The 2009 ECNY Awards nominees unveiled!

The ECNY Awards announced this year’s nominations live at noon today via Ustream webcast, because why not. It’s 2010. This is how we do it now, Montell Jordan. If you missed it, you can watch it again with Comix’s Kambri Crews and two-time ECNY winner Kumail Nanjiani reading the names of those just honored to be nominated. Somehow, they read The Comic’s Comic for the second straight year as one of the ECNY’s nominees for best website. I’m rather humbled, and prepared to be humbled once again when I undoubtedly lose to one of my fellow nominees. Watch the broadcast here:

But what about you? Did you or your favorite New York comedian or comedy act make the cut? Voting is open now through March 3, with the winners announced in a fun ceremony at Comix on March 8. Here are your 2009 ECNY Award nominees…

Best Female Stand-Up
Claudia Cogan
Katina Corrao
Morgan Murphy
Giulia Rozzi
Brooke Van Poppelen

Best Male Stand-Up
Hannibal Buress
Pete Holmes
Sean Patton
Rory Scovel
Baron Vaughn

Best Sketch Comedy Group
BoF (Best of Friends)
Elephant Larry
Murderfist
New Exc!tement
Team Submarine

Best Improv Group
Big Black Car
Death By Roo Roo
I Eat Pandas
Improvised Shakespeare Company
Stepfathers

Best Host
Chris Gethard
Seth Herzog
Pete Holmes and Jessi Klein
Gabe Liedman, Jenny Slate and Max Silvestri
Joe Mande and Noah Garfinkel

Best Musical Comedy Act (Solo or Group)
Adira Amram
Shayna Ferm
Leibya Rogers (Mindy Raf)
Snakes
Stuckey & Murray

Best One Person Show
Big in Japan – Dave Hill
Dead Millionaire – Jenny Slate
Fag Life: A Conversation with Fred Phelps – Brent James Sullivan
Supernormal – Tom Shillue
Use It – Ann Carr

Best Short Comedic Film

DAMN (You Wish)
– Carolyn Castiglia, Tom McCaffrey, Mara Herron, and Anya Garrett

Eagles are Turning People into Horses
– BriTANick

Everyone Poops Trailer
– Landline TV

Hey That’s Awesome!: 2012
– Rob Lathan w/Bobby Moynihan

What Do You Want on Your Tombstone?
– Elephant Larry

Best Technician
Jon Gutierrez
Geoff Grimwood
Carol Hartsell
Frank Heijl
Rich Jones

Best Variety Show
Fifty First Jokes
Moonwork: An Evening of Original Works
Rejection Show
Risk! True Tales Boldly Told
Whiplash

Outstanding Achievement in Flyer or Postcard Design
Agorafabulous: Mike Wang and Lauren Goldberg
Brown Ambition: Anya Garrett
Fag Life: A Conversation with Fred Phelps: Mindy Tucker
Heart of Darkness – Dimitri Drjuchin
Swords Improv: Bradford Jordan and Eric Michael Pearson

Best Website

FRONTPAGEFILMS.COM


THEAPIARY.ORG


THECOMEDYNERDS.COM


THECOMICSCOMIC.COM


URDB.COM


VIDEOGUM.COM

Outstanding Achievement in the Field of Tweeting

@FRIEDMANJON


@JULIEKLAUSNER


@LIZZWINSTEAD


@MRDAVEHILL


@RANDAZZOJ

Best Book

All Local Bands Suck (Except Ours)
– Porter Mason

And Here’s the Kicker: Conversations with 21 Top Humor Writers on their Craft
– Mike Sacks

Get Rich Cheating: The Crooked Path to Easy Street
– Jeff Kreisler

Rejected: Tales of the Failed, Dumped and Cancelled
– Jon Friedman

The Terrible, Horrible Temp-to-Perm Debacle: Book Two in the Just Make a Choice! Series
– Bob Powers

The Will to Whatevs: A Guide to Modern Life
– Eugene Mirman

Emerging Comic Award
Myq Kaplan
Mike Lawrence
Kate McKinnon
Thomas Middleditch
Dan St. Germain
Brent Sullivan

Sean L. McCarthy

Editor and publisher since 2007, when he was named New York's Funniest Reporter. Former newspaper reporter at the New York Daily News, Boston Herald and smaller dailies and community papers across America. Loves comedy so much he founded this site.

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14 thoughts on “The 2009 ECNY Awards nominees unveiled!

  1. the nominees are very homogeneous in the type of comedy they do, the shows they do and the friends they keep. The ECNY awards actually just focus on the alt comics (who all hang out together).

  2. The nominees are determined by a public nomination process, which this year resulted in hundreds of nominations in each category. That list then went to our industry committee ‚Äî which is made up of professionals from every aspect of the comedy scene in New York, including large clubs, small venues, press, television networks, talent scouts, etc. ‚Äî and their votes determined the 5 or 6 nominees in each category. Every effort has been made to keep the process fair and cast the net of representation as wide as possible. Of course, one doesn’t expect to please everyone.

  3. regardless of your secret industry panel or not, your nominees are all the from the alt scene. Unless of course there are absolutely no comics of color who could have qualified for the “Emerging Comics” category? Even the African American comics (all 2 of them, also representing the entire minority comic population in NYC I guess), are alt comics. In this vast net you cast, allowing people to submit via the internet, there where no urban comics, no Asian comics at all? (your list doesn’t even have ONE Asian comic, and I’m even counting South Asians in that calculation)
    there isn’t even any rhyme or reason for for the groupings. You have Myq Kaplan (Tonight Show, Live At Gotham) who only works as a standup, in a category with comics who have no TV credits as an emerging comic.
    As mentioned before, regardless of your process, the results lean in one direction; alt comics. This can not be denied Brooke van Poppelen was nominated last year as well. I guess the industry panel really loves the material she is doing.
    I would be very interested in seeing your “industry” panel’s identities, but like the MPAA, it has to be kept a secret so the results can not be disputed. I don’t want to get in an argument about this, as I don’t care. My initial comment was an observation I made when looking up all the nominees. I felt obligated to reply because I felt your tired explanation of how every emerging comic in NY deserving of recognition just happens to be an alt comic was utter bullshit.

  4. Suspiciously “Rejection”-centric.
    Ahh, the ECNY “Our careers are not where we would like them to be.”
    Pure bullshit!

  5. The ECNY Awards is ultimately a show that spoofs award shows, and yes, it does heavily focus on the “alt comedy” scene. It always has and has never hid from that. It’s all for fun.

  6. That’s a much better answer than Carol’s ‘we cast a wide net a representation’. (which clearly is not the case) Maybe you should change the name to “NY Alt Comedy Awards” or spoof NBC with “Stand Down for Diversity”. Or how about a new category “Most outstanding joke about LOTR, Robocop or Time Machines” although you’d probably have millions of entries in that one.
    Oh well, Jon and Carol (who both produce the ECNY Awards), you’ve done your part to help keep NY comedy cliquey and to recognize a lack of diversity in both the comics and their material. Having the same comic nominated again and again each year. (Pete Holmes is up for 3 awards this year, Van Poppelen returns as does Joe Mande, Elephant Larry etc) Kudos to you, as comedy dies just a little bit with your award ceremony.
    Just stop making statements that are flat out lies like ‚ÄúOnce again, I‚Äôm extremely proud to announce of the diverse and talented list of comedians nominated for our awards”. Diversity is in no way part of the ECNY awards.

  7. wow, your logic is truly dizzying. How can I argue with a completely unsubstantiated opinion followed by “Done” AND then a Period? I mean the period ends discussions. It’s like the king punctuation mark. Case closed. Done.
    You have shown me the error of my ways Fly. Well played sir, well played.
    I guess when all the comics that were nominated go down to the Strip and get their numbers to audition every 6 months they are trying to show the clubs we don’t need you. Or when they ALL put on shows in the basement of Comix (BTW Comix management is the club representation Jon and Carol mention) they are saying “We hate the clubs!!!! That’s why we’re in the basement to undermine your establishment!!!”
    In closing, Fly, you’re an idiot. DONE.

  8. An alt comic would have made that response funnier.
    Next year maybe they can make a category for “angriest club comic” and you can have a shot at that one!

  9. we can toss insults back and forth Fly, but the truth is I’m not a club comic and no matter what opinions either one of us offer on alt vs. club comedy in the end the original fact I pointed out is true; the ECNY Awards are very unvarying in the type of comedy they promote, that the panel of industry and the comics maintain an incestuous relationship. That despite the ECNY website stating that the awards are “diverse”, they are not.
    Feel free to continue to dispute any and every thing besides the actually facts I’ve laid before you.
    “ninety percent of alternative comics are shitty comedians.” – Patton Oswalt

  10. Best website is a tough one! I love this site, but have been reading and commenting on Videogum longer. I don’t think The Comic’s Comic and Videogum are comparable, actually.
    Oh well… There are a lot of comics I like nominated. I have NO IDEA who will win Best Male Stand Up. I want to vote for them all.

  11. Frank, what definition of “diverse” are you using?
    There are men, women, people of different colors, sketch groups, improv groups musical performers, web categories, authors…
    Those are all different types of things, are they not?
    And isn’t that all “diversity” means? Being comprised of different things?
    (I mean, if they were claiming it meant RACIAL diversity, perhaps lodging a complaint makes sense, but that’s not the position you’re taking, is it?
    Sure, the people putting on the show promote the kind of comedy that they like.
    Like Jon agreed.
    Isn’t that how any awards show works?
    They take nominations and pick what they think is the funniest.
    (Additionally, I honestly don’t think Baron Vaughn and Sean Patton, for example, are homogeneous comics doing the same thing, either, are they? Other than being funny, original comedians.)
    Everyone is certainly welcome to their opinions.
    All the best,
    Myq
    PS That Patton Oswalt quote is incomplete.
    I believe that the part that precedes it is “ninety percent of all comedians are just boring people,” and his whole point is that 90% of EVERYONE in comedy is crap, and that differentiating mainstream and alternative is a waste of time. Funny is funny.
    PPS To Fly, I agree with Frank that unsupported antagonism doesn’t much further the dialogue here. Frank has made some reasonable points, and there’s no need to be uncivil.
    PPPS I don’t believe my position hinges on the fact that I’m included in the nominations, but just wanted to fully disclose just in case of any perceived bias.
    Thanks for reading!

  12. Myq,
    I was referring to both racial diverse and “type of comedy” diverse. Although there are many categories in the ECNY, it is as one comic says it, “In Maine we are very diverse; we have tall white people, short white people, fat ones and skinny ones.”
    In the end the majority of the comics in the ECNY are white, the two African American comics constitute two out of how many? Percentage wise? All of the comics are in the “alt” category. I think that’s a bit disingenuous calling them the “Emerging Comics of New York” when in fact they do not focus on New York as a comedic whole but rather only one part of it.
    As a new comic I was very interested in these awards at first, but then when I noticed the bias in them my “feelings” were hurt. Just another thing in the New York comedy scene that works on the basis of exclusion.
    I do however appreciate your evenhandedness in your answer as well your logical argument as opposed to just insulting me.
    The Oswald quote is not incomplete in it’s meaning. Yes he did say 90% of most comics are boring people, but in the interview he went into detail about the woes of the alt scene. How alt comics look down at club comics and audiences without learning the basics of joke writing. The examples of being a 4 star chef, having “The Wedding Planner” as a punch, and how badly an alt comic would do on the road solidify his “shitty comics” comment. He clearly said most comics are boring, but most alt comics are shitty comics.

  13. To promote the awards show, Kambri’s sending a team wearing Salieri masks into the subway.

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