Schtick or Treat: An NYC comedy Halloween tribute

Dozens of New York City stand-up comedians got together Saturday night in Long Island City to have a little fun, Halloween-style, by performing tribute sets of other, more famous comedians. A few comics didn’t get the memo, apparently, but after a false start, Gilad Foss really set the bar high with his spot-on impersonation of a young Woody Allen (see it on DailyMotion, too).

It was the most fun I’ve seen out of this community since the last time so many of them had gathered at The Creek in early January for "50 First Jokes." And by this community, I mean I’m not sure how to classify this sub-group of the New York comedy scene. They’re not the alt-alt comics. They’re not underground comics. They’re not the AA ball or junior circuit. So who are they? Do I even need to find a word to categorize them? How about this for an example, then: Tom McCaffrey did a take on Louis CK, while there was another comic Saturday night who impersonated McCaffrey. Co-hosts Matt Ruby (Rodney Dangerfield) and Mark Normand (Groucho Marx) led the proceedings, and Ruby posted his own recap. Other highlights: Jared Logan as Kevin Meaney, Mara Herron as Janeane Garofalo, Chelsea White as a female version of Mitch Hedberg, Mo Diggs as Carlos Mencia telling the bit he stole from Cosby, Becky Ciletti as Sarah Silverman, Jamie Lee doing Maria Bamford’s voices in a bit we’d both seen Bamford do live just a week earlier, and there were inspired takes on Steven Wright, Gallagher (with mini sledge-o-matic and slice of watermelon), Larry the Cable Guy, Yakoff Smirnoff. The only thing I didn’t much care for: The white comedians who chose to do racial and/or homophobic material from black comics, as if the setting suddenly made that OK. But back to highlights.

After the jump, you can see Adam Newman in a white suit doing part of Steve Martin’s routine, followed by a video of Martin doing the original routine live for comparison’s sake. Enjoy!

Adam Newman does Steve Martin.

And here’s the original Steve Martin bit on sex jokes.

Related: Jon Clarke as Bob Newhart.