Madison Comic Antoine McNeail Shoots for the National Stage: Humor Deeply Rooted in Humanity (Part 1 of 2)
(Above): Antoine McNeail performs at the Laugh Factory in Los Angeles (Below): Antoine McNeail at the Urban League of Greater Madison offices
by Jonathan Gramling
When I interviewed Antoine McNeail, a Madison-honed comic, at the Urban League offices, it seemed like a straight-up interview, but it always felt that comedy lurked just beneath the surface, like there was some instantaneous combustion of laughter ready to explode.
When MvNeail was growing up in the inner-city of Milwaukee, it was family comes first, even in the world of laughter.
“I came to comedy because I think I have a very funny family,” McNeail said. “I was in the inner-city of Milwaukee. And so, I had to learn how to roast and stick up for myself. I had older brothers and older cousins. We had to be funny. We used to play a game called, ‘Make Me Laugh.’ My brother, cousin and I, our job was not to laugh when someone else performed. And so we had to make people laugh in order to get our turn.”
And perhaps the laughter was a coping mechanism for some very challenging times.
“I’ve been around a lot of different things that may have been challenging to my upbringing,” McNeail said. “But it helps me be a better adult. From being in that environment, I had my first job when I was 15-years-old. I found out when I was 14-years-old that my son was on the way and at 15, I had my first son and got my first job. I started doing extra activities to make sure he was provided for. I got a job at the Boys & Girls Club. That was one of my first on-the-script jobs. I had been doing jobs in my brother’s name just to work. I used to work for my dad who owned a limousine business in Milwaukee for the greater part of 20 years. It was called McNeail’s Limousine Service. It was one of the largest limo fleets in the Midwest. We work on those cars, wash cars. That’s what I was doing when I was younger.”
It’s not difficult to see McNeail as the proverbial clas clown. His material wasn’t a made-up story. His humor drew from the world around him.
“I was always unofficially testing material everywhere and it wasn’t always well-received,” McNeail said. “I’ll give you an example. I was really good with mimicking teachers. In hindsight, it was terrible because they didn’t want to be mimicked. But the kids loved it. And the same thing went with coaches. I played basketball. Coaches hated me mimicking them. But all of the players would die laughing. I did it all during my junior year in high school. I was always mimicking coaches, teachers and parents. I was pretty good with finding a rhythmic cadence of people and also roasting people.”
McNeail’s comedy may have made him popular, but it sometimes got in the way of his life.
“I mimicked so many coaches that I can call people now from high school who haven’t seen me for 15-20 years and they would probably think I’m that coach and bust out laughing,” McNeail said. “Principals, they wanted to take me out of class and called it horseplay. What’s horseplay? They couldn’t describe exactly what I was doing. A teacher kicked me out of advanced algebra for mimicking a teacher. He tried to tell a joke about me and I told a joke about him. My joke went a lot better. And he was like, ‘Get out in the hallway.’ I went out into the hallway and he was like, ‘You’re no longer in this class anymore.’ And I couldn’t take advanced algebra that I needed in order to go to college. I went to UW-Madison in political science.”
It got in the way of work sometimes as well.
“I went through that at work,” McNeail said. “I was working at Dean Health Center for a while. And my co-worker and I would joke and laugh a lot. And I had him laughing a lot. So they were like, ‘He can’t sit next to you.’ And I’m like, ‘I’m 37-years-old. Why are you giving
me assigned seats like a kid?’ And I didn’t start comedy until I was 33-years-old. I guess you would call it a late start. But I had a lot of good life experiences. I would be at the job being able to mimic the supervisor or head boss. And people would come pass and I would just do a look or a wink and they would just be dying laughing. They would say, ‘You should do comedy.’”
McNeail decided to take them up on their suggestion. He went to the open mic at the Madison Comedy Club.
“I went to the Comedy Club on State Street and watched the Open Mic for 2-3 weeks,” McNeail said. “And I was like, ‘You just have to do it.’ From there, I started doing comedy in 2014. And then they had this thing, ‘Madison’s Funniest Comedy Competition.’ I was like, ‘I’m going to win.’ From there, I learned it was people who had a lot of different material and different experiences. There was politics. ‘How many people can you get to come and see you. Do you have new material?’ I entered the competition and although I didn’t win, I got a lot of experience and it gave me a lot of motivation to keep coming back on Wednesdays. That was my sanctuary. That was where I worked out most of my material, like three minute sets for a long time. And I still go there every Wednesday when possible.”
While McNeail’s comedy is often about people — and himself — he is conscious about the power of words and doesn’t use them at the expense of other people.
“Nowadays, I look at roasting as a form of bullying, so I don’t really roast people, even when people in the audience really deserve it,” McNeail confided. “There’s always a heckler somewhere, sometime. And I will typically give them about three warnings. And then I suggest they kick them out. The average comedian will come in and say, ‘Look at those shoes. What about that hat.’ I don’t get into that. I call that low-hanging fruit. In my mind, it’s like being a boxer. Boxers shouldn’t see people who aren’t trained and say, ‘Hey do you want to box?’ Because I have a trained knack for being funny and comical, I don’t want to use my gift for bad. I want to use my gift for good. I’m not here to put people down. If you were at the show, I wouldn’t go, ‘Hey white guy.” People do that. When I’m at a show, I don’t want someone going, ‘Hey Black guy.’ My thing is tell your story. What are you there for? So I will go up in LA and I will talk about me and my stomach and the way I look. I’m not going to fly to LA to do a three-minute set to go find someone in a crowd. Why would I fly or drive hours to go talk about people who pay to come see the show?”
For McNeail, comedy isn’t a profession or a gig. It’s a way of life.
“You don’t think of it as comedy,” McNeail said. “You are going to different places. Most people are trying to make you laugh. Or you are trying to make someone laugh even if you’re at the grocery store or with family and friends. It could be on the elevator and you can get a little chuckle. I’ll go on the elevator and it gets to be so quiet. And I’ll just ask the question, ‘Why is it always so quiet in here? What’s your name?’ I’ll wait until the silence is there. And I will say something odd or awkward. I love just kind of catching people off-guard, saying something very randomly. “What kind of cologne do you have on? “Oh, it’s some WD-40 and gravel. I like smelling like a working man.” I could just answer the question, but it makes me feel better. “What do you want for lunch?” “Maybe some deep-fried oatmeal.” “Deep-fried oatmeal?’ “Have you ever had that? It’s typically on the hidden menu.” I’ve had people at McDonald’s and I hear people, ‘Do you have deep-fried oatmeal.” And I’m just busting up. I just like messing with people because it gives me a joy.”