The Comedy Store

Well, that was funny.

Our little party consisted of Lindsay, Kyle, and Sam, Paige, Drew, and Tracey. One more person than required. That's a "bringer show". You have to bring people. For this one I had to bring at least five.

I had never been to The Comedy Store before. I had read about its history in a very good book called I'm Dying Up Here by William Knoedelseder. The show I was in last night was in The Belly Room and it was produced by Cindy Liebman, a.k.a. Crazy Cindy. I didn't get to explore the whole place, but the area around the Belly Room was pretty interesting. So many offshoots, corridors, stairs and goofy rooms. Very interesting place. The Belly Room, which was created as a dedicated space for female comics but now just functions as the club's small room, holds about 80 people. They had some trouble with the mikes cutting out. I'm guessing a short in the cord. Fortunately, for me it behaved itself.

Sitting backstage and in the green room was interesting. All the other comics, besides Cindy and me, were young guys. I had taken my uke out and tuned it up when the lights in the green room suddenly went out. No one ever figured out what happened there. We all went out to the backstage area to watch the show.

Cindy opened the show. She's not called Crazy Cindy fer nuthin'. She's an in-your-face comic, and she had a good time with my family and friends sitting in the front row. She asked Paige about her boobs, she asked Kyle how he masturbates (his brilliant answer- Manually!), and apparently, Drew and Tracey are now married. Then she brought out a couple comics. Since this was a bringer show, the quality of the performances was quite a bit more uneven than anything I have seen at Flappers. Some of the guys were pretty good, a couple of them were rambling, and one of them was downright hostile to the audience. Newsflash, dude. If the audience doesn't laugh at your jokes, it's not their fault.

Then it was my turn. I don't really remember everything I said. After letting the audience know that it was my family in the front row, I asked Paige about her boobs and I asked Kyle how he masturbates. I made a joke about being from Riverside (people seem to think that's funny), and then I sang the Bosom song. People laughed. Right in the middle of the song a young guy ran up on stage and hugged me! That was hilarious! Someone actually planted his face in my bosom! After that I did Phone Sex. I always close with Phone Sex. I was vaguely aware of some loud conversation in the back of the room, but I plowed on through. And then I was done. I have played the Comedy Store.

We stayed for the rest of the show, which was a bit too long. I was tempted to sneak up and tell my group it was ok to leave, but they were almost half the audience. After the show we chatted out in front for a little while and then said goodnight. I feel pretty good about the whole thing. It was pretty much as I expected.

Thank you to everyone who came out to support me. Cindy has booked me for December 6th. I think that might be he last bringer show I'll do for a while. I think it's a lot to ask my loved ones to plop down $30 on a ticket and two drinks for a show of questionable quality.

I'm glad I did it, and now I have one more credit to add to my bio.