Comedy 101: Moontower Edition Photo Album! Class 6 Debuts on SiriusXM Today

Comedy 101 hit up Austin’s Moontower Comedy Festival this year and got an answer to the question: Does Austin have what it takes to stand up to our panel of mentors? The answer, a resounding yes. We’re very excited to announce that the hour recorded at Moontower is airing TODAY on SiriusXM’s Raw Dog Channel at 2pm on the Bennington Show, and you’ll definitely want to have these photos to check out while you listen. Here’s what you missed:

Thursday, April 20th we took over Austin’s historic Antone’s rock club with our hit live show, Comedy 101. Hundreds of fans showed up to see a line up of six local open mic comics do stand up in front of our audience and our panel of “mentors” to see if they could make the room laugh.

For anyone unfamiliar, we give young comics, just starting out, the chance to perform on a big club stage, in front of a packed crowd. But they have to do more than impress our audience- they also have to get past our panel of “mentors”- three headliners, each with a bell to ring in and to interrupt the comics with “advice” about their set, their jokes, their clothes, anything is fair game. Our mentors are the fastest, the funniest and the most brutal comedians, and they’re out for blood.

At Antone’s Big Jay Oakerson, Dan Soder, and Luis J. Gomez returned to the stage to mentor for us and they were brutally funny, showing zero mercy to our young, eager performers. The show was hosted, of course, by the great Ron Bennington and Gail Bennington, of SiriusXM’s Bennington Show, who were brilliant, as always.

Our performers were all local, organic Austin, Texas talent,  young in their comedy careers and eager to get laughs. We have to give gigantic thanks to Samantha Mitchell, Carina Magyar and of course Colleen McGarr who helped connect us with Austin’s scene to find our six very funny, and ballsy as fuck comedians. Have to say, they gave NY open mic’ers a run for their money in all departments.

First Up: TIMOTHY BANFIELD

The night started with Timothy Banfield who claimed to have the greatest Christopher Walken impression in the world, can do impressions of Mark Wahlberg and Jay Leno, and knows how to rewind his voice. Timothy has been on the Tonight Show with William Shatner, and so facing our panel was a walk in the park for him. Sort of. Although Big Jay had a difficult time understanding that Timothy was actually on the Tonight Show, and had a lot of questions about that. Timothy didn’t get a huge amount of laughs, but he did get a “good one” from Luis who was impressed by Timothy’s ability to improv. Follow him on Twitter @FunnyGuyTimmy

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Australian and Austinite: Leni Mex

Leni won the crowd, and our panel over quickly- maybe even in her intro when she said she once put pepper in her undies. She had a great accent, loves pills and masturbation, and hates Outback Steakhouse. She’s the first person to compare Vegemite to anal, and got Soder to break out his Aussie impression. She’s fabulous. Follow her @LeniMex on Twitter.

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Short and Sweet: Hi-Fi BONG aka ROBERT DRLICKA

Our third comic has performed for gigantic crowds- he auditioned for America’s Got Talent and made the cut on television. He’s also been quoted in newspapers and is well known around Austin sidewalks. Robert was the only performer to come on stage in character, and our mentors weren’t big fans of characters– in fact, he barely got a chance to get a joke out– but he inspired some of the best jokes of the night from the panel.  We could not get a decent photo of him, but we love him, and you can find him and his many personalities at @hifibong or @robertdrlicka on Twitter or insaneman.com.

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100% Austin: CHRISTINA PARRISH

Christina Parrish shocked out of the gate throwing shade at Big Jay. She may have been the tiniest comedian, but she had fire and she even got a few big laughs. Follower her on Twitter @ibesuper and visit christinaparrish.com.

Comedy 101’s First Trans Comic: Austin Smartt

Austin didn’t get abused by our mentors so much as she was propositioned. It was quickly decided that Ms. Smartt had the hottest legs in Comedy 101, and everyone wanted a piece of her. And she gave a lesson in tucking your dick, that you won’t soon forget. She was also really funny and the audience adored her. Follow her on @austinissmartt on Instagram.

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And Closing for the locals…DEREK KOPSZYWA:

Derek did his city justice, closing out the night for the local performers getting some real big laughs, a lot of fashion advice and plenty of Stand By Me references. #nohorizontalstripes  Follow Derek on Twitter @Derekomedy

Chris Stanley, Prop Comic

The night wasn’t over yet…we still had one last surprise in store for Austin. The stylings of the hottest rising prop comic in Texas- Chris ‘Peppy Hamburger’ Stanley. He’s not only the hottest prop comic in Austin, he’s also the only prop comic in Austin.

We had such a blast bringing Comedy 101 to Austin, and despite that our mentors ripped the ass out of Austin’s young guns, everyone went home friends.

Thank you Moontower!

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