Comedian connects with students over relatability, diversity

By Emily Klingman

When comedian Godfrey took the stage in the Bart Luedeke Center Theater, he didn’t hold back from basking in his entrance applause.

“Don’t be lazy motherf—ers,” he said.

Godfrey started out the night by asking questions about life at Rider and comparing it to his time at the University of Illinois as a pre-med psychology student. He joked about the woes of college students all across the country. He covered topics from the small, shared-living spaces of dorms to skipping classes and getting along with professors.

“I was the only brother in every class…kind of hard to be absent,” Godfrey said.

He also talked about other hot college-student topics like the athletic teams on campuses. In interacting with the audience, Godfrey was able to joke and comment on issues personal to Rider students. Through crowd participation, he was able to tailor his jokes especially to the crowd — like when he learned a popular major at Rider is accounting and the basketball team is a fan favorite. He then asked if the team was any good.

“You guys decent?” he asked before answering himself. “No, because you’re known for accounting.”

Throughout his show, Godfrey constantly brought diversity into every topic he had, and, as he mentioned, for good reason.

He was always quick to point out any and all black achievements in today’s society and in the past. Quite a few times, if he sensed the crowd didn’t believe him, he’d tell people to take out their phones and look it up. He talked about how black people invented stoplights, gas masks, pace makers and cardiac surgery. Black culture is everywhere, he told the crowd. His proof?

“You never see brothers in the car playing bagpipes,” he said.

One aspect of Godfrey’s performance everyone enjoyed was how real and authentic his show was. He was constantly laughing at his own jokes and audience reactions. At some points, he would go off on tangents based off his own observations of the crowd and their reactions to his jokes. At one point, he started another tangent and said to the crowd, “I don’t know why I’m telling you this.” It made the theater seem like it was a giant group of friends hanging out together and having fun.

Overall, Godfrey’s comedy was a hit with the whole theater. Students enjoyed his realness and the authenticity laced with his humor. Godfrey made it easy for everyone to laugh at themselves.

Originally printed in the 10/05/16 edition.