Fallon and Fey Spotted on the Set of Marty and Maya, Cheri Oteri Gets Into Stand Up, and Plenty of News

jeffrey gurian column

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 covered the scene in Brooklyn and at The Stand, New York Comedy Club, and Gotham Comedy Club.


SNL’s Cheri Oteri is Giving Stand Up a Try, Hosts Gotham Comedy Live

I was at my usual table for this week’s Gotham Comedy Live to see SNL alum Cheri Oteri hosting the show with Nick Guerra, Kenny Josephs, Billy Bonnell and Sam Morril performing. After the show, Sam Morril told me that he and Joe Machi had just done Red Eye together and even though they are great friends they torture each other with put downs whenever they can. He said that Joe showed up to Red Eye wearing a flesh colored shirt, that made him look like he was naked and Sam said he “burned him on it” on the air. He said that he and Joe are working on developing something for TV together. And Sam is constantly on the road and is looking forward to doing the Comedy Attic in Bloomington, Indiana and the Drafthouse Comedy Theatre in Washington, D.C.

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At the after party, I congratulated Cheri on her performance, during which she told several stories about her family, and about growing up in the 70’s, for which she got a HUGE ovation, and she laughingly told me she had never done stand-up before and had been practicing for a while in clubs out in LA. She did a special thank you to our servicemen, several of whom were in the audience and who came down to the after party. She graciously took photos with the servicemen and all who asked, and she made herself very accessible, and hung out at the party for a while.

Joking Off Makes a Big Move to OG MTV

I popped into The Stand and ran into my boy Derek Gaines who was hanging with Matt Pavich. Matt told me he had just gotten back from shooting 20 episodes of MTV2’s Joking Off in 9 days. He’s been on all three seasons so far, and he said that this season it will actually air on regular MTV first. He described the shoot as comedy bootcamp and in the seven episodes that he was in personally he said that everybody is writing together and helping each other, and it’s like you’re writing 20 new minutes of material every day. He likened it to doing a bunch of open mics every day except that you’re on TV. And he particularly praised Leonard Ouzts as being someone who was really fun to work with. He said that Leonard is a force to be reckoned with and will be a big star.

No Surprise: Big Stars Hanging Around the Marty and Maya Set

Joey Kola who has won awards for being the best warm-up comedian for TV shows was headlining Gotham this holiday weekend, and said he’s been headlining the club periodically ever since it opened. He’s been performing for 34 years and warming up TV shows for 23 years. Currently he’s doing Rachel Ray’s show, and he just got the gig to warm up Kevin James’ new CBS sitcom called Kevin Can Wait, which he says is being shot right here at the Gold Coast Studios on Long Island. He’s also doing NBC’s new show Maya and Marty which is a sketch show produced by Lorne Michaels starring Maya Rudolph and Martin Short on which John Mulaney is a writer. He said many big stars have come to the set like Jimmy Fallon and Tina Fey. And he’s doing a movie called Gender Bender which will start shooting in July and it’s a crazy story about three guys who lose their jobs to women and decide that they want to become women. Through some sort of magic, they lose their penises and spend the rest of the movie trying to get them back. Joey described it as “very Hangover, meets Hot Tub Time Machine.” He also said his schedule is so crazy that he’s booked into 2017 already, and with Rachel during the week and Kevin James on Friday he’s a very busy man.  But he’s a great guy and makes sure to take the time to give back. He’s involved with 34 different charities and says that for every paying gig he gets that makes money, he tries to match that by doing one charity gig. Joey Kola is a good man, and funny as shit! The audience was HOWLING at his set.

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Goddam Comedy Jam Rocking at Bonaroo This Year

At New York Comedy Club,  Matteo Lane was hosting a late show.  Matteo told me he’s doing Bonnaroo this year for the first time with the Goddamn Comedy Jam, run by comic Josh Adam Meyers. He said that comics do a ten minute set and then get up and perform their favorite cover song, unrehearsed and accompanied by a professional band. It’s based on the concept that every comedian wants to be a rock star. He said that Bill Burr does it a lot, but plays the drums because he doesn’t sing. Matteo told me that Louis CK has also done it along with Dane Cook, Eric Andre, and Sarah Silverman among others. And Matteo had an interesting background I wasn’t aware of. He had been a storyboard artist and fashion illustrator for eight years and actually drew commercials for big products like 7 Up, Lexus and Bud Light. This background prepared him for a half hour animated show he’s currently developing for TV which he’s not only writing, but drawing as well. Watch for him on Seth Meyers coming up in August.

 

Aaron Berg Just Got Back from Taping This Is Not Happening, Nic Novicki is a Small Soder

Gotham Comedy Club Comedy Juice was great this week.  When I got there, I ran right into Nic Novicki who was there to do Comedy Juice. Nic just got back from performing for our troops in the Middle East and Europe and was in countries like Egypt, Jordan, Turkey, Spain and Portugal. Nic said in a lot of those countries, people were not used to seeing little people, and they stared. Openly.  Nic has a short film he produced for HBO called One Halloween that will be screening at the Kodak Theatre in LA on June 23rd and then will air on HBO GO. He’s also developing a comedic travel show. He shared the concept with me on the promise I wouldn’t divulge it yet, and it’s a GREAT idea, and something that hasn’t yet been done, which is rare. Nic is the Executive Producer and host of the show, and all I can tell you is that his co-star is an actor he’s worked with for many years. Nic as you know was on both The Sopranos and Boardwalk Empire, and he often helps cast projects with little people in them.  And has pictures on his cell phone of his face right next to Dan Soder’s face because everyone, including Dan Soder agrees they they look alike. See what YOU think!

small soder

Aaron Berg was hosting the show, and sitting with Pete Lee. Aaron’s arms seem to be getting bigger by the moment and he and Pete compared biceps for a photo. Soon Aaron will need a separate shirt for each arm. Aaron spits jokes like rappers spit beats. He’s the fastest improv-er I’ve seen, and he never ceases to amaze me. He had just gotten back from LA from taping Ari Shaffir’s Comedy Central show This Is Not Happening, a hilarious story-telling show on which surprisingly enough he told a very sexually oriented story! The show is filmed at Cheetah’s, a strip club in LA. I asked him if there were any strippers there at the time, and he said no, only him. He himself was a stripper back in the day. He just went out to LA for two days to film and flew right back. He swears he landed back in NY at JFK at 9:20 and by 10:03 was on stage, hosting a show at The Stand.

Bill Dawes was on the show and told me he’s starring in a film called Before The Sun Explodes in which he stars as an unsuccessful stand-up comic, and he laughingly said that the part was written for him in mind by Deborah Eisenstadt, who premiered the film recently at SXSW. He wasn’t sure whether to take that as a compliment or not! It premieres this week at the New Filmmakers L.A. and he was very excited about it.

Adam Stone is a Dad Again, A Very Special IAS This Week

I had an interesting encounter out in Brooklyn when I went out to Billlysburg to do Brad Steuernagel’s show and wrap party for his webseries The Goose is Loose. He and Justin Lang do characters called Goose and Louis BK. The Stone Brothers came out for the show, as did Carolina Hidalgo who I hadn’t seen in too long. and there was a girl there who looked so familiar to me. She was introduced as Maggie Champagne which she swears is her real name, and she reminded me that we met accidentally on the set of Inside Amy Schumer when they happened to be filming in my building.  Maggie is an actress and stand-up who has been a recurring character on Inside Amy Schumer playing all different kinds of roles during all four seasons so far. She told me the sketch I walked in on is called “Beautiful Ballad” and that she and Amy do some lip syncing in the scene, which will air this coming Thursday. I would LOVE to do Amy’s show. Just sayin’! (Amy if you read this, call me! LOL)  Adam Stone just had his second child 5 weeks ago, and we sat talking about being a dad, and how hard it is combining that with show biz.

This show is held in the basement of a bar. It’s a very cool space, but while I was in the audience some pipes in the ceiling dripped on me and a large moth  flew through the room, and carried away a couple of audience members. I ventured a guess that I was the only person ever to show up on that stage wearing a sport jacket, … and without a beard!

And with that, … I’m OUT!!! Hope you all had an AMAZING Memorial Day weekend! I know I did!

Jeffrey Gurian is a comedian, writer and all around bon vivant in New York City. Subscribe to his YouTube channel, Comedy Matters TV.  Photos below Jeffrey Gurian with Cheri Oteri, Maggie Champagne, Matteo Lane, and Nic Novicki.

jeffrey gurian and cheri oeri jeffrey gurian and maggie jeffrey gurian and matteo lane jeffrey gurian and noviki

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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.