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Hartford HealthCare Podcast
Laughter is the best medicine: Angel Rentas, APRN
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Welcome to More Life. In this episode, Hartford HealthCare’s Steve Coats welcomes Angel Rentas. Angel is an APRN who works at Hartford HealthCare’s Heart & Vascular Institute EP Lab at Hartford Hospital. He’s also a professional stand-up comedian!
Angel has a great story about breaking on to the comedy scene in the 80’s - which is no easy task - and how his career in healthcare came to be. He also talks about his family’s journey from Puerto Rico to mainland America and how comedy helped him with that sometimes-difficult transition.
Check the links in this episode’s notes to learn more about Angel. Subscribe to More Life to be notified each time a new episode drops. Just search Hartford HealthCare on your favorite podcast platform.
You bring humor into your workplace because it's therapeutic, and then you bring your workplace when you do jokes into outlet. I find it's an outlet for patients, it's an outlet for providers as well.
SPEAKER_00Welcome to more life. In this episode, Hartford Healthcare's Steve Coates welcomes Angel Rentis. Angel is an APRN who works at Hartford Healthcare's Heart and Vascular Institute in the EP lab at Hartford Hospital. I'll let Angel describe what that's all about because it's fascinating. He's also a professional stand-up comedian. Angel has a really interesting story about breaking onto the comedy scene in the 80s, which is no easy task, and how his career in healthcare came to be. He also talks about his family's journey from Puerto Rico to mainland America and how comedy helped him with that sometimes difficult transition. Here's Steve Coates.
SPEAKER_04So, Angel, how did you take this path? Most people start as in a career and then transition into stand-up comedy because it's their dream. For you, it was different.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, that's that's the role. That it's usually, you know, like you're doing a job and then you decide to stand up. But actually, when I was in college, I needed to eat, and there was uh a show going on. It was actually a fashion show, and the guy didn't have an MC and he said to me, Hey, you're kind of funny, come up there, can you do some jokes and just entertain people and get so I went up and did a little bit of time and introduced people in there? And then when I got off, he gave me 25 bucks. At that time, that was a lot of money for a guy in college. So um, yeah. So I said, you know, I saw I always liked you know humor. So I ended up starting to do stand-up. Then uh I started in Glastonbury, it used to be a place called um Billy Jacks. So I did an open mic there, and then from there I just started doing more stand-up and uh slowly but gradually started building up, ended up going all over the place.
SPEAKER_04So when you were growing up, I guess most comedians, right, they they see people that they they want to be like or they want to do that. Was there a moment, was there a person that you saw on TV? You said, Yeah, I want to try that.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, actually, you know, my parents are pretty funny people, and I remember when we first got a TV, one of the first things we used to watch was the Ed Sullivan show. So I saw a Red Skeleton, but uh it was really my uncles who kind of influenced me because they brought back then it was an A-track, but they introduced me to Richard Pryor. So I listened to a lot of Richard Pryor, and then I started listening to a lot of uh Red Fox, Bill Cosby, and then I started listening to Woody Allen, and uh it's just just a lot of different people that I started to listen to.
SPEAKER_04Those are comedic legends. Now, Pryor is always I I don't know any list that he's not number one on. His material was based really on his personal life, and some of it was based on the pain of his growing up. Where does your material come from? Or has it changed?
SPEAKER_03It falls somewhere in the middle. You know, it's it's you know, I always use humor to kind of get me out of situations, you know, because you know, somebody's laughing, they can't really beat you up. So when I was growing up, that was one of the tools I learned right away. You start using humor, it it really kind of opens people up. People don't want to beat up a guy that's making them laugh, those kind of things. And and uh and Richard Parr talked a lot about pain and things he was going through. But you know, mine, I kind of switched it around. I used it more like a defense mechanism as well. And and I use it throughout my whole life. You just learn how to use humor in different ways. Uh, that most people use their own skill sets. Some people are really good at negotiating. I'm really good at finding humor and things and then making people feel at ease and then using that to move in.
SPEAKER_04You're a Hartford guy, families from Puerto Rico. Talk a little bit about your journey to get to Connecticut, to get to Hartford growing up, basically.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, so my my dad was uh military in the army and he came here first, went to Florida, and then he came to the Connecticut, but uh which is the migration of uh a lot of uh American citizens from uh Puerto Rico who come to the United States, to the mainland to to find work, you know. And people say, you know, why do you come? But if you ask anybody why they relocate, let's say you ask somebody from Mass, why'd you come to Connecticut? It's because of work. So it's the same thing. But he he came up the ladder with our culture at that time, they weren't hiring people of certain look. So he just was able to only get jobs in uh in the picking industry, basically strawberries and tobacco. And then after certain laws changed, he was able to go find work in other places. But that experience he had and the experiences that we had coming here, they kind of brought up certain issues that you had to deal with, and humor for me was a good way to do it.
SPEAKER_04You're starting your comedy career in the early 80s, which is considered, you know, the comedy club boom. Some pretty famous people down there in the early and mid-80s, like Seinfeld, Gilbert Gottfried. Pretty impressive that you're doing that going into the city. What was that like?
SPEAKER_03Going up to New York in the 80s was you know, New York wasn't the New York you know now. It's it's it was a little bit beat up. Those were like 2 30 in the morning gigs, you wait for your turn and get up, and then maybe uh two, three people, one drunk guy, a nun, and a guy with a goat, that kind of thing in the crowd, you know? And you go up there and you do your time and then you get off. Those guys are really great because they invested, they they were always in there. They they didn't care what they were doing. That was their school, that was their way out. You know, for me, you know, it was my secondary in a sense. I college was always considered first, and then comedy was something that was helping me go through college.
SPEAKER_04So you're going to school while you're doing these, you know, you're going into New York City to do these 2 30 in the morning gigs. Where did you go?
SPEAKER_03I started on UConn and then uh after UConn went to uh actually I worked at Hartford Hospital since I was about probably 18. When I got out of school, I went to uh work at the Institute of Living, and then I went into school for I picked up a RN degree, started working at the main hospital, main campus. And uh after that I did uh ER, ICU, and then I went back for my advanced practice.
SPEAKER_04So you touched on something interesting, and I you know, I've read a lot about comedians and you nail it. It's it's something you have to live, right? And you have to live for getting those late night or early morning spots. You have to dedicate your entire life to it. But for you, it seemed you found joy in doing it, and your your calling was really working in healthcare.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, so so to me, it's like you you have to invest in something. And and I thought, you know, I'm I'm very somewhat somewhat conservative in a sense, like I wanted a job where I can help out and use my skills, and I enjoy people. So that was a natural progression for me. Uh, but uh as far as humor is concerned, you know, you do have to do it full time. This is something you can't do part-time. It was good for me because I went to New York, I met, you know, all these people, I went to Montreal, uh I met a bunch of people, you know, I hung out with Dé Chappelle, I uh hung out with Sedgek Danetainer, I did Kevin Hart, all those people that you hear about, you know, I got to meet them and see them, but those people really focus on what they're doing. Just like I focus on medicine uh and put full time into it, that's the same thing they do. And it gave me a lot, it gave me a lot back. So to me, combining both of them was a natural progression as well.
SPEAKER_04So you take in, so you're going to school and like a college kid working a part-time job, you're taking a train into New York City.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, that's right. Yeah, that's how it was. I was going to New York. Back then, yeah, you go to com the main places to go to were the improv, comic strip, you know, danger fields, but they were all lottery picks. So you pick a number and then they say, all right, come back around one o'clock, or come back at uh eight o'clock, and your spot may be set for nine or ten, but then all of a sudden, you know, somebody comes in and bumps you out, and then you go till one. One time I was sitting there, Seinfeld comes in, he does time, and now you have to wait till one o'clock, one thirty in the morning.
SPEAKER_04I have to ask you then, you're an advanced practice provider, make a comfortable living, can pay the bills. Why would you subject yourself to this now? It's just for the love of it, I'm guessing.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I'm like the I'm like a garage band. You know, the guy called me up, hey, do you do time? I said, Yeah, I can do time. Let's uh you know, we'll negotiate what we want to do and how we want to do it. And I'll go into New York when I get invited to to certain things, you know, certain clubs or certain uh events. I was in the North Carolina Comedy Fest uh last year. You end up getting invited to these things as you start to know people and get more into business. But you also end up doing is doing your own shows. You know, you have the opportunity because you know so many people, you're able to take advantage of doing your own shows. And and for me, what I tend to do is, you know, like you said, you we already I don't make a huge living, you know, but I make a pretty decent living where I can have a house of kids and everything I want. So what I do is when I do a show, I usually try to find uh organization that needs money or a cause, you know, something to push a cause for. So, you know, those are usually shows I do if I organize a show.
SPEAKER_04Now you work in the Heart and Vascular Institute in the electrophysiology lab. How did you choose that path as a career?
SPEAKER_03Oh, so that there used to be a program, Emergency 15, uh, paramedics. There were 15, there were firemen, there were paramedics. And uh when I turn on TV, I used to see these the firemen come on, and all of a sudden these two paramedics would come out and they will pop epi and they would go and you see these these jets come out. And I say, That's cool. And then they would stick the guy, and the guy wake up and I say, I want to shock people, I want to stick them, you know. So that kind of thing. So I was like, I want to, I want to stick somebody, you know. So uh, so that kind of geared me a little bit towards going towards emergency medicine, and uh, and so I ended up working in the ER quite a bit. And then from there, I wanted to do children's. I did a little bit of children's med uh ER. And then uh one of my friends who was an EP, uh really great guy out of um Joe Delorfano, asked me if I can help him do comedy, and I started helping him learn how to do comedy. And then in turn, he said to me, You should join me and just an EP and see what it's like. So I ended up doing a rotation with him, and after that, I just ended up getting hired by Harford. I've been there ever since.
SPEAKER_04How important is it to bring humor into what you do professionally?
SPEAKER_03I think in general it's therapeutic. It kind of switches back and forth. You bring humor into your workplace because it's therapeutic, and then you bring your workplace into your when you do jokes and and and kind of it's an outlet. I find it's an outlet for patients. It's uh I find it's an outlet for providers as well. It gives you the sense of of looking at something very differently that may have looked bad before. You turn it around and look at it differently.
SPEAKER_04So you work in the EP lab. Are you I mean, you're not telling jokes about heart rhythm and aphib, are you?
SPEAKER_03No, no, no, no. You have to tell somebody how that is, you know. Like I I I do do bits on like uh seeing the light, that type of thing. You know, uh my opening joke a lot of times when I come on to the stage and people know me, they just said my name is Angel, is such a simple joke because I in the emergency room I actually work with a guy named Jesus. So when I walked in, I said, I'm Angel, this is Jesus, we're gonna take you upstairs, and people would just look at me. So I thought that you know the the job of comedians to translate that onto a stage, you know, that's an easy transition.
SPEAKER_04So uh back to kind of your choice of of career, and and I know there's this really fraternal group of, you know, if you're a comedian, you're a comedian for life, and whether you're great at it or not great at it, there's this fraternity. Is it different if it's not your chosen field? I think a lot of the folks that were there, I'm guessing you were honest with them. If you're going to the improv, if you're going to catch a rising star, that hey, I'm just in this because I love doing it. I'm not in it as a career. Do you find are you still part of that kind of click?
SPEAKER_03I think everybody who does comedy would love just to do that full time. You know, the reality is you have to make a living and you have to make choices. What I find is the guys who do make it, their choices are to focus on that. When you focus on that, everything else doesn't fall into place. So marriage, children, all those things that you want, you have to put those on a sideburner. Just like if you want to be a CEO and successful, you have to, and you want to focus on your job. You have these guys that do all this work. Can they become very successful? But something else has to give. Uh, I wasn't willing to give the side of my family, take them through that kind of a torture. So there is a balance. And most guys that do comedy, they would love to do it full-time.
SPEAKER_04And your family has been all in when you were starting out or even now.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. When I started, I was doing really well. I was actually heading to New York. I had a friend who invited me to Montreal Comedy Fest that did the improv in LA. But then, you know, at certain points, you know, you you decide to have a family and you and you think, well, what's the cost of that? What am I willing to pay? And you don't want to miss out on that. So I decided having kids and you know, and being with them was more important.
SPEAKER_04Was there a point if you had gotten, say, you know, you're in school, you're you're on a great career path, but some a network comes along and says, hey, we want to develop a sitcom with you, or um, we're gonna travel, you know, maybe open up for a you know a bigger star. Or was there was there a point where you would have taken that?
SPEAKER_03Oh yeah, you bet. You bet. So I'll give you an example. Like Pablo Rodriguez, who was a uh uh is a comic out of California, he's Mexican, but he got a spot on Johnny Carson and he did his 15, 20 minutes, and after that he got paid $10,000 a shot and he had spots in Las Vegas open up. So you you know, comedians, once you get a spot and you get that's when you get a manager. You know, you see these guys come cruising around, they you know, they don't have managers, they get their own gigs, and then when they become big, they get managers.
SPEAKER_04Was it tough during, you know, you could say we're kind of emerging from COVID, but kind of writing and performing not not just the physical aspect of separation from the crowd, but I mean just kind of finding humor in really dark stuff. I mean, we talked about prior, and that's where he that's where he found a lot of this. But did you did you get any inspiration from kind of the darkness of COVID?
SPEAKER_03Yeah. If you listen to a lot of comedians, a lot of their humor comes from their own experiences. You know, you there's a lot of jokes on the pandemic, and I think that's just natural. The thing that was hard for comedians and all stand-ups that we when I would talk to them and when I performed was they weren't able to have the crowd. And like you said, it's really stand-up is an intimate thing where you're standing in front of a bunch of people. And so that we did a lot of Zoom comedy shows during the pandemic. All you see is yourself talking.
SPEAKER_04Can you though joke or make light of the topic of COVID? I think it was Woody Allen in in the movie Crimes and Misdemeanors, correct me if I'm wrong. Uh the quote is comedy is tragedy plus time. You can make fun of something years and years after it happens. But if we're in the middle or just coming out of COVID, can you have material about COVID? Are are you bringing the pandemic into your act?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, all the time. You know, but you know, and you talk and the funny thing is that I think what makes things funny is there's a couple of things for me, is like how much you can relate to that joke. When you talk about kids, people with kids can relate better. When you uh talk about shared experiences, you know, that that makes the joke funnier. And the shared experience you have is COVID. So people understand that when they talk about it. I have I, you know, my my dog, because my wife's been home all day, is being coming has anxiety now because now she's going back to work. So, you know, to cure that, we have them on hemp. So my dog is on hemp because he's got anxiety from COVID, you know, and somebody, you know, will say they that's just a shared experience. There's a lot of people who have COVID dogs and things like that. So I mean, a lot of those type of jokes are are relatable. And your audience, you know, when you talk about nursing, nurses have gone through this COVID issue and they wore all the protective gear and everything in in itself, you know. We I I have a joke I talk about wearing a mask and and having these lines as I get older not come out as fast because I don't have rebound anymore, you know? So that's relatable.
SPEAKER_04And as we close today, I have to ask you this and just kind of maybe a bit of a corny question. How important is laughter in the healing process, whether you're in the hospital or or at home, uh just in general, how important do you think laughter is?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, you know, it's therapeutic on both ends. For for the patient, you know, like the best example to give you is there's a lot of uh literature out there now as far as like humor and health. And cousins you wrote a book on his experiences with cancer, but there's a lot of material out there and it shows that, you know, people who laugh at things, they're able to take control of them. And a better example is people with cancer, they don't have a choice of having cancer, but they have a choice of laughing, and laughing gives them a better focus of control, feeling like they have some control over that. The patients uh do that a lot because I work in sudden death and they and they enjoy joking around, you know. Uh, and then there's gallows humor too, which uh a lot of people use. And so you have to be careful with that. But you know, the people in the emergency room, in the working emergency room, those people are very talented and do very hard work and it's very nerve-wracking because it's life and death, and there's a lot of stress behind it. So I find they joke around that makes them feel a little better. It's an outlet for them. And uh, and I think it's important. You know, I think I think laughter is one of the things that you have. And I look at it like you have a choice either to cry or to laugh. And I think laughter gives you an outlet.
SPEAKER_04Hey, Angel, best of luck to you and thanks so much for joining me today.
SPEAKER_00My pleasure. Thank you, Steve and Angel. Check the links in this episode's notes to learn more about Angel. Subscribe to More Life to be notified each time a new episode drops. Just search Hartford Healthcare on your favorite podcast platform. For Hartford Healthcare, I'm Enron DePierre. Thanks for listening to More Life.
SPEAKER_02I'm ready for my coast up. All the fact is that the light up. You know, I love this feeling. I got more life than I like. We can go anywhere we want to go.