It’s probably normal, Nina Oyama thinks, for funny people to also be a bit sad. Take, for instance, her own path into comedy. As a depressed teenager who had figured out that acting up in class could earn her laughs and attention, she enrolled in an open mic course and started doing standup aged 17.
“When you’re a sad little loser teenager and you get on stage and everyone has to watch, even if you bomb, for five minutes, you have everyone’s full attention,” she reflects. “And by everyone, I mean, like, 12 people at some shitty basement. I wasn’t playing good rooms … but it feels pretty good. I think I just got hooked on that feeling.”
