Just For Laughs Montreal 2013: Colin Quinn to keynote; Joan Rivers, Eddie Izzard, Sarah Silverman, Seth Meyers hosting Galas

Bonjour! Allo! Hi. Good morning, good afternoon and good evening to you all.

The biggest comedy confab of the year, Just For Laughs Montreal, has announced the lineup for its 31st annual celebration of funny — this summer’s dates run July 10-28, 2013.

Colin Quinn will deliver this year’s keynote address JFL ComedyPro Conference (July 25-27). The first three keynotes have come from Lewis Black, Marc Maron and Patton Oswalt. The conference includes Quinn’s speech, Andy Kindler’s traditional State of The Industry address, as well as industry panels, live podcast recordings and real-life social networking.

This year, JFL has scrapped the ZooFest label and instead is calling its smaller, less expensive showcases Off-JFL. The biggest made-for-TV spectacles do remain the JFL Galas. For 2013, JFL Galas will be hosted by:

  • Eddie Izzard (July 24, 2013), presenting international acts, including French comedy star Gad Elmaleh performing in English
  • Seth Meyers (July 25, 2013), fresh off the news he’s graduating from Saturday Night Live head writer and Weekend Update host to NBC’s Late Night host in February 2014
  • Sarah Silverman (July 27, 2013) and friends
  • Joan Rivers (July 27, 2013)

More acts and the festival’s annual award honorees will be announced June 5, 2013.

In the meantime, JFL even has a highlight teaser reel featuring a mix of performances and promos via selfies to show you. Roll the clips!

Highlights for Just For Laughs Montreal in 2013

  • Talk Of The Fest at Club Soda — hosts include SNL’s Taran Killam & Bobby Moynihan, and Kristen Schaal
  • Amy Schumer at Metropolis
  • Colin Quinn’s one-man show, “Unconstitutional”
  • Colin Mochrie and Brad Sherwood improvising
  • Hannibal Buress performing solo, as well as hosting Hip Hop Karaoke
  • Bo Burnham, Nick Kroll and Danny Bhoy return with solo shows…they’ll be joined by efforts from Tig Notaro, Pete Holmes, Trevor Noah, Judah Friedlander and Marc Maron
  • Themed showcases include The Ethnic Show hosted by Shaun Majumder, Date Night: The Relationship Show hosted by Godfrey, Bobby Slayton and Jimmy Carr presenting The Nasty Show, Le Bilingual Show hosted by Mike Ward, Britcom presented by ex-pat Rich Hall, and The Bar Mitzvah Show with Elon Gold

And, of course, there are industry buzz-buzz showcases such as The New Faces of Comedy, The Homegrown Comedy Competition, Variety’s Ten Comics To Watch and so forth and so on.

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.

View all posts by Sean L. McCarthy →

One thought on “Just For Laughs Montreal 2013: Colin Quinn to keynote; Joan Rivers, Eddie Izzard, Sarah Silverman, Seth Meyers hosting Galas

Comments are closed.