The Definitive Guide to Comedy
The annual Del Close Marathon brings the founders of the Upright Citizens Brigade together along with thousands of performers from around the world, celebrating their late improv guru Del Close by improvising comedy shows around the clock for a three-day-and-night weekend. In its 18th year, the UCB4 – Amy Poehler, …
Here’s what I know about Yannis Pappas. He’s a native New Yorker. He’s gotten shot. He’s a sneakerhead. He’s Greek. In fact, so Greek he has performed in character as Mr. Panos, which is not to be confused with when he performs as a Puerto Rican transsexual named Maurica (More-eeesa). …
Robert Kelly plays the Heathens drummer Bam Bam on Denis Leary’s FX series, Sex&Drugs&Rock&Roll, which begins its second season this Thursday, and popularized the double-meal deal, Bang Bang, playing Louis CK’s brother Bobby on the award-winning FX series, Louie. He hilariously chastised me for combining the two things, Bam Bam! …
Welcome to our 100th episode together of The Comic’s Comic Presents Last Things First. This isn’t like the other episodes, and not just because it’s our 100th episode – I mean, is any sit-down with Doug Stanhope normal, exactly? Even though Stanhope and I haven’t sat down together in more …
Gary Gulman is the tallest funniest Jew I know, and I’ve known him personally since 2004, when he competed on seasons two and three of NBC’s Last Comic Standing. Gulman went to Boston College on a football scholarship but found his goal line in stand-up comedy a few months after …
Jay Oakerson’s first TV credit was on BET. Big Jay started stand-up comedy in all-black rooms in Philadelphia, and now he’s playing to everyone while often relying on his sharp wit to riff with the crowds in the moment. He hosts an all-crowd-work series Big Jay Oakerson’s What’s Your F@#king …
Matt Balaker is writing a book about Greg Giraldo; scratch that, he’s writing THE book on Greg Giraldo, as there hasn’t been a proper biography about the outrageously witty stand-up comedian since he died in 2010 at the age of only 44. Balaker, a comedian himself, has interviewed more than …
Kevin Bartini is a stand-up comedian and writer who audiences see first when they attend tapings of The Nightly Show with Larry Wilmore on Comedy Central. Bartini also has warmed up TV audiences for The Colbert Report, The Daily Show, and sometimes now The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. He …
At 83, Dick Gregory remains an active comedy legend, logging more than 200 stand-up gigs a year. Gregory changed the game in 1961 when he performed at Hugh Hefner’s Playboy Club in Chicago, and the notoriety of becoming the first black comedian to play to white crowds led him soon thereafter …
Quincy Jones is the birth name for a legendary music producer from Seattle, and also the stage name for a 32-year-old stand-up comedian who had moved from Seattle to Los Angeles to pursue his comedy dreams. In one year, comedian Quincy Jones (his birth name is Quami Wallen, but he’ll explain that …
