Steve Byrne

Last updated
Steve Byrne
Steve Byrne at ATX TV Festival 2014 Sullivan and Son.jpg
Byrne at the ATX TV Festival 2014 for Sullivan & Son
Born (1974-07-21) July 21, 1974 (age 49)
Freehold, New Jersey
Medium Stand-up
NationalityAmerican
Years active1997–present
Genres Observational comedy, Character comedy, Black comedy
Subject(s)Korean-American culture, Irish-American culture, race relations, racism, self-deprecation, relationships, sex, pop culture, stereotypes
Children2
Notable works and roles Sullivan & Son

Steve Byrne (born July 21, 1974) is an American stand-up comedian and actor. He is best known from his multiple stand up comedy hour specials; creating, writing, and starring in Sullivan & Son ; and as the writer/director of the feature film The Opening Act .

Contents

Early life and education

Byrne was born in Freehold, New Jersey. Byrne grew up in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and went to Hampton High School. He graduated from Kent State University in Kent, Ohio. His mother is Korean and his father is of Irish descent. [1] [2] Byrne has a younger brother, William.

Career

Byrne was exposed to stand up comedy while working at the comedy club Caroline's in New York City. The first time he got on stage was at Stand Up New York on September 30, 1997. [3]

In 2003, Byrne filmed the documentary film 13 or Bust, where he did 13 shows in one night at every comedy club in Manhattan, breaking the record for most sets in one night by a comedian. His Comedy Central Presents Half Hour Special premiered in 2006 and was voted the seventeenth-most-popular Comedy Central Presents by fans as part of the Standup Showdown on comedycentral.com. That same year, he did a show for Comedy Central and the troops at Ft. Irwin in 2006. Byrne has participated in USO tours of Afghanistan in June 2008, Japan and Guam in July 2009 and Afghanistan again in 2010.

He has had small parts in several films: The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard , starring Jeremy Piven and produced by Will Ferrell; Four Christmases , starring Vince Vaughn and Reese Witherspoon; and Couples Retreat , starring Vince Vaughn and Jon Favreau.

Byrne had a one-hour special on Comedy Central in 2008 titled Steve Byrne's Happy Hour. In 2010, he had another one-hour special on Comedy Central titled The Byrne Identity. He filmed his third hour special Feb. 8th in New York City in 2014, called Champion , for Netflix.

In early 2011, he toured on The Comedy Road Show with Vince Vaughn and Kevin James to promote the film The Dilemma . In the summer of 2011, he toured on The New Majority Tour with Lisa Lampanelli, Gabriel Iglesias and Russell Peters.

Byrne wrote and created with Rob Long the comedy Sullivan & Son on TBS that premiered in the summer of 2012. A second season that aired in summer of 2013. The show had an average of 2.4 million viewers per episode and was brought back for a third season with 13 episodes slated for summer of 2014. Byrne toured with the other comedians and co-stars of the show Owen Benjamin, Ahmed Ahmed and Roy Wood Jr. in support of Sullivan & Son in 2015.

In October 2017, Byrne was the supporting act for The Tenderloins in their "Impractical Jokers: Where's Larry? Tour".

Byrne spent the early part of 2018 directing a documentary about Las Vegas headliner, magician and comedian The Amazing Johnathan, entitled Always Amazin'. The documentary won best documentary film at the Sydney Lift Off Festival, Special Mention at Los Angeles Lift Off Festival, and was screened at Hollywood Now Festival, All Things Comedy Festival and Vancouver Just for Laughs Film Festival. Always Amazing was released in 2019 for free on YouTube. [4]

From 2017–2018, Byrne wrote a script while on the road about his early years in stand up comedy, which eventually became The Opening Act . Byrne also directed the film, which was released October 16, 2020.

Byrne has had several television appearances. He was featured on the NBC series The Real Wedding Crashers and a featured comedian on The Tonight Show appearing ten times. He has made appearances on Chappelle's Show , Tough Crowd with Colin Quinn , @midnight , The History Channel's "History of the Joke," Mad TV's 300th episode and Super Bowl promos on CBS with Prince and again with Bill Cowher. His stand-up has been featured on The Late Late Show , Jimmy Kimmel Live! , Last Call with Carson Daly , BET's ComicView , ABC's Good Morning America as well as Comedy Central's Premium Blend . He has appeared on the Showtime comedy series Live Nude Comedy and shot a pilot for the G4 Network based on a Japanese Game Show called Drunken Businessman. He also was the winner of the MySpace Standup Or Sitdown competition on TBS.

Byrne has been a featured comic in The Just For Laughs Festival in Montreal, the HBO US Comedy Arts Festival in Las Vegas the TBS Very Funny Festivals in Chicago and Toronto and The CanWest Comedy Fest in Vancouver. He has been part of several national comedy tours including The Jameson Comedy Tour, Vince Vaughn's Wild West Comedy Tour, and The Camel Cigarettes Sin City Tour, and his own national MySpace tour. He has opened for musical acts Kanye West, Mariah Carey on her Charmbracelet Tour, Modest Mouse, Puddle of Mudd, Spoon, Rev. Horton Heat, and Kings of Leon. Byrne has toured with The Kims of Comedy with Bobby Lee of Mad TV and Ken Jeong of NBC's Community and The Hangover .

Personal life

Byrne is married and has two children. In 2020 Byrne and his family moved from Los Angeles to Nashville. [5]

Related Research Articles

Brian Joseph Regan is an American stand-up comedian who uses observational, sarcastic, and self-deprecating humor. He is known for incorporating body language and facial expressions into his act. His performances are often described as clean as he refrains from profanity as well as taboo subject matter. Regan's material typically covers everyday events, such as shipping a package with UPS, mortgages, and visits to the optometrist. While he does not define himself as youth-oriented, Regan makes frequent references to childhood, including little league baseball, grade school spelling bees, and science projects.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dave Attell</span> American stand-up comedian

David Attell is an American stand-up comedian, actor and writer best known as the host of Comedy Central's Insomniac with Dave Attell.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Angelo Tsarouchas</span> Canadian comedian

Angelo Tsarouchas is a Canadian comedian, actor, and writer living in Los Angeles. He is known for incorporating Greek culture into his stand-up comedy routines, and has been called the "King of Greek Ethnic Comedy." He organized World Dafni Day, a celebration of Greek diaspora from Dafni, his father's birthplace.

Michael Allan MacDonald was a Canadian stand-up comedian and actor. He wrote and appeared in several films, including Mr. Nice Guy. He appeared in such television shows as the Late Show with David Letterman and The Arsenio Hall Show.

Jay Malone is a Canadian comedian from Kentville, Nova Scotia.

Nathaniel Stroman, known professionally as Earthquake, is an American stand-up comedian, actor, voice artist and radio personality. He presently hosts a radio show entitled, Quakeshouse for SiriusXM and Kevin Hart's Laugh Out Loud Network. His first Netflix special entitled Chappelle's Home Team- Legendary: Earthquake was produced by Dave Chappelle and his Magic Lemonade production entity in February of 2022.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Roy Wood Jr.</span> American comedian and actor

Roy Norris Wood Jr. is an American stand-up comedian and actor best known for his correspondent appearances on The Daily Show. A resident of Manhattan, Wood was raised in Birmingham, Alabama, and Memphis, Tennessee. After graduating from Ramsay High School in 1996, Wood began his career in stand-up comedy as the opening act for Tommy Davidson. He had a position as head writer on the WBHJ radio series Buckwilde Morning Show from 2001 to 2006. Wood has been featured on NBC's reality television series Last Comic Standing in 2010 and the TBS sitcom Sullivan & Son from 2011 to 2014. He formerly hosted two podcasts for Comedy Central: Roy's Job Fair and Beyond the Scenes.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Wayne Federman</span> American comedian

Wayne Federman is an American comedian, actor, author, writer, comedy historian, producer, and musician. He is noted for numerous stand-up comedy appearances in clubs, theaters, and on television; his book on The History of Stand-Up; and supporting comedic acting roles in The X-Files, The Larry Sanders Show, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Crashing, Silicon Valley, Legally Blonde, 50 First Dates, The 40-Year-Old Virgin, and Step Brothers. He was the head monologue writer for NBC's Late Night with Jimmy Fallon in its first season. He won a 2022 Primetime Emmy Award for producing the HBO documentary George Carlin's American Dream.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Troy Miller (film producer)</span> American film director

Troy Miller is an American film producer, director and screenwriter. He is best known for his work in comedy. Miller is known as an innovator in alternative comedy, and has directed four feature films as well as directing and producing numerous TV shows and specials.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ahmed Ahmed</span> Egyptian actor and comedian

Ahmed Ahmed, is an Egyptian-American actor and comedian.

The Axis of Evil Comedy Tour is a comedy tour featuring four Middle Eastern comedians and special guest comedians. The tour's name is derived from a speech by US President George W. Bush which designated Iraq, Iran, and North Korea as the "axis of evil". The tour started on 11 November 2005. The group jokes about their culture along with being Middle Eastern in America. All of the comedians state that their lives changed considerably with 9/11, with one member, Egyptian American Ahmed Ahmed, whose name matches the alias used by an Osama bin Laden henchman, noting that he is frequently stopped by airport immigration officials on suspicion of terrorism – including a 12-hour stint in a jail in Las Vegas. On 10 March 2007, they were given their own Comedy Central special. The group broke up in 2011.

<i>Wild West Comedy Show: 30 Days and 30 Nights – Hollywood to the Heartland</i> 2006 American film

Wild West Comedy Show: 30 Days and 30 Nights – Hollywood to the Heartland is a comedy documentary film directed by Ari Sandel and follows the 30-day comedy tour of several stand up comedians. It premiered September 8, 2006, at the Toronto International Film Festival. It opened in wide release in the United States on February 8, 2008.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Caparulo</span> American stand-up comedian

John Caparulo is an American stand-up comedian.

<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.

<i>Sullivan & Son</i> American television series

Sullivan & Son is an American sitcom created by Steve Byrne and Rob Long that was broadcast on TBS. It starred Byrne as Steve Sullivan, who surprises his parents when he leaves his job as a corporate lawyer to take over a bar owned by his father in Pittsburgh. The series was executive-produced by Vince Vaughn, Peter Billingsley, and Long, who also served as showrunner. It premiered on July 19, 2012. On November 20, 2014, TBS cancelled Sullivan & Son after three seasons.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cort McCown</span> American actor

Cort McCown is an American actor.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Chad Daniels</span> American comedian

Chad Daniels is an American comedian. His albums have reached the top 10 on the Billboard comedy charts three times: No. 2 for 2017's Footprints On The Moon, No. 6 for 2019's Dad Chaniels, and No. 7 for 2014's Natural Selection. As of 2019, his albums have been streamed more than 700 million times. Footprints on the Moon also reached No. 1 on the iTunes comedy chart.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nate Bargatze</span> American comedian (born 1979)

Nathanael Bargatze is an American comedian. His comedy is characterized by references to his family, comedic encounters, and life anecdotes.

Beth Stelling is an American stand-up comedian, writer, and actress. She has performed in the Netflix series The Standups and served as a writer for the HBO television series Crashing. Stelling has released two comedy albums, Sweet Beth and Simply the Beth, and two comedy specials, Girl Daddy and If You Didn't Want Me Then.

<i>The Opening Act</i> 2020 American comedy film

The Opening Act is a 2020 American comedy film written and directed by Steve Byrne, in his directorial debut. It stars Jimmy O. Yang, Alex Moffat, Cedric the Entertainer, Neal Brennan, Bill Burr, Whitney Cummings, Jermaine Fowler, Ken Jeong, Russell Peters, and Debby Ryan.

References

  1. "Steve Byrne". TVGuide.com . Retrieved 4 December 2022.
  2. "Comedian Steve Byrne". Groupon . Retrieved 4 December 2022.
  3. Downs, Gordon (August 23, 2011). "The Comedy Cellar and Oasis: 21 Questions with Steve Byrne". SanDiego.com. Retrieved 2011-08-23.
  4. ALWAYS AMAZING: The True Story of the Life, Death, and Return of Amazing Johnathan | Movie , retrieved 2022-02-23
  5. @stevebyrnelive (December 24, 2020). "As a former resident of Los Angeles the last 15 plus years, I just experienced the craziest thing as a new resident…" (Tweet) via Twitter.