Day: June 29, 2010

In its announcement today, Seattle's Labor Day weekend Bumbershoot festival boasted that it has offered comedy alongside its music stages for many of its 40 years — far longer than all of these newer, popular upstarts. Kids, right? Anyhow. What about the kids who'll be performing for you kids in Seattle this September? There will be lots of them, spread out over three separate comedy stages: One for the larger group events and showcase, one for up-and-coming and up-and-up stand-ups, and a third for the local Pacific Northwest flavors of comedy. Comedy Stage South: Patton Oswalt & Friends; Bring the Rock with Greg Behrendt; Comedy Loves Music! featuring Garfunkel and Oates, David O‚ÄôDoherty and Nick Thune; Comedy Podcast Live! featuring live episodes of Never Not Funny with Jimmy Pardo, WTF? with Marc Maron, and The Nerdist with Chris Hardwick Comedy Stage North: Donald Glover; Chris Hardwick; Jamie Kilstein; Nick Kroll; Joe Mande; Marc Maron; John Mulaney; Morgan Murphy; Kumail Nanjiani; Tig Notaro; Chelsea Peretti Comedy Stage West: Blood Squad; Duos; Bridgetown Comedy Festival Showcase; The Cracked Up; Famous Mysterious Actor Show; Komedy Kabaret; Laff Hole!; New Kids; Stop Podcasting Yourself Live Podcast; TBTL Live Podcast; Ubiquitous...

Although Forbes only categorizes four performers on its 2010 edition of "The Celebrity 100" as comedians, the magazine actually counts 13 comedians on its list of famous people ranked by wealth and power. Ellen DeGeneres, with $35 million in earnings from her daytime TV show, endorsements and more, was the highest-ranked comedian at #23. Other comedians, in order of ranking, with their yearly income: #24, David Letterman, $45 million #34, Jay Leno, $35 million #37, Jerry Seinfeld, $75 million #46, Ben Stiller, $53 million #51, Conan O'Brien, $38 million #57, Adam Sandler, $40 million #78, Steve Carell, $34 million #84, Ray Romano, $35 million #90, Tina Fey, $7.5 million #93, Jeff Dunham, $22 million #94, George Lopez, $18 million #98, Chelsea Handler, $19 million The magazine used other factors, including press attention and social media, to determine the rankings. Forbes also profiles Chelsea Handler in its coverage, and also talks to comedian Aziz Ansari, who wasn't on the list, calling Ansari "the Next Big...