By NICK TODARO

Staff Writer

At first glance in the Student Center, Main Floor on Feb. 3, John Roy did not look like a particularly funny guy for somebody who has won "Star Search." The only outward clue he has any comedic talent comes from his smile; a transformation. His face lights up and his eyes almost disappear next to the spread of his mouth.

Roy, 28, said he has been a comedian for about three years professionally, and the life can get to someone not prepared for it.

"I'd tell any comic that's trying to get into the business to realize something important," Roy said. "There's a difference between being funny spontaneously for your friends and for an audience that comes in wanting you to make them laugh."

Roy's humor is deliberate. He knows his audience wants to laugh, or they would not be there. Even so, he is no comic prodigy. He has a long road ahead of him to become a popular comic if one goes by audience response in the Student Center.

John Lary, a junior history major, was reluctantly smiling at the end.

"He started out iffy but ended OK," Lary said. "I'd have to say he is better than the last comic I saw live."

He started with risquŽ jokes and carried them right through to the end, but his set was not focused on crudeness. The feeling was at first a kind of, "he just said that, didn't he?" He ended on a more "I know exactly what he means" note.

Roy also has a timing talent for bringing back old jokes by weaving them into a subject completely unrelated, which is a crowd-pleaser.

He pointed out how ridiculous a tie really is, when one thinks about it.

"It's just a big penis-pointer-outer. And what really makes you think is, if it's just a big penis-pointer-outer, why would you think of wearing a tie to a funeral?"

He has a shaved head, which he called, "not a racist thing, man. It's just a hair cut," Roy said. "You know when a white guy is crazy. I'm not." Other white guys with shaved heads may know what he is talking about.

Roy also said he has heard enough about the good-looking jerk that gets all the girls. He knows that it is just about the good-looking part. The jerk thing is just the "cole slaw. I didn't order it, but it came with the entrŽe."