Houma comic someone to laugh at

For years, Steve Shaw acted on his teacher’s advice, preserving memorable moments in writing.

“I had all these thoughts and ideas on bar napkins and scraps of paper that I kept forever,” the Houma comic recalls.

The notes came in handy when he strayed from his day job, teaching first at Vandebilt Catholic High, then Fletcher Technical Community College and, later, Nicholls State University, into the comedy world.

“I always enjoyed humor, so I took a couple of standup classes at the University of New Orleans in 1992 and 1993,” Shaw said. To graduate, he first had to perform onstage.

“I was hooked from the first time,” he said.

From that stage at the New Orleans Hyatt, Shaw has developed a following.

Over the past 16 years, he’s performed at benefits and banquets for various groups, comedy clubs and casinos and LePetit de Terrebonne Theatre. Shaw was also the house emcee and a regular at Tab Benoit’s Lagniappe Music Cafe in Houma back in the day. He’s also a past winner of the International Cajun Joke-Telling, Most Popular Comic in New Orleans and Louisiana Laughfest contests.

On April 16, at the Houma Courtyard Marriott, he’s looking to rekindle the magic, performing two shows along with New Orleans comics Kenneth Lafrance and Tommy “Tee-Ray” Bergeron. Show time is 7 and 9 p.m., and tickets cost $20.

“It should be good, relatively clean comedy,” Shaw said. “The first show can probably be rated PG, while the second show is PG-13. The subject matter may be more adult, but the language is not.”

The three south Louisiana veteran comedians, teachers all, rely on their everyday lives for much of their material.

“Both Kenneth and Tommy have a wide appeal,” Shaw said. “They incorporate a lot of their experiences in the classroom into their routines.

“You’ll hear about some of the most outrageous excuses teachers get for not having homework or about different discipline styles,” he said.

Life is a treasure trove for comedy. As a former teacher and current counselor, “I still have my day job!” Shaw chides, and the father of three children, two girls, ages 15 and 12, and a 5-year-old son, he has a wealth of material.

Family and friends generally understand that Shaw’s comedy is fictionalized, he said. “It gives me a chance to put alternate endings on things that really happened.”

“My brother is about the closest I come to talking about for real,” the comedian added. “He had enough real weirdness that I don’t have to fictionalize it.”

But it’s actually Shaw’s comic persona, whom he describes as “Dumber than Boudreaux,” that takes the heat onstage.

“My comedy is not mean comedy because I am the butt of most of my jokes,” he explains. “It took about a year and a half to develop this character. He carries a lot of my insecurities. Onstage, he magnifies the stupid things I do and say in real life.”