Comics Camp Out for NBC Auditions, Trevor Noah Drop In, Brent Morin Tapes His Special and More Comedy News From NYC

gurian montreal edition

Jeffrey Gurian is a writer and comedian in New York who loves to Jump Around. Follow his regular column, right here, to find out what’s happening in comedy, and who Jeffrey Gurian ran into this week in and around New York. This week, Jeffrey stopped at , New York Comedy Club, The Stand, and more!


Trevor Noah Surprises Gotham Comedy Juice, Monroe Martin Works Out Tonight Show Set, Alonzo Bodden Reigns It In For Showtime

I stopped by Gotham for my weekly dose of Comedy Juice. I find it very refreshing, if that doesn’t sound too lame! Chris Millhouse was the host and he’s always funny talking about his unmanliness. Vince Royale was in from LA and he’s hilarious. Vince was made a regular on the 2nd season of FOX’s Laughs, starting August 27th. He had been a guest on the first season and was then asked back to be a regular on the upcoming season. Very cool! Also in from LA was the man responsible for Comedy Juice, Mark Serritella. He had a great set and told me he relies on both Chris Millhouse and Gibran Saleem to co-host and help book the shows while he’s back in Los Angeles.  I found myself remembering that last August I did the show with Trevor Noah and just as I was thinking about that, Chris introduced a special surprise guest and it was actually Trevor Noah! AMAZING! The crowd went insane. He’s so well liked and everyone’s excited to see what he’d got planned when he takes over The Daily Show on September 28th. Sometimes the crowd laughed so loud it was hard to hear what he was saying.

 

Carly Acquilino was on the show and she came in with her boyfriend Pete Davidson. She went up first while Pete watched her performance. That could be tense but she’s a pro and did really well, making lots of jokes about “her boyfriend” but none of course naming Pete. After the show they were outside together and I asked them if it was open knowledge that they were a couple, because I didn’t want to write it if it wasn’t and she thanked me a lot for asking. Pete gave me props by saying “You can always trust Jeffrey Gurian!” Monroe Martin dropped by to do a short five minute set and afterwards told me he was running his set for The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon which he did later in the week.

carly aquilino and pete davidson

Dwayne Perkins dropped some philosophical knowledge on the crowd and Alonzo Bodden was in the house too.  Alonzo revealed that  he had to take some of his jokes out of his act when he taped his Showtime special because there was some concern about certain jokes offending a certain major organization. After the show we had a chat about political correctness and how it’s affecting comedy, and he said that he aspires to be famous enough that some day he has to apologize for a joke! He was psyched about doing The Nightly Show with Larry Wilmore that week and then headlining Carolines for the weekend. His Showtime special will air in February, and hopefully will not offend anyone!

Crowd Gathers at The Stand to Watch Monroe Martin’s Tonight Show Debut

Very often there’s a big crowd of comics hanging out outside The Stand, so I usually pull up to see what’s going on. It was the night of Monroe Martin’s debut on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon, and he killed it with the set I had seen him do at Comedy Juice a few nights before. A bunch of his comic friends came out to watch it on TV with him, and it was Derek Gaines, Cris Italia, Steve Marden, and so many more that I can’t recall the names because there was so much excitement about it I forgot to write them down, and now they’re lost in a comedic blur!

Dave Smith Takes Down a Rival Podcaster, Joe List Loses to His Roommate at Rell Battle’s Roast Battle

The Roast Battle continued at New York Comedy Club this week with Rell Battle who co-created the original Roast Battle in Los Angeles as the MC. The judges were LA comic Yassir Lester who’s a judge on MTV’s series Snack-Off, Mark DeMayo, ex-NYPD who was recently featured in the NY Post, Amanda Seales and my buddy Dante Nero. Phil from Chico and Matt Pavich did great providing the warm up for the show.  I sat out in the audience with Vince Royale, Steve Marden, and Joe List.  Eagle took on Napoleon, Tom Cassidy went up against Ian Fidance, and Joe List went up against his roommate Chris Scopo. For the main event  Krystyna Hutchinson from the Guys We Fucked podcast went up against Dave Smith from Legion of Skanks. Each of them had a follow podcaster with them in the audience for support. Krystyna brought Corinne Fisher, and Luis J. Gomez was there backing up Dave! And they tore into each other! Dave was declared the winner. The club was packed and everyone hung out and partied afterwards.

joe list and chris scopo at roast battle

Brent Morin Tapes His Hour Special

Brent Morin one of the co-stars from NBC’s Undateable taped a one hour special for Netflix at The Gramercy Theatre on which has become such a popular place to shoot comedy specials. Barring the fact that little tiny drinks, in small plastic cups go for $14. it was still a fun time. While at the bar I ran into Josh Lieberman from 3 Arts who handles Brent, among tons of other big stars, and we had a chat about some upcoming events, and Montreal where I had just seen him a few weeks before. Adam Ray was in from LA too and opened for Brent. He connected well with the audience and had a good set. A lot of his stories were reminscences about high school and his youth, like about being asked to read out loud in class, and about a bus trip he took. It was a very smooth taping and one he could be happy with. It was very cool to see that his parents were there, and came down to hang out with him and his friends after the show in the private room downstairs. A lot of his friends showed up too and were extremely vocal in his support, and I know because I wound up sitting right in front of them! It was great to see Brent again and I was glad I could get to congratulate him on this show cause it’s a very special thing to do, which I guess is why they call it a “special.” He’s pysched about the third season of Undateable starting October 9th and it will be live which is exciting for the whole cast and aside from SNL is not something that has been done for a very long time.

Bill Bellamy Charms the Ladies

Bill Bellamy headlined at Gotham this week and he did something really nice at the end of the show that I saw. He had already finsihed his set but had gotten so much applause that he stayed up on stage to do something special for the ladies in the audience. He asked any girls who had anything to celebrate to come up on stage and receive a rose, and each one of them got to say what they were celebrating, and got some stage time with Bill. Most were birthdays but one woman was celebrating her divorce and made it obvious she would have left with Bill on a moment’s notice!

Stand Up Comics Camp Out for NBC Auditions

When I left the club I noticed people camping out on the street leading up to the club, and when I asked what it was about I was told it was for Stand-Up NBC auditions that were coming up on Monday and Tuesday, August 17th-18th. They asked people not to line up until 7 A.M. Monday morning with the auditions set to start at 9 A.M. However, these aspiring comics were planning on sleeping on the street all weekend because only the first 100 comics would be seen. Now that’s dedication, and shows you what comics will endure to even get seen in this business.

On that note, I’m OUT!!!

camping out for nbc auditions

 


Jeffrey Gurian is a comedian, writer and all around bon vivant in New York City.  Subscribe to his YouTube channel. Below, photos, Jeffrey with Brent Morin.

jeffrey gurian with brent morin

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Jeffrey Gurian is a comedy writer, comedian, author, producer, comedy connoisseur, comedy journalist, and an all around bon vivant. You can find him on red carpets, at comedy events across the country and hosting Comedy Matters TV. He’s the author of the book Make ‘Em Laugh with an intro by Chris Rock”. You've seen him on Comedy Central's Kroll Show and he's a regular on SiriusXM's Bennington Show and it's predecessor the Ron and Fez Show. He's also A BIG BELIEVER in Happiness and Love.
Jeffrey Gurian
Jeffrey Gurian
Jeffrey Gurian is a comedy writer, comedian, author, producer, comedy connoisseur, comedy journalist, and an all around bon vivant. You can find him on red carpets, at comedy events across the country and hosting Comedy Matters TV. He’s the author of the book Make ‘Em Laugh with an intro by Chris Rock”. You've seen him on Comedy Central's Kroll Show and he's a regular on SiriusXM's Bennington Show and it's predecessor the Ron and Fez Show. He's also A BIG BELIEVER in Happiness and Love.