We were lucky to catch up with Jerrel Beamon recently and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Jerrel, appreciate you sitting with us today to share your wisdom with our readers. So, let’s start with resilience – where do you get your resilience from?
I get my resilience from my thirst of wanting to learn. Failure is always painful to go through but I see failure as a opportunity to learn. I’ve definitely benefited and learned from my failures. There’s a few people who look at my life and see a few of my accomplishments. Such as performing at the Apollo Theater, opening for a few celebrities, running successful show and etc, and they’ll believe that those accomplishments are due to my lack of failure. This however is contrary to their perspective my success is greatly due to my failures. I’m only 22 years old so I still remember exactly what it was when I started doing open mics in 2019 when I was 17. My parents would come with me because legally I needed a guardian with me to perform. A lot of the veteran comics told me I had an “it factor” I was doing pretty well on stage for an new comic. I was advancing in contest and getting booked earlier than most comics. I still remember getting booked to open up for Desi Banks at Dayton Funny Bone when I was 18 (I only was doing stand up consistently for 5 months). This was bigger than I realized because Desi Banks at the time had 7 million followers on Instagram alone. The show was sold out with 300 people and I had to go after an seasoned comedian who had been doing it for 15 years who has becomed a mentor to me Raymond Jackson. Raymond crushed on stage I went after and after 2 minutes on stage I completely lost the crowd. I was getting heckled by regular audience members and even my mother (I later found out she was heckling to encourage me). Another seasoned comedian from my hometown Dayton Ohio who’s became a mentor to me as well named Mark Gregory went after me and made fun of me for 4 minutes straight. He joked that I bombed so bad that a dude in a wheelchair was trying to walk out the showroom. After the show was real brutal I had friends and family who came to the show it was very awkward to say the least. People avoided looking at me and I felt defeated. This failure was painful and brutal however it was one of the best things that has ever happened to me. This was my first major bomb on stage and I learned so much from it. I dissected every single mistake I made during that set I asked for advice and feedback from veteran comedians I looked up too. Going through that failure has helped me learn how to adjust during a set, control a room, and have confidence on stage. Throughout my career I have definitely learned more from my failures than my successes. You can’t let failing keep you from moving forward or progressing. Failing will help you see if you really love what you’re doing. I stay resilient because I know that I always see the fruits of my labor by learning and pushing forward.
Thanks, so before we move on maybe you can share a bit more about yourself?
My name is Jerrel Beamon I’m a 22 year old stand up comedian from Dayton, OH. I’ve been doing stand up comedy for 5 years. I’ve been wanting to do stand up comedy since I was 10 years old. When I saw Eddie Murphy Comedy Special Raw that sparked my interest in becoming an stand up comedian. As of right now I’m focused on traveling more and getting into more Comedy Festivals. Most importantly I’m focused on booking/producing more shows. I love performing on stage but I also love producing shows. I book and run a comedy show called Comedy for the People at Wiley’s Comedy Club in Dayton, OH and I book a few other rooms as well but I wanted to produce more shows.
Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?
Three qualities that were most impactful in my journey so far is my resilience, confidence, and humility. My advice to people starting early in their journey is to take risk so they can fail and learn it’ll build their resilience. Believe in themselves and realize that nobody is required to support them it all starts with you. Lastly be grateful and mindful that you always have to be the work no matter how much you’ve achieved. This will keep you humble.
Before we go, maybe you can tell us a bit about your parents and what you feel was the most impactful thing they did for you?
When I was 13 years old I got accepted to be in an student ambassador program called People to People founded by former President Dwight Eisenhower. It was expensive but I was fortunate enough that my parents we’re able to pay for me to go. I got to go to 5 countries (Spain, France, Italy, Monaco, Vatican City). This help me see the world at an early age and really see/understand different perspectives. My parents have always really pushed that on me. That why I always applied to programs and joined clubs that would take me out of Dayton Ohio because seeing other places helped be understand my home more. I grew up in West Dayton in a neighborhood called Five Oaks. Not a super dangerous neighborhood but it was definitely not an neighborhood most of my student ambassador peers were used to. I saw some crazy stuff in Five Oaks my parents kept me sheltered for the most part. I attended Richard Allen Academy in West Dayton which was 99%black. Until I went to an Private Catholic Highschool which was like 87% white. My parents constantly put me in circumstances that would help me see different perspectives and it’s very impactful for. This has greatly assisted with my comedic perspective as well.
Contact Info:
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jerrels_comedy?igsh=MWJsbmxzM3lxYnc3NA==
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/share/219xdiQ4zvNdYWYx/?mibextid=qi2Omg
