List of stand-up circuits

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Stand-up comedians are selected for bookings on the basis of how clean or dirty their act is, their popularity, and their ability to draw an audience. [1] [2] [3] Circuit runners, agents, and production companies have the power to make or break a comedian's career. [4]

Contents

Defunct circuits

Defunct American circuits

Lecture circuit

The lecture circuit hosted the US's precursory stand-up comedians, with humorists like Artemus Ward and Mark Twain. [5] [6] [7] Twain prepared, rehearsed, revised and adapted his material for his popular humorous presentations. [8] [9]

Theatre Owners Booking Association (T.O.B.A.)

TOBA was started in 1912 by comedian Sherman H. Dudley in response to segregation and discrimination from social clubs, circuits, and unions. [10] [11]

Keith-Albee circuit and Orpheum circuit

In the era of vaudeville, the United Booking Office (UBO) controlled all the high-end theaters; Keith's controlled everything east of Chicago and Orpheum controlled Chicago and everything to the west of it. [12]

Chitlin' Circuit

The Chitlin' Circuit was a "collection of all-black venues, clubs, [and] theaters". [13] [14] Reopened during the Harlem Renaissance in 1934, the Apollo Theater was the performers' most sought after venue. [15] [16] Notable performers for this circuit include Richard Pryor, Moms Mabley, Dick Gregory, Redd Foxx, and the duo Tim and Tom. [17]

Borscht Belt

Also called the Jewish Alps, they hired performers that included stand-up comedians. [18] The Catskill Mountains are depicted in The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel . [18] The booking agency, Charles Rapp Enterprises controlled most of the Catskill resorts—owning the two largest: the Concord and Grossinger's. [19]

Playboy comedy circuit

Before the advent of full-fledged American comedy clubs, Hugh Hefner created a chain of Playboy Clubs and employed people like Dick Gregory, [20] [21] Mort Sahl, Steve Martin, and Lenny Bruce. [18] [22] [23] [24] [25] Hugh Hefner ok'd Burns and Carlin at the Playboy Club Tonight, which was not recorded in a Playboy club.

Defunct Australian circuits

Tivoli circuit

The Tivoli circuit was Australian vaudeville from the late 1800s to the mid-1900s. [26]

Contemporary circuits

Def comedy jam circuit

In its original form, HBO's "Def Comedy Jam" was an alternative to the club circuit, providing opportunities to black stand-ups and has since grown into something larger. [27] [28] The stylistic origins of the Def Jam comedy genre directly borrow from the hip-hop scene and the rap "arena". [29] [30]

Open mic circuit (UK)

The open mic scene is referred to as the open mic circuit in the United Kingdom. [31] [32] [33]

College circuit

There are two associations that lead the college circuit: the Association for the Promotion of Campus Activities (APCA) (which has 200 member colleges) and the National Association for Campus Activities (NACA) (which has 1,100 member colleges). [34] Comedians in the US and Canada audition for NACA to hundreds of college and university bookers, [35] first with a 90-second video submission, and then a ten-minute, in-person audition to perform hour-long sets. [36] Sets must not trigger students by "punching down", contain any denigrating material, [37] or contain dark or blue humor; it must be "intelligent humor" [36] and contain subjects that college-aged adults express contempt for. [38] Higher education, that was once seen as the bastion of free speech is now criticized by some comedians for being too PC (politically correct). [35] Some stand-ups no longer perform at colleges and universities due to an incompatibility with new audiences. [39] [40] [41] [42] [43]

Cruise circuit (CLIA)

The Cruise Lines International Association contains 60 cruise liners. Comedians work an average of two days per week; this circuit is said to not aid in moving up in the field. [44] Cruiseliners have both clean comedy and blue comedy at different times during the day, but opinionated political material is frowned upon. [45] Hecklers are tolerated more in a cruise setting. [46]

Corporate circuit

In the UK, corporate gigs are called corporates. [47] Corporate circuit comedy must be clean comedy that neither swears nor references sexual acts; [48] church (or "squeaky clean") comedy is preferred; two celebrities that perform this type of comedy are Jim Gaffigan and Brian Regan. [49] In a lecture given at the University of Oxford, Stewart Lee stated that his character is unable to do corporate gigs, because he takes on the role of being superior to his audience. [50] [51]

USO Tours

Starting in 1941 and continuing to the present, the United Service Organizations is a nonprofit corporation that employs performers like stand-up comedians for the entertainment of the United States troops and its allies. [52] During WWII, there were four sub-circuits: the Victory Circuit and Blue Circuit entertained stateside military personnel, the Hospital Circuit performers visited the wounded and the Foxhole Circuit performers went overseas. [53]

Christian comedy circuit (CCA)

The Christian Comedy Association started in the 90s, in an attempt to use comedy as a "spiritual vehicle." [54] Comedian Doug Stanhope has criticized Christian comedy. [54] Heckling is almost nonexistent in the church circuit. [54] Christian comedy is clean comedy that claims to help one's soul. [55]

Late night television circuit

This form of variety entertainment gives emerging and notable headliners guest spots to deliver their "tight five". [56]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Vaudeville</span> Entertainment genre

Vaudeville is a theatrical genre of variety entertainment which began in France at the end of the 19th century. A vaudeville was originally a comedy without psychological or moral intentions, based on a comical situation: a dramatic composition or light poetry, interspersed with songs or ballets. It became popular in the United States and Canada from the early 1880s until the early 1930s, while changing over time.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Stand-up comedy</span> Comedy style where the performer addresses the audience directly

Stand-up comedy is a performance directed to a live audience, where the performer stands on a stage and delivers humorous and satirical monologues sometimes incorporating physical acts. These performances are typically composed of rehearsed scripts but often include varying degrees of live crowd interaction. Stand-up comedy consists of one-liners, stories, observations, or shticks that can employ props, music, impressions, magic tricks, or ventriloquism.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Humorist</span> Intellectual who uses humor in writing or public speaking

A humorist is an intellectual who uses humor, or wit, in writing or public speaking. A raconteur is one who tells anecdotes in a skillful and amusing way.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pigmeat Markham</span> American entertainer (1904–1981)

Dewey "Pigmeat" Markham was an African American entertainer. Though best known as a comedian, Markham was also a singer, dancer, and actor. His nickname came from a stage routine, in which he declared himself to be "Sweet Poppa Pigmeat". He was sometimes credited in films as Pigmeat "Alamo" Markham.

Alternative comedy is a term coined in the 1980s for a style of comedy that makes a conscious break with the mainstream comedic style of an era. The phrase has had different connotations in different contexts: in the UK, it was used to describe content that was an "alternative" to the mainstream stand-up of the day which took place in working men's clubs, and was characterised by unoriginal gags often containing elements of sexism and racism. In other contexts, it is the nature of the form that is "alternative", avoiding reliance on a standardised structure of a sequence of jokes with punch lines. Patton Oswalt has defined it as "comedy where the audience has no pre-set expectations about the crowd, and vice versa. In comedy clubs, there tends to be a certain vibe—alternative comedy explores different types of material."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Open mic</span> Live show at a variety of different clubs

An open mic or open mike is a live show at a venue such as a coffeehouse, nightclub, comedy club, strip club, or pub, usually taking place at night, in which audience members may perform on stage whether they are amateurs or professionals, often for the first time or to promote an upcoming performance. As the name suggests, performers are usually provided with a microphone plugged into a PA system so that they can be heard by the audience.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Moms Mabley</span> American comedian and actress (1897–1975)

Loretta Mary Aiken, known by her stage name Jackie "Moms" Mabley, was an American stand-up comedian and actress. Mabley began her career on the theater stage in the 1920s and became a veteran entertainer of the Chitlin' Circuit of black vaudeville. Mabley later recorded comedy albums and appeared in films and on television programs including The Ed Sullivan Show and The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour.

Theatre Owners Booking Association, or T.O.B.A., was the vaudeville circuit for African American performers in the 1920s. The theaters mostly had white owners, though about a third of them had Black owners, including the recently restored Morton Theater in Athens, Georgia, originally operated by "Pinky" Monroe Morton, and Douglass Theatre in Macon, Georgia owned and operated by Charles Henry Douglass. Theater owners booked jazz and blues musicians and singers, comedians, and other performers, including the classically trained, such as operatic soprano Sissieretta Jones, known as "The Black Patti", for black audiences.

The Chitlin' Circuit was a collection of performance venues found throughout the eastern, southern, and upper Midwest areas of the United States. They provided commercial and cultural acceptance for African-American musicians, comedians, and other entertainers following the era of venues run by the "white-owned-and-operated Theatre Owners Booking Association (TOBA)...formed in 1921." The Chitlin Circuit sustained black musicians and dancers during the era of racial segregation in the United States from the 1930s through the 1960s.

American humor refers collectively to the conventions and common threads that tie together humor in the United States. It is often defined in comparison to the humor of another country – for example, how it is different from British humor and Canadian humor. It is, however, difficult to say what makes a particular type or subject of humor particularly American. Humor usually concerns aspects of American culture, and depends on the historical and current development of the country's culture. The extent to which an individual will personally find something humorous obviously depends on a host of absolute and relative variables, including, but not limited to geographical location, culture, maturity, level of education, and context. People of different countries will therefore find different situations funny. Just as American culture has many aspects which differ from other nations, these cultural differences may be a barrier to how humor translates to other countries.

Tony T. Roberts is an American comedian. He has appeared on HBO's Def Comedy Jam, BET's ComicView, and It's Showtime at the Apollo.

Terry Scanlon was an Australian comedian and pantomime artist. He was one of Australia's top comedians; he worked with some of the early greats of Australian comedy, including Roy Rene and George Wallace. In the 1930s, however, he was one of the vanguards to modernise comedy out of baggy suits, funny face make up and slapstick into the more modern stand up style comedian - in a tailored suit, the only prop a cigarette in hand, delivering gags. His role in the evolution of Australian comedy was acknowledged in a tribute by Joe Martin when he was honoured as a life member of the "ECHINDAS" by his peers years later.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Otto Petersen</span> American ventriloquist and comedian (1960–2014)

Otto Sol Petersen was an American ventriloquist, comedian, and actor known for his act Otto and George, which he performed with his dummy George Dudley. Petersen began performing with George as a street act in Manhattan and Brooklyn in the early 1970s. In the late 1970s the act moved into night clubs and began to evolve into an "X-rated" act.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Gary Owen (comedian)</span> American comedian and actor (born 1974)

Gary Owen is an American stand-up comedian and actor. He has cultivated a large African-American following after headlining on cable channel BET and performing at targeted events, such as Shaquille O'Neal's All-Star Comedy Jam Tour. After being named "Funniest Serviceman in America", his big break came in 1997 on Black Entertainment Television's stand-up showcase Comic View. Owen followed this debut with featured roles in the films Daddy Day Care, Little Man, and College. In 2016, he was in a TV show on BET called The Gary Owen Show.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Black Vaudeville</span> Vaudeville-era African American entertainment

Black Vaudeville is a term that specifically describes Vaudeville-era African American entertainers and the milieus of dance, music, and theatrical performances they created. Spanning the years between the 1880s and early 1930s, these acts not only brought elements and influences unique to American black culture directly to African Americans but ultimately spread them beyond to both white American society and Europe.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jay Jason</span>

Jay Jason was an American stand-up comedian who continuously performed in the show-business industry from 1933 to 2000.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nick Reynoldson</span> Canadian stand-up comedian

Nick Reynoldson is a Canadian stand-up comedian and writer.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Denver D. Ferguson</span> American journalist

Denver Darious Ferguson Sr. was an American businessman and nightclub owner in Indianapolis, who had a leading role in establishing the "Chitlin' Circuit" of United States entertainment venues for black entertainers and audiences in the 1930s and 1940s. Earlier in his career he established a newspaper, The Edmonson County Star, in his home town of Brownsville, Kentucky, before moving to Indianapolis, where he established a printing company. His younger brother, Sea Ferguson, helped in the print shop and with Denver's other business ventures.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Adrianne Tolsch</span> American comedian

Adrianne Tolsch was an American comedian. Tolsch's comedy style is bold, conversational, and covers broad topics. She made jokes about life as a middle-age woman, her sex life, her Jewish identity and Jewish family, and life experiences. She was long associated with the Catch a Rising Star comedy club in New York City, as a performer, club manager, and the club's first woman emcee. She was a headliner at many major comedy clubs in the United States and toured domestically and internationally. She also performed on Broadway and in cabaret shows and was a graphic artist. She was married to fellow comedian and writer Bill Scheft. The two toured together in the United States and co-produced the documentary film Take My Nose... Please!

Modern stand-up comedy began around the turn of the century, evolving from a variety of sources including minstrel shows and vaudeville. Early stand-up comedians spoke directly to the audience as themselves without props or costumes, which distinguished these acts from vaudeville performances. These comics stood in front of the curtain during their shows, like early 20th century "front cloth" stand-up comics in Britain and Ireland whose numbers allowed the stage behind them to be re-set for another act.

References

  1. ↑ Shouse, Eric (2020). "Shit Talking and Ass Kicking: Heckling, Physical Violence and Realistic Death Threats in Stand-Up Comedy". In Oppliger, Patrice A.; Shouse, Eric (eds.). The Dark Side of Stand-up Comedy. United Kingdom: Springer Nature Switzerland AG: Palgrave Macmillan. p. 253. doi:10.1007/978-3-030-37214-9_12. ISBN   978-3-030-37213-2. Profanity is commonplace in contemporary stand-up comedy (so much so that 'clean comedy' is a marketable commodity).
  2. ↑ Quirk, Sophie (November 2011). "Containing the Audience: The 'Room' in Stand-Up Comedy" (PDF). University of Kent, UK. Participations: Journal of Audience & Reception Studies. 8 (2): 221. Retrieved 27 December 2020. Across the UK, there are hundreds of small, informal gigs that run on enthusiasm, for little or no financial profit. It is in these that most comedians get their start. They learn their craft and gradually work their way up through larger audiences and more prestigious venues. The lucky minority come to a point where they can tour their own show, their fame perhaps fuelled by appearances on television. The very few become famous enough to graduate to the arena gigs or produce a best-selling DVD. Importantly, it is the live circuit of small-to-medium gigs which fuels the upper echelons of the comedy industry, training and nurturing the talent that big business will adopt. In this sense, those small-to-medium rooms are fundamental to all levels of stand-up production.
  3. ↑ Brodie, Ian (2014). "Stand-Up Comedy Broadcasts". A Vulgar Art: A New Approach to Stand-up Comedy. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi. p. 162. ISBN   978-1-62846-182-4. Obscenity and other risky material are not inherently part of stand-up comedy, but their avoidance can require a self-censoring and circumnavigation of certain topics that might not be present in conversation among intimates ... [t]ogether the performer and the audience negotiate what is appropriate and what is inappropriate.
  4. ↑ Quirk, Sophie (2018). The Politics of British Stand-Up Comedy: The New Alternative. Palgrave Studies in Comedy. London, UK: palgrave macmillan. p. 99. doi:10.1007/978-3-030-01105-5. ISBN   978-3-030-01104-8. LCCN   2018956867. The power to elevate comedians to fame and fortune lies in the hands of a small number of businesses, particularly agents and production companies, along with commissioners for major broadcast media.
  5. ↑ Henderson, Archibald (14 July 2004) [1911]. Mark Twain. Duckworth & Company. Retrieved 18 August 2020. Mr. Clemens [Twain] once remarked to me ... 'When I first began to lecture, and in my earlier writings, my sole idea was to make comic capital out of everything I saw and heard. My object was not to tell the truth, but to make people laugh. I treated my readers as unfairly as I treated everybody else—eager to betray them at the end with some monstrous absurdity or some extravagant anti-climax.'
  6. ↑ Mintz, Lawrence E. (Spring 1985). "Special Issue: American Humor" (PDF). American Quarterly . 37 (1). The Johns Hopkins University Press: 72. doi:10.2307/2712763. JSTOR   2712763 . Retrieved 2 August 2020. The lecture circuit in the nineteenth century supported dozens of successful humorists, the most famous of whom were Mark Twain and Artemus Ward
  7. ↑ Lee, Judith Yaross (2006). "Mark Twain as a Stand-up Comedian". The Mark Twain Annual. 4 (4). Penn State University Press: 5. JSTOR   41582220. [Mark Twain] toured his first lecture, usually known as 'Our Fellow Savages of the Sandwich Islands,' for 100 performances beginning in 1866
  8. ↑ Zacks, Richard (2016). Chasing the Last Laugh - Mark Twain's raucous and redemptive round-the-world-comedy-tour. New York, London: Doubleday. ISBN   9780385536448.
  9. ↑ Lee, Judith Yaross (2006). "Mark Twain as a Stand-up Comedian". The Mark Twain Annual. 4 (4). Penn State University Press: 7. JSTOR   41582220. Artemus Ward, a spoof of P.T. Barnum, did displace Charles Farrar Browne [AKA Ward] as the persona evolved from print into the more generic deadpan burlesque preacher of the lecture platform ... Twain's deadpan self-deprecations ... [were] borrowed from Ward
  10. ↑ Wertheim, Arthur Frank (2006). "Part 5 Vaudevillians Versus the Combine[:] 12. A Host of Grievances". Vaudeville Wars: How the Keith-Albee and Orpheum Circuits Controlled the Big-Time and Its Performers. Palgrave Studies in Theatre and Performance History. Palgrave Macmillan. pp. 179–180. ISBN   0-2306-1136-2. Discrimination by the 'White Rats' union and white-only social clubs ... caused African Americans to form their own organizations ... formed the [social organization, the] Frogs in 1908 ... [and] the Colored Vaudeville Benevolent Association (CVBA) established in 1909 ... With limited access to white-owned vaudeville circuits, blacks were forced to operate their own chains. The first all-black circuit was formed in 1912-13 by Sherman H. Dudley, a former minstrel player and a well-known comedian, who operated more than twenty-eight theaters. In 1920, Dudley helped form the Theater Owners' Booking Association (TOBA), a circuit which grew to more than eighty theaters. The TOBA programs featured all-black touring shows, especially tabloid musical comedies highlighted by popular singing and comedy acts. The shows helped popularize blues and jazz  ... The frequent daily performances, long routes, and low pay on the TOBA tour caused black entertainers to label it the Chitlin Circuit that was 'Tough on Black Actors' or 'Asses.'
  11. ↑ Double, Oliver (2014) [2005]. Getting the Joke: the inner workings of stand-up comedy (2nd ed.). New York: Bloomsbury Methuen Drama. p. 24. ISBN   978-1-4081-7460-9. Small-time vaudeville included the venues run by the Theatre Owners Booking Association (TOBA), which booked black acts and attracted black audiences.
  12. ↑ Oliar, Dotan; Sprigman, Christopher (2008). "There's No Free Laugh (Anymore): The Emergence of Intellectual Property Norms and the Transformation of Stand-Up Comedy". Virginia Law Review. 94 (8): 1846. JSTOR   25470605 . Retrieved 16 September 2020. [M]ost vaudeville theatres were part of vaudeville circuits, or chains. Vaudeville's high-end (or 'big-time') theatres were organized into two dominant circuits, separated geographically so that they did not compete. The big-time vaudeville circuits cooperated in booking performers centrally through an arrangement known as the United Booking Office ('UBO'). The 'small-time' vaudeville business, although somewhat more competitive, was still dominated by the same Keith and Orpheum circuits that controlled the big-time business ... If a performer wanted to do an act in any place important, they would have to go through the UBO ... Keith's controls all houses east of Chicago; while Orpheum functions in Chicago and all points west. Both book from the same floor of the Palace Theatre Buildings in New York ... a bloc of from 300 to 350 'Small Time' vaudeville theatres in which Keith's and Orpheum are either owners, or control the policies of the theatres through their bookings.
  13. ↑ Wayne Federman (18 June 2019). "S2 EP. 03: THE APOLLO AND THE CHITLIN' CIRCUIT". The History of Standup (Podcast). The Podglomerate.Learn. Event occurs at 3:12-4:00. Retrieved 17 August 2019. The Chitlin' Circuit was a collection of all-black venues, clubs, [and] theaters—that was in the United States during the era of, basically racial segregation, and this is not just in the South my friend. This is in the North as well, where a lot of African-American families came north during what's called the Great Migration and a number of clubs opened up specifically in these neighborhoods—which were redlined—and subsequently launched some of the greatest music and comedy acts we've ever known. And so the Apollo Theater was in the chitlin circuit. Not only in it, the crown jewel.
  14. ↑ Nesteroff, Kliph (22 December 2015). "Make 'Em Laugh: 'The Comedians' Tells The Story Of Stand-Up". NPR. Retrieved 20 August 2019. The Chitlin' Circuit was African-American comedians performing for African-American audiences because comedy was segregated back then ... But it was not acceptable in those days for a black comedian to address a white crowd, because as a comedian on stage, you are superior to your audience. You are giving them your point of view — and in those days it wasn't allowed, so the Chitlin' Circuit alleviated that thing.
  15. ↑ McNary, Dave (13 February 2019). "Apollo Theater Documentary Selected as Tribeca Festival Opener". Variety. Retrieved 20 August 2019. The Apollo began operating in 1934 during the Harlem Renaissance and became the most prized venue on the 'Chitlin' Circuit' during the time of racial segregation in the United States.
  16. ↑ Davis, Andrew (2014) [2011]. Baggy Pants Comedy: Burlesque and the Oral Tradition. Palgrave Studies in Theatre and Performance History. Palgrave Macmillan. p. 38. ISBN   978-1-137-37872-9. The famed Apollo Theater on 125th Street was built as a burlesque house in 1913 and was operated as one until 1934, when new owners made it famous as a variety house for the African American community.
  17. ↑ Barnes, Mo (9 January 2019). "A conversation with Luenell: When does Black comedy become hurtful?". rollingout. Retrieved 20 August 2019. Comedians such as Redd Foxx, Dick Gregory, Richard Pryor and Moms Mabley were popular first in clubs on the 'Chitlin' Circuit' in urban hubs.
  18. 1 2 3 "What Hugh Hefner did for comedy". Chortle. 28 September 2017. Retrieved 17 August 2019. [Hugh Hefner's] clubs providing a bridge between the old-school resorts of the Catskill mountains and the comedy club explosion of the 1980s.
  19. ↑ Nesteroff, Kliph (2015). "Nightclubs". The Comedians: Drunks, Thieves, Scoundrels and the History of American Comedy. New York, NY: Grove Press. pp. 73, 74, 75. ISBN   978-0-8021-2568-2. There were Mob-run roadhouses along the highway leading to the Catskills, but the Mountain resorts themselves were family operations. The demise of vaudeville allowed the area to gain traction as unemployed vaudevillians chased a paycheck ... with affordable prices and like-minded people, it earned the famous nickname 'the Borscht Belt.' ... Catskill crowds could be difficult ... The Catskills were dominated by one major booking agency ... A booker for MCA in the 1930s, [Charlie] Rapp amassed a large network of showbiz connections and went independent in 1942 ... Charles Rapp Enterprises monopolized the Mountains, booking talent for the largest and most important Catskill resorts—the Concord and Grossinger's ... The Catskills endured for several decades.
  20. ↑ Double, Oliver (2014) [2005]. Getting the Joke: the inner workings of stand-up comedy (2nd ed.). New York: Bloomsbury Methuen Drama. p. 29. ISBN   978-1-4081-7460-9. [Dick] Gregory started off on the Chitlin Circuit, and got his big break with a booking at the Playboy Club in Chicago on 13 January 1960.
  21. ↑ Parker, Ryan (27 September 2017). "Hugh Hefner Gave Dick Gregory His Big Break". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved 17 August 2019.
  22. ↑ Wayne Federman (11 June 2019). "S2 Ep. 02: The Playboy Circuit". Apple Podcasts (Podcast). The Podglomerate.Learn. Event occurs at 0:00-2:07. Retrieved 17 August 2019. Hugh Hefner ... decides in 1960 ... to open a club in Chicago called the Playboy Club and then opens a number of these clubs all around the country, creates this circuit where comedians ... this is before comedy clubs.
  23. ↑ Wayne Federman (11 June 2019). "S2 Ep. 02: The Playboy Circuit". Apple Podcasts (Podcast). Tom Dreesen. The Podglomerate.Learn. Event occurs at 23:00-23:30. Retrieved 17 August 2019. When I started out in show business, there were no comedy clubs. Every nightclub in America had a comic ... They [Playboy] had two showrooms, The Penthouse and The Playroom ... When they're ready to start the show ... The girl singer would go on and do 3 or 4 songs and then, she would finish, and we'd come on and we'd be doing like 45 minutes and she would do 15 like minutes
  24. ↑ Wayne Federman (11 June 2019). "S2 Ep. 02: The Playboy Circuit". Apple Podcasts (Podcast). Dick Capri. The Podglomerate.Learn. Event occurs at 24:30-25:20. Retrieved 17 August 2019. They [Playboy] gave you nothing ... they did not pay transportation and they did not pay for the hotel room; you could eat there where the employees ate ... and the top money at that time was a 1,000 dollars a week, and I did not get that; Jackie Gayle, he was the top comedian of the playboy clubs in those days you know, and I got $500 a week.
  25. ↑ Martin, Steve (2007). Born Standing Up: A Comic's Life . New York: Scribner. pp.  156. ISBN   978-1-4165-5364-9. In March 1975 my agent, Mart Klein, secured a job in San Francisco, two weeks headlining the Playboy Club for fifteen hundred dollars per week
  26. ↑ "National Library of Australia" (PDF). January 2015.
  27. ↑ Cohen, Sandy (11 September 2017). "Chappelle, Lawrence, Hughley celebrate 'Def Comedy Jam 25'". Associated Press. Retrieved 4 August 2020. The only way for standup comedians to find an audience beyond the club circuit back then was to score a spot on TV, and 'Def Comedy Jam' provided that opportunity for black comics, including Martin Lawrence, Dave Chappelle, D.L. Hughley, Sheryl Underwood and Cedric the Entertainer ... Lawrence hosted the original 'Def Comedy Jam' series as the same time he was starring in his own network sitcom in 1992.
  28. ↑ WILLIAMS, FRANK B. (13 March 1997). "Totally 'Def'". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved 4 August 2020. Nearly six years after exploding onto the scene and launching the careers of dozens of black comics, HBO's raunchy and wildly successful 'Def Comedy Jam' continues to be a force ... [;]Martin Lawrence ... Bill Bellamy ... John Henton ... [and] Joe Torry are some of the more well-known veterans of the 'Def Comedy Jam' circuit.
  29. ↑ Fulton, DoVeanna S. (2004). "Comic Views and Metaphysical Dilemmas: Shattering Cultural Images through Self-Definition and Representation by Black Comediennes" (PDF). Journal of American Folklore. 117 (463): 87–88. doi:10.1353/jaf.2004.0010. S2CID   36279369 . Retrieved 4 August 2020. 'Def Comedy Jam' is an extraction of the hip-hop scene: its setting, music, performers, and audience are all part of the contemporary rap arena. The stage is set very close to the audience so that comics are neither at a distance from nor at an exaggerated level above them. This setting engenders a sense of community and familiarity. Indeed, instead of the usual monologue that comedians normally present in stand-up comic situations, this setting allows for the comics to carry on a dialogue with the audience. Comedians often ask questions of the audience, and the answers are heard by nearly everyone. This dialogue is a form of the African American oral tradition of call and response, which is quite different from the hecklers mainstream comedians may encounter. Although hecklers are generally an undesirable, but often expected, aspect of stand-up comic routines, the call and response of 'Def Comedy Jam' is an essential element of African American dialogic performances. Similarly, the audience's response to the performance illustrates the connection between them and the performer. The 'Def Comedy Jam' audience is made up largely of young African Americans; the laughter is animated and boisterous. Many male audience members jump out of their seats, stand up, shout, and 'high five' one another—or even the comic— when they find an anecdote, joke, or situation particularly amusing.
  30. ↑ Brodie, Ian (2008). "Stand-up Comedy as a Genre of Intimacy". Ethnologies. 30 (2). Cape Breton University: 159. doi:10.7202/019950ar . Retrieved 15 September 2020. DoVeanna Fulton alludes to this collaboration between comedian and audience with respect to the performances on Def Comedy Jam, a series produced by Russell Simmons of Def Jam Records and originally broadcast on HBO. [Fulton states that] 'The stage is set very close to the audience so that comics are neither at a distance from nor at an exaggerated level above them. This setting engenders a sense of community and familiarity ... This setting allows for the comics to carry on a dialogue with the audience. Comedians often ask questions of the audience, and the answers are heard by nearly everyone. This dialogue is a form of African American oral tradition of call and response, which is quite different from the hecklers mainstream comedians may encounter.' 2004: 87-88
  31. ↑ Larner, Sam (25 November 2015). "What Life Is Like As an Amateur Comic On the Open-Mic Circuit". VICE UK. VICE MEDIA LLC. Retrieved 28 February 2019.
  32. ↑ "100 ways to save the open-mic circuit". Chortle. 6 September 2012. Retrieved 28 February 2019.
  33. ↑ Khorsandi, Shappi (10 July 2020). "Stand-up comedy is not considered an art, so the circuit is being left to die". The Independent. United Kingdom. Retrieved 8 August 2020. [S]ome of this country's finest comedians are the ones you might never have heard of. Only a minuscule percentage of our vast comic talent is what you see and hear on TV and radio. The rest are on the circuit ... Even before the pandemic, theatres under this government were woefully underfunded, often being run almost entirely by volunteers. Panto and touring comedy shows have become the bread and butter of many of these theatres; they bring in the punters, fund the theatre shows. You can't be a touring comedian without learning the craft in the clubs. Every megastar comedian tests their material in clubs.
  34. ↑ Schwenson, Dave (2005). Comedy FAQs and Answers: How the Stand-up Biz Really Works. New York, NY: ALLWORTH PRESS. p. 171. ISBN   1-58115-411-9.
  35. 1 2 Flanagan, Caitlin (September 2015). "That's Not Funny! Today's college students can't seem to take a joke". The Atlantic. Retrieved 26 January 2019.
  36. 1 2 Bauer-Wolf, Jeremy (30 August 2018). "College Comedy: Provocative Yet ... PC?". Inside Higher Ed. Retrieved 10 February 2019.
  37. ↑ Chris Fleming (comedian), Michael Moynihan (Vice News), Jason Meier (Emerson College booker), Kat Michael (Simmons College booker), Katy Hamm (Lesly University booker), Judy Gold (comedian) (24 May 2018). College Campuses Can Be Minefields For Comedians (HBO) (YouTube) (Streaming). Boston: VICE News Tonight: HBO. Event occurs at 3:32-3:39. Retrieved 8 February 2019. [A comedian] can talk about [their] experience, but [they] can't make fun of someone else's identity.
  38. ↑ Ellis, Iain (8 February 2018). "Haven't You Learned How to Take a Joke? The Comedy-on-Campus Debates". popMATTERS: Culture. Retrieved 10 February 2019. Thus, college comedians can mock those groups "liberal" students deride—Evangelical Christians, Scientologists, working-class rural males—yet they dare not even flirt with jokes about race, gender, and sexuality.
  39. ↑ Rich, Frank (1 December 2014). "In Conversation Chris Rock: What's killing comedy. What's saving America". Vulture: Devouring Culture. Retrieved 10 February 2019. I stopped playing colleges ... because they're way too conservative ... in their social views and their willingness not to offend anybody.
  40. ↑ Schramm, Michael (8 June 2015). "Jerry Seinfeld says comedians avoid college gigs, students are 'so PC'". USA Today. Retrieved 10 February 2019.
  41. ↑ Chris Fleming (comedian), Michael Moynihan (Vice News), Jason Meier (Emerson College booker), Kat Michael (Simmons College booker), Katy Hamm (Lesly University booker), Judy Gold (comedian) (24 May 2018). College Campuses Can Be Minefields For Comedians (HBO) (YouTube) (Streaming). Boston: VICE News Tonight: HBO. Event occurs at 4:15-4:26. Retrieved 8 February 2019. Judy Gold is one of many famous comics, including Jerry Seinfeld and Chris Rock who say they avoid playing college campuses, because they believe younger audiences can't take a joke.
  42. ↑ Ellis, Iain (8 February 2018). "Haven't You Learned How to Take a Joke? The Comedy-on-Campus Debates". popMATTERS: Culture. Retrieved 10 February 2019. It is notable that the majority of the most vociferous critics of today's student audiences—Seinfeld, Maher, Gottfried, Louis CK, Dennis Miller, Larry the Cable Guy—are middle-aged (or older), white, presumably heterosexual males ... Ricky Gervais ... too
  43. ↑ Quirk, Sophie (2015). Why Stand-up Matters: How Comedians Manipulate and Influence. New York: Bloomsbury Methuen Drama. p. 173. ISBN   978-1-4725-7893-8. [S]udden and dramatic conversions from an intensely held opinion to its opposite are not the norm at comedy nights. Comedians typically avoid playing to incompatible audiences precisely because audiences do not display this kind of adaptability.
  44. ↑ Bauer-Wolf, Jeremy (30 August 2018). "College Comedy: Provocative Yet ... PC?". Inside Higher Ed. Retrieved 10 February 2019.
  45. ↑ Golden, Fran (11 September 2014). "The best cruise lines for comedy". Great Falls Tribune. Retrieved 11 February 2019.
  46. ↑ Scott, Katherine (June 2018). "Five reasons to set sail on a comedy cruise". honey: travel. Nine Digital Pty Ltd. Retrieved 11 February 2019.
  47. ↑ Quirk, Sophie (November 2011). "Containing the Audience: The 'Room' in Stand-Up Comedy" (PDF). University of Kent, UK. Participations: Journal of Audience & Reception Studies. 8 (2): 234. Retrieved 27 December 2020. The most profitable gigs are the ones generally cited as the artistic nadir; the stag and hen dos and the notorious 'corporates'. While a good gig ensures that everything works together to support the comedy, the gig provided as a sideshow at a big party confronts the comedian with an audience who have other priorities.
  48. ↑ Corely, Jerry. "Corporate Comedy". Jerry Corley's Comedy Clinic. Stand Up Comedy Clinic. Retrieved 11 February 2019.
  49. ↑ Goodale, Gloria; Wood, Daniel B. (9 July 2016). "Why clean comedy is becoming big business". The Christian Science Monitor. The Christian Science Monitor. Retrieved 11 February 2019.
  50. ↑ Stewart Lee (3 July 2013). On Not Writing (Lecture) (YouTube). St Edmund Hall: University of Oxford. Event occurs at 46:40-47:40. Retrieved 13 February 2019. I can't ever do the lucrative, corporate gigs that ... because in that ... people can get paid a lot of money for doing half an hour at a bankers' convention, but you have to be the sort of person that appears to please people ... [and not treat them as] deficient
  51. ↑ Greene, Grace F. (2012). "Rhetoric in Comedy: How Comedians Use Persuasion and How Society Uses Comedians". The Corinthian: The Journal of Student Research at Georgia College. 13 (11): 136. Retrieved 26 January 2021. [T]he superiority theory supports the idea that certain things are found to be humorous when an audience feels victorious (Meyer, 2000). It could be argued that all forms of humor, even the most subtle, are simply developments of this theory and that 'the pleasure we take in humor derives from our feeling of superiority over those we laugh at' (Monro, 1997).
  52. ↑ "Hope for America: Performers, Politics and Pop Culture: Entertaining the Troops". Bob Hope Gallery of American Entertainment. Library of Congress (exhibit). Ground Floor, Thomas Jefferson Building. Retrieved 4 August 2020. Beginning in May 1941 and continuing for nearly fifty years, Hope brought his variety show to military camps and war zones to entertain troops with song, dance, comedy, attractive women, and people in the news.
  53. ↑ Gohn, Sandi (5 June 2019). "USO Camp Shows, D-Day and Entertaining Troops on the European Front Lines in WWII". USO.org. USO, Inc. Retrieved 4 August 2020. [I]n October 1941, the USO worked with entertainment executives to create a new branch of the organization called USO Camp Shows, Inc. That month, it sent its first overseas tour, featuring comedians Laurel and Hardy, Chico Marx, and Broadway tap dancer and film star Mitzi Mayfair to the Caribbean to entertain troops ... This sub-branch of the organization was organized into four circuits – the Victory Circuit, the Blue Circuit, the Hospital Circuit and the Foxhole Circuit. The Victory and Blue Circuit troupes entertained stateside military personnel, while the Hospital Circuit troupes were tasked with visiting the wounded and the Foxhole Circuit troupes headed overseas ... As stated in the 1944 guide given to all USO Foxhole Circuit performers, 'You're in the Army now.' ... By V-E Day, the USO was putting on 700 shows per day all around the world and, by the end of the war, had sent over 7,300 entertainers overseas to perform for the troops. Together, they put on an estimated 420,000 performances for over 130 million service member attendees ... Although big-name stars like Edward G. Robinson, Ann Sheridan, Bing Crosby, Mickey Rooney, traveled to Europe post D-Day, the large majority of USO performers were lesser-known acts.
  54. 1 2 3 Leon, Harmon (1 July 2015). "God's Comics: Inside the World of Christian Stand-Up". VICE. VICE MEDIA LLC. Retrieved 18 February 2019.
  55. ↑ Posten, Bruce (15 August 2014). "Christian ventriloquist Ryan Bomgardner believes God wants us to laugh" . Reading Eagle. Retrieved 18 February 2019. I define Christian comedy as clean comedy that can be good for the soul. I believe God wants us to laugh
  56. ↑ Quirk, Sophie (2015). Why Stand-up Matters: How Comedians Manipulate and Influence. New York: Bloomsbury Methuen Drama. p. 157. ISBN   978-1-4725-7893-8. Television is seen as an essentially conservative medium, which limits the range of comic material presented, and marginalizes the more revolutionary work that takes place on the live circuit.
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