slideshow

slideshow

Like many comedians, Rick Salas plays the self-deprecating social commentator — pacing back and forth on stage between wry observations about pop culture, gender and race.



Like them, he jokes about his weight, his love life and his myriad insecurities. And he heckles the audience, when the timing’s right.



Like his comedic peers, he can come off interchangeably as insightful, blunt or alcoholic.



But, unlike most comedians, Salas wants to keep his act in Tracy — and bring other comics out here, too.



“People complain about how there’s nothing to do in Tracy, but if they’d just show up and support comedy in town, we can start bringing in big names,” he said, adding that he’s eyeing the Grand Theatre stage for some future comedy shows.



The 37-year-old motorcycle salesman first set foot on stage eight years ago. He lasted only a year in the open-mic circuit before his patience ran out and he took to hosting instead.



“There’s this game you have to play to get stage time, and it’s like high school drama all over again,” he said. “I didn’t want to play the game.”



Despite his disdain, he managed to secure stage time at major Northern California venues during his first 12 months, including the San Jose Improv, San Francisco Punchline, Sacramento Punchline and Cobb’s in San Francisco.



“I didn’t like having to cozy up to the right people, and I hated trying to get the supposedly ‘right’ people to like me,” he said. “I just wanted to do comedy. I just wanted to be on stage.”



So he started renting out venues throughout the Bay Area, inviting big names and claiming as much stage time as he wanted for his own act.



That self-bought freedom gave him leeway to refine his material, even though he still had to work for a living.



For years, Salas divided his days between 12-hour shifts at the motorcycle dealership and hours-long nights at comedy clubs.



“I would go to bed at 3 in the morning and then have to get up to go to work again at 9,” he said, shaking his head. “I was beat.”



Salas plays up his blue-collar charm on stage, but he almost never jokes about his day job.



“It’s not funny to me,” he said dismissively. “I’m in sales purely for the money I make there.”



That pragmatic sensibility is something Salas developed early in life.



He ran away from home when he was 15 and moved to a town outside of Los Angeles, where he finished high school. Because he looked older than he was and no one asked his age, he got a job at a local bar.



“I’ve always looked and acted older. Now it’s the opposite — I think I’m younger than I actually am,” he joked.



Learning to live as an adult taught him to observe people, ideas and events critically — a skill he said is fundamental for any comic.



In fact, just talking to Salas, few would know he’s someone who forces people to laugh out loud against their will.



The guy barely smiles. He judges, complains and puts people on the spot, which, he said, limits his circle of friends to people who can tolerate his soapbox rants.



Once he’s on stage, though, and his criticism is placed in the context of entertainment, he elicits laughter.

“A lot of my comedy is just about what I observe and how I criticize. It’s not something people like to hear every day, but they accept it more as comedy,” he said.



A good joke should shatter the barrier of self-importance by making people uncomfortable, he added.

Salas’s comedy targets the college-educated youth’s politically correct hubris, the hick’s black-and-white self-righteousness and followers of trendy countercultures — to name a few.



“It’s so easy to make fun of those people who sit at Starbucks all day on their laptops, wearing their non-prescription glasses and spending $8.95 on coffee; the ones who sit there stony-faced, not laughing at a single joke,” he said, referring specifically to an audience at one of his Palo Alto gigs. “So, I asked them, ‘How come we have to have this contest about who’s going to laugh at the first racially insensitive joke? When was the last time you did something for somebody else besides yourself?’

“If you don’t laugh at some things, you cry about it, so I choose to laugh,” he concluded. “I make fun of pretty much everybody.”



In Tracy, he said, he gets a better reception. He has no family in Tracy, where he’s lived for three years, but as long as he can do comedy, work and live here, he’ll call it home.



His shows, which he hosts at the newly renamed Oxus Kabob House the final Friday of each month, attract a few hipster couples and groups of mostly young friends out to have a good time.



The local crowd reacts well enough to Salas’ act and even gives the comedian joke fodder with their whistles, shouts and comments yelled out of back-row bravery.



“He really sets the tone for the night with his energy, and he kind of gets a good feel for the crowd,” said his booker, Rafael Solano, who started working with Salas about four years ago. “It’s important for the host to warm up the audience, so the comedians coming up next know what to expect. Rick is really good at that. He’ll try a few trial jokes and get the show started.”



Salas has come a long way from his first act at a school talent show, back when he attended California State University, Chico.



“When I first started, my material was horrible,” he said. “I’ve always had a good stage presence, that’s always been there, but when you’re just starting out, you have to get as much stage time as you can. It’s the only way to improve your material.



“You can sit at home and write as much as you want, and it may be funny to you, but the only way you’ll improve is when you get out there and do shows. At some point, you will bomb. It’s unavoidable. I did, and I’ve known people in comedy for years who have, too.”



But failure is part of comedy, Salas said. There’s no room for ego — comics have to face the fact that it’s their fault if an audience doesn’t laugh.



About a month ago, the Tracy Women’s Club approached Salas about doing his routine at one of their meetings. He hesitantly accepted the offer.



“They told me the average age was somewhere between 50 and 107, so I was a little uneasy about that. It was so different from anything I’d done before. Plus, it was in the middle of the day. I’d never done that before either. I’ve only ever performed at night, when there’s drinking and kind of a party atmosphere.”



He spent hours writing material specifically for the daytime gig, polishing up standby jokes to be squeaky clean.



The extra effort paid off.



“They loved it,” he said, though even innuendos he considered vague drew a few gasps from the audience.



His act earned a standing ovation, and the ladies wouldn’t let him go till he stayed for a Q&A session.

“He went to the trouble of gearing his presentation to suit our audience,” said Councilwoman Evelyn Tolbert, a member of the club who was there the night Salas performed. “He admitted that his material gets a little bluer for the nighttime crowd, but I didn’t get the impression that, even in a different setting for a different audience, his material would be offensive.”



Salas said his willingness to try something different helped win them over.



“You’ve got to be versatile and adapt to the audience at hand,” he said. “And performing at that meeting for them was like a test for me,” he said.



Versatility, he said, comes through hard-won experience and frustrating failures.



He admits, though, that it’s the failures that are most valuable.



“Disappointments have made me a better comic,” he reflected.



He could take that experience to up the ante on his own act, but hosting’s the name of the game for him now. With Tracy home to a new 550-seat theater (with a  reasonable few-grand-a-night rent, according to Salas,) he’s ready to get some comedy superstars in town.



And for Salas?



He’s happy to play the opening act.

• In the Spotlight is a weekly profile in Our Town. This week’s interviewer was Our Town Editor Jennifer Wadsworth. To nominate someone to be In the Spotlight or to comment on this week’s column, call 830-4225 or e-mail jwadsworth@tracypress.com.