Five Questions with Mike Racine, One of New Yorks Funniest Finalists
This Saturday, as part of the New York Comedy Festival, Caroline’s on Broadway will hold their annual New York’s Funniest contest. The yearly competition searches among New York City’s younger comics, to find who is New York’s funniest.
We grabbed NY’s Funniest contestant Mike Racine to ask him five questions about being a comedian and being in New York to stay with the theme of the New York Comedy Festival. You can follow him on twitter @MikeRacine. see him this Saturday at Carolines at 4pm. He’ll also be performing at Stand Up NY on Thursday November 6, at 8pm.
Here are his 5 questions.
The IBang: What is the best neighborhood in New York?
Mike Racine: Williamsburg. It’s a lot of cool people doing really cool things and funny hats, interesting hats, cool clothes. And everybody’s pretty happy and rich, and there’s no crime.
The IBang: What was the first comedy show you did here, not including open mics?
Mike Racine: I did a couple of bringers at Gotham. I would come in from Jersey and I did one like 6:00 show, and they were like ‘oh cool, come do the 8:00 show.’ And I was like ‘oh cool the 8:00 show!’ And they were like, ‘you only have to bring ten people. ‘ And I brought thirty people and that was the last bringer I ever did because nobody wanted to come back. Because it was like $60 a person. So then I got invited to do another one and nobody showed up. I had like three people there, so then my three friends that came had to wait till the end of the show to see me go on and do like three minutes.
The IBang: How are NY comedy clubs different from other clubs?
Mike Racine: There’s a lot of talent. There’s more than one funny comic. And, the celebrity drop-ins are pretty cool. You can see someone like Louie CK, Chris Rock or Dave Chappelle come in and work on stuff and its always– as a younger comic its always a pretty cool experience to see somebody who is great, who is a veteran– work out stuff and perform.
The IBang: Do you have any stories about being heckled?
Mike Racine: No, not really. But I was the doorman at Carolines, that was my first job when I moved here, and there was a guy on stage, and he was getting heckled. And I tried to go over and say something to the heckler, but this guy was a big Italian guy and he just turns around and I’m like, ‘hey you have to keep quiet’ and he was like ‘relax dude, its a comedy show’ and I’m like ‘alright that’s fine’ and I walked away cause I was like so afraid of this guy. The comedian was Colin Kane, and he was like ‘why didn’t you bounce him Mike?’ And I was like, ‘what do you want me to do?’
The IBang: Who is your favorite local comic who isn’t known nationally?
Mike Racine: I’m actually doing a show at Stand Up NY as part of the NY Comedy Festival, and I have Tim Dillon hosting and Megan Gailey she’s featuring. She’s from Chicago and they’re both really good. I enjoy watching them. Tim is really funny, Megan is really funny so I’m excited to work with them this week.
New York’s Funniest Competition Finals will take place at Carolines on Broadway on Saturday November 8, 2014 at 4pm. You can get tickets here.
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