O
ne of the best parts about being a comedian is standing in front of a room full of people, all lis- tening with rapt attention and
laughing at the right moments. Smiles, cheers, and knee-slapping
perks of a comedian’s job. If you’re doing the job right, of course. Well,
smiles,
cheers, and knee-slapping laughs are just what you hear when Carlos Mencia is on stage. Audiences love his straightforward, unapologetic, sometimes brutally honest humor. But while most people only know him as the funny man who pokes fun at people and life in general, Mencia is much more than that—he’s a self-made business- man, father, husband, actor, and philan- thropist.
Carlos Mencia: Laughing and Living
by Carolina Saucedo 64 HISPANIC NETWORK MAGAZINE Celebrating 19 Years of Diversity
www.hnmagazine.com
Over 20 years ago, when Mencia began to work in comedy, there were very few Hispanic role models for him to admire. He had to take his inspiration where he could find it. “I looked up to Richard Pryor, Whoopi Goldberg, and Steve Martin—I had a diverse array of role models,” says Mencia. When he started doing standup comedy, he was going by his real first name, Ned, until Mitzi Shore, the owner of the Los Angeles based Comedy Club said, “You can’t be an angry Mexican named Ned.” Now Mencia is not Mexican—he is from Honduras—but Shore wouldn’t budge. “Everybody is going to think you’re Mexican, so you may as well get used to it,” she told him. And Shore had discovered Sam Kinison and worked with Richard Pryor, so Mencia figured she knew what she was talking about. So Ned Mencia be- came Carlos Mencia, and the new first name stuck. Looking back, Mencia recog- nizes that changing his first name was a bold decision. “I realized that people in Hollywood change their names all the time. The difference was that they were downplaying their ethnicity. I was the only idiot that did the opposite and went more Hispanic as opposed to less.” Today, Mencia is one of today’s most
admired entertainers, on both stage and screen. His stage success has opened doors for him that now allow him to take his act to new, bigger venues in both movies and television, just like many comedians be-
laughs…all
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