Steve Martin’s Creativity: The Rebel’s Rebel

Kaizen Creativity: The Science of Creativity & Innovation

Steve Martin is one of my all-time favorite creative people. What makes him so special is that he somehow managed to rebel against a group of comedians who were themselves in a rebellion. He became the most financially successful stand-up comedian of all time, selling out arenas years in advance. He was one of the first rock starts of comedy. In the process, he developed an entirely new genre of stand-up comedy, known today as anti-comedy. Anti-comedy is the art of being so unfunny, that you’re funny. It’s telling a corny, awful pun, but selling it as if it were pure genius.

Martin’s early career was often disastrous. He was so different from other comedians that the audience wasn’t sure what to do with him. Every other comedian told easily identifiable jokes. Martin was working from the belief that if he told enough bad jokes, he could get the audience to feel so much tension that they’d eventually have to let it out as laughter. And so he let the bad jokes fly, one after the other.

Martin’s extremely unique approach to comedy caught the eye of producers for Saturday Night Live. His performance was a major success. He became a rockstar practically overnight. In his autobiography, he talks about his first show after SNL. When he took the stage, the audience shouted and cheered so loudly that it frighten and shocked him. This wasn’t how comedy audience normally behave, but then again, this wasn’t a normal comedy show.

Martin’s extremely consistent approach to maximizing uniqueness was his biggest barrier to success early on, but it was what made him so incredibly unique later. Steve Martin was the only comedian willing to pursue anti-comedy. He was willing to learn what works and what doesn’t. The original idea of using anti-comedy made him incredibly unique. But it was his determination in learning the rules of anti-comedy that made him the success he is today.

So often as artists, we’re afraid of having our unique ideas stolen. History tells a different story though. People only steal safe ideas that are easy bets. They don’t steal wildly original and unique ideas. Any comedian could have stolen Steve Martin’s style any time over his first 10 years. But they didn’t. It was only after he was already successful that the copy-cats came out. And at that point, he was so good at what you did that they didn’t matter.

Of course we should do what we can to guard our ideas from being stolen, but we shouldn’t live in fear of it. We should be more afraid of never tapping our creative potential. Don’t be afraid to trust yourself and what makes you unique.

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