my own experience, I craft my comedy sets, even if they’re only 8 minutes, to be a story with an arc, to take audiences through a small journey with me. Yes, I have jokes I could pull from the middle of my set for clips, but I know they hit harder in my set than out of context online because I’ve told other jokes to help set the vibe.
3. Some jokes have too long of a setup.
Generally in comedy, good jokes will have laughs every 6-10 seconds. However, some jokes do require a longer setup, typically for a bigger payoff of a strong punchline at the end. Those do great when you have a captive audience at a comedy show, but they perform poorly on social media if there is not a good hook in the first 3 seconds.
This is just the way of the world these days. People will scroll on if they aren’t entertained quickly. That does not necessarily mean the joke is bad; it’s just not right for social media.
4. Crowd work tends to get better engagement on social media.
Algorithms push reels and TikToks further if they have a lot of likes and comments. Crowd work, just by nature or what it is, tends to encourage commenting. The more comments, the further the algorithm is likely to push the joke. On the flip side, a solid joke from the core part of a comedian's set might be good and make people laugh, but they may be less inclined to comment on it.
These reasons, and others, have also led comedians to feel pressured to post more crowd work clips.
Comedians Prefer to Post Crowd Work Because It’s Unique to Their Set
Most comedians will readily tell you that they post crowd work clips or want to post crowd work clips because they don’t want to post their core jokes from their regular set. Sometimes, if a comedian doesn’t do a lot of crowd work, this will keep them from posting much on social media at all.
Comedians Don’t Want to Give Away the Good Stuff
Comics work hard to craft their jokes and their sets for comedy shows. Many feel that posting their jokes online devalues them in certain ways, so they prefer not to.
Comedians Worry It’ll Ruin Their Live Performance
Most comedians worry at least a little bit that people will get tired of their jokes. A lot of the thrill and success of a joke is reliant on an element of surprise. Jokes generally work because you don’t see the punchline coming. It’s a twist that gets you.
By posting their core jokes on social media, comedians worry that people won’t feel the need to see them live or that they won’t laugh because they’ve already heard the joke.
We all know this isn’t 100% true. I’ve watched Mike Birbiglia’s “My Girlfriend’s Boyfriend” more times than I can count, and I still bust up when he’s “scramblin’”. I also have always loved watching Jordan Jensen’s clips online, and she’s posted some core jokes. When I saw her do them live, that didn’t stop me from making a fool of myself by crying heavily from laughing so hard.
Sometimes, if a joke is good enough, it’ll hit no matter what. People love to hear the classics.
But still, there’s something to it. Keeping some core jokes as a hard hitting surprise for a live show just makes sense.
Crowd Work Takes Practice
A lot of crowd work is actually prepared for. It's not as "spur-of-the-moment" as it might appear. A lot of times, the jokes that comedians seem to effortlessly fire off are something they've already prepared in their head.
I don't mean to pull back the curtain on this, but it's not that comedians are just born different and that's why they can pull off crowd work. Good crowd work comedians have practiced their crowd work over and over again, sometimes with the exact same jokes they seem to be "coming up with" in that moment.
A common way to prepare for crowd work is to set it up. A comedian may have a joke about being a dad that's fairly versatile, so they might ask the crowd if there are any dads in the audience. Based on the response, they can use and shape their dad joke to fit what the audience says.
Here's an Instagram Reel where I was able to roll with someone in the audience shouting something because I had a line ready in my head. I was in the process of setting up my tiny joke by saying it was my birthday when someone shouted, "What'd you get for your birthday?" Thanks to my brain injury (more on this later), I didn't answer his question directly because the only thing my brain registered was, "birthday". But I was already prepared to talk about what I had for dinner for my birthday. The crowd doesn't know that that was what I was setting up for, so it looks like I'm responding to what he shouted.
It's admittedly not outstanding crowd work, but just a little illustration of how some "crowd work" works if it's prepared for.
Social Media Has Reshaped Comedy A Bit
This trend has pressured more and more comedians to try out crowd work. They feel the need to do it, to be able to preserve their core jokes, as well as fit in with what the algorithm is looking for.
Is that a good thing? Maybe, maybe not. Crowd work is fun, but not all comedians’ style requires it. There are many comedians that do better at telling stories or roping you in with rhythmic one liners that would otherwise be interrupted by crowd work.
Additionally, crowd work has reshaped how comedy audiences behave. I’ve seen this happen more and more over the years. After many comedy fans have watched so many crowd work clips on TikTok or Instagram, they now are conditioned to think it’s okay to talk during comedy shows.
Don’t Talk During Shows Unless You’re Spoken To
Going to just put this out there as a hard and fast rule for comedy audiences. If the comedian isn’t talking directly to you or asking for audience participation, please do not talk, for the enjoyment of those around you and to allow the comedian to perform their set that they've worked hard on.
Not every comedian is going to have a sharp or witty comeback to a heckle, and that’s okay. Stand-up comedy comes in a lot of different flavors, and some comedians don’t work that way.
Crowd Work Isn't For Everyone. I Don't Do Crowd Work
I’ll share my own situation as an anecdote. I was hit by a truck in 2024 and suffered a Traumatic Brain Injury. I’ve recovered for the most part, and I do talk about it during my set, but I have one key symptom that has lingered since the accident: a language processing disorder.
What this means is when there is a lot of stimulation (ie. lights, sounds, stress, people staring at me…), my brain stops processing language that I hear in real time. There is a delay, maybe a half second, maybe a few seconds. So for example, when people laugh at my jokes, my brain might not register that they laughed for a few seconds. I compensate for this when I’m on stage by deliberately planning in pauses for laughs (which is good practice anyways).
What this also means, though, is if someone in the crowd shouts something out, there is a really good chance my brain does not register what they said for a few seconds, and by then, I might have already moved on to my next joke. If they continue talking, it’s a lot like how when you run too many programs on a computer, it starts lagging. My brain will do the same.
So I purposely do not ask questions or invite people to talk during my sets because I know I won’t be able to respond. For that and similar reasons, it’s polite, as an audience, to not talk so that I and other comedians can perform our sets.
It’s Rude to Talk When Others Are Talking
We learned this in kindergarten, right? The comedian’s holding the “talking stick” so they talk now. It’ll provide a better experience for the audience as a whole if people in the crowd are not talking.
No one likes their own experience ruined because two people next to them won’t stop gossiping about how their friend is marrying that guy with the bad toupe. That’s not what the other audience members came to the show for.
Crowd Work Is Its Own Beast
It's not a requirement of all comedians if they want to do stand-up, but it's definitely a part of comedy that has become more prominent in recent years. So hopefully this article will give you more appreciation for the crowd work clips you see, as well as a better understanding as to why it "seems" more popular as of late.
