Everyone should be calm - comedian Laura Ramosu says she can help with that

As the comic embarks on his biggest US tour to date, he's brought his viral characters with him and shared a little more than he was once comfortable with.

Whether you follow her or not, Laura Ramosso's image is probably familiar to one of your feeds. The 31-year-old comedian has become a regular on TikTok and Instagram scrolls for her characters — especially her impressions of her Italian father and German mother, who always wears black turtlenecks, her hair pulled back, glasses inexplicably perched atop her head.

It's funny, it's catchy, but these quick hits may undermine the body of work the 31-year-old is building. His fifth show, Calm Down, isn't just a nod to one of his characters' catchphrases or something he longs for most in this punishing news cycle from which there seems to be no escape. It's an artistic culmination that combines design, stand-up, collective work and, yes, clowning. And after cultivating dedicated live audiences in Europe, Canada and Australia, he's about to perform Calm Down in Los Angeles on October 17, at the end of his biggest US tour to date.

Patton Oswalt and Michelle Wolf call Sebastian Maniscalco to reverse acquisition of SiriusXM channel

"Trailer Park Boys" actor Michael Smith was accused of sexual assault

"I hope you calm down after the show," she says. "But the title and the series is kind of where I'm at right now. I need to be calm. We all need to be calm. That's the mantra I've adopted this year. It's not working, but it's good to put it out there."

Ramosu is talking to Zoom, a little coldly, from what appears to be a haunted Airbnb in a gold. Bustling city I've never heard of. He insists it's a pleasant experience, and his resume shows he's a game traveler. He grew up as the altruistic counterpart of an army clown before setting out to work in the world. Italian-born Ramoso, who now lives in Canada, spent her childhood in Cameroon, China and Vietnam, taking care of her mother's work with the World Health Organization. Ramosu was never in danger of being close to Ebola, but he saw the real thing. In Baku, Azerbaijan, his commute to school coincided with the beheading of a cow by a punctual (and very public) butcher at 7:40 a.m. "I think they were teaching me a lesson," he says. "Life is fickle. Your head might be cut off at 7:40 in the morning."

He says that sharing pieces like these made him uncomfortable, but during our conversation he notes that calming down has been his most personal work. But he's affected by the strangest of emotions, because his sold-out central axis seems to be working. "This direct line between me and the audience, as opposed to my characters or designs, has been clearer than ever," he says. I really enjoy it, but it happened this year. "I was already scared."

You have audience participation during your shows. As an artist and art consumer, do you think there should be a disclaimer when this is on the table?

no I think audience participation gets a bad rap from the history of really terrible examples. I try to create an environment where you can say no if you don't. They want to, and people do. And I just keep going. But what I've found is that 99 percent of the time people are open to what could be. It gets exciting because then the crowd is like, "Oh, okay, we're all in this together." My favorite thing about it is that it cannot be rebuilt. It is only for that specific audience. And then it was like, "Oh my God, I was at the show with Jake, the guy in the pink shirt. Oh my God." And there were a lot of jokes about Jake, and that's what makes it special for me.

What do you do when people who were playing and maybe weren't?

Struggles are caused by people who are too playful. That's when I have to do the math in the back of my head to say, "Okay, I need to be more careful with this person because he's changing the narrative." So I've been successful in choosing the right participants by how they sit, just how they interact with the show.

I'm assuming that the vast majority of people paying to see you know that the characters you know online are only part of your arsenal, but there might be one person at every show who's just like, "Do your mom!" When writing this show, how much did you think about the pressure caused by the kick game?

Oh, so the last two and a half shows, that's when people started coming from my social media pages. I always knew to make sure I respected the characters and also wanted to do them. In fact, I would love to do them all the time sometimes but I knew it would become a challenge. How can we incorporate these characters that people know from this context into this different context? And posing as the characters is just fun. You feel the excitement in the room. So there's no way I can think of not including the characters in the show.

Can you tell the difference between someone who came to your comedy via Instagram and Tik Tok?

Most of the tickets I sell are through Instagram and Facebook. And the vast majority of my audience skews across those platforms, say 28 to 40. The differences I feel in my audience are mostly geographic. But, in my audience, you'll find mostly moms and daughters having a great time together. And boyfriends and husbands who don't know who I am.

Your show Frances went from sold-out shows at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival to the Soho Theater in London. Much remarkable contemporary television emanates from one or both of these platforms, Phoebe Waller-Bridge's Fleabug, Richard Gadd's Reindeer Baby, Michaela Cole's Bubblegum. Do you want to turn your comedy into a series?

Yeah, that's definitely what I'm working on right now. It's fun, but it also helps diversify my output. I will take every opportunity to continue writing. I know that the social media landscape will inevitably change. So I put my hands in more than one bucket.

Have you read clowning? Have you noticed that clowning is having a moment?

Clowns are having a big moment, especially in Los Angeles. I was mainly focused on Commedia dell’arte, which is Italian clowning. I know many people who went to France to study with Philippe Gaulier or Lecoq. La Coq School is very serious, I really didn't take it that hard. But I think the clown shows have been some of the most fun I've ever had performing.

You've opened for Tina Fey and Amy Poehler on the Restless Legs tour, which is a real bummer. What did you learn from watching them work?

You are always told that the greats, even your biggest idols at the top of your industry, still feel the work. You'll never really believe it, but I have to see it. It was really eye-opening to watch them go out, kill it, and then work on their material for the next show and isolate the moments they wanted to be better. It taught me that it never goes away, that feeling like, "God, I just have to fix this moment." You can objectively be the best of the best and still have it. I guess that's what makes them so great, this never-ending quest to get it right in their eyes. And then I asked Tina if she was still nervous, because I was. "Sometimes, but I'm not alone. I have Amy," he said.

Have you ever wanted someone on stage with you?

I only get that feeling when I'm making a show, especially when I'm testing ongoing shows and trying out new material. Sometimes it's good to share that bomb or win with someone else, but I have a great stage manager and director. They are not just with me. I share the load with them and share the wins with them. Also, because of the structure of my show - and this is going to be very malicious - I sometimes feel like the audience is my stage partner. Because I have this partnership and I feel that the conversation is always there.

When you're on stage, do you like to see faces or do you like lights?

I don't like to see faces (laughs). I like to see darkness. I don't want to see anyone getting up, going to the bathroom, or moving around. Only darkness please