Joke from Tony Hinchcliffe apparently bombed when he told it on Saturday night, a day before New York rally
The podcaster who provoked an angry backlash against Donald Trump’s campaign with a racist joke about Puerto Rico reportedly tested out the gags at a comedy club the night before delivering them at Sunday’s televised rally at Madison Square Garden.
Tony Hinchcliffe, whose 11-minute set has thrown Trump’s team into damage limitation mode a week before the presidential election, made the same quip, calling the territory “a floating island of garbage”, at the Stand club in New York on Saturday, according to NBC.
The joke bombed, drawing just a few awkward chuckles, NBC said, citing one of its own producers and three audience members.
I am absolutely not defending this racist’s jokes, so please do not think I am.
I am just going to explain why he still did the joke because I used to do stand-up (nowhere near at this high a level).
Sometimes, you are just convinced a joke is funny. You are absolutely convinced. Nothing will tell you it isn’t funny. The audience isn’t laughing? You told it wrong. Something was off. You have to tell it again because of course it’s funny. It makes you laugh every time you think of it. So you have to try again. And you can get stuck in that loop very easily.