Sean Daly: SARASOTA
It’s hard to be funny when you look like you’re drowning. Tim Hedley knows this cruel rule of comedy well.
Standing under bright stage lights, Tim grasps note cards he has just pulled from his trusty black Spider-Man folder. He licks his lips. Totters side to side. He leans into the microphone and reads each word slowly, one by one, sans nuance or mirth.
“WHY …
“DID …
It’s November 2010. Tim, 29, is practicing his shtick at the world’s first, and only, comedy workshop for the mentally disabled. He has Down syndrome, and it comes with what experts call a disfluency: Tim’s socially strong, academically weak. He also has a severe stutter and often searches for words as if he’s violently gulping air. Only slowwwing down solves this.
“THE …
“FISH …
“B-B-BLUSH?”
“I don’t know, Tim,” says the workshop’s creator, Les McCurdy, sitting just beyond the stage. “Why DID the fish blush?”
Tim gets ready to unload the punch line.
As always, this could go either way.
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