Can Blindness Be Funny?
For centuries, people have been laughing at caricatures of blindness in TV, film and entertainment – but how often are they laughing with us? Amir Rahimi has begun exploring the art of standup comedy as a fledgling comic in the Washington, DC comedy scene. Rahimi became blind as a teenager, and after fighting his vision impairment for years, he finally found peace in the ability to make people laugh. In his first few public sets, Rahimi plays with notions of masculinity, pokes fun at strangers who find his vision impairment fascinating, and isn’t afraid to joke about his own shortcomings as a way to “humanize” the blind experience and make it more relatable for the average, flawed human being. Rahimi sat down to chat with us about his successes and failures in developing his first ten minutes, and talk about his motivations and ambitions for what he hopes will be a long and fruitful comedy career.