Carly Aquilino at Nacho Bitches, Mike Bocchetti Gets Roasted, and Texas Comes to New York

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 at Gotham Comedy Club, New York Comedy Club, and more.


Carly Aquilino Pops in at Nacho Bitches

Nacho Bitches at New York Comedy Club was spectacular this week. I actually got there early which amazed everyone as I usually come in in the middle and leave before the end, but I got there early by accident. I ran into Carly Aquilino out in the street grabbing a smoke. She was the special guest on the show. She told me she’s been busy touring around. Corinne Fisher and Blair Socci do the show and split the hosting duties. Blair Socci has to have the most interesting delivery of man or woman on stage right now. It varies from sentence to sentence, and I’m in awe of anyone with the confidence to do that, because it defies the norm.

In the green room waiting to go on was Rosebud Baker who told me her significant other- Seaton Smith– told her about my apartment and about my spoon plants when he came by to shoot a little video interview. I asked Rosebud what she had coming up and she said she was doing The Check Spot —Emma Willmann’s SiriusXM show. And she’ll be roasting comic Frank Liotti coming up in March and doing a RoastMasters battling Nate Fridson at the end of February. She asked if I would print that if anyone has any dirt on Nate to please let her know. She said she listens to the old roasts to get the rhythm, and that she really doesn’t want to do so many roasts, she’d rather be working on expanding her act, but the roasts are so fun, she can’t say no. And I got to see Greta Titelman who actually did do a real check spot that night and managed to survive that ordeal. I always like seeing people I hadn’t seen before and Greta has her own show called Room Service at The Jane Hotel every month. I’ll have to drop by and check it out.

 

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D.L. Hughley on the Radio

D.L. Hughley comes to town periodically and when he does, he does his national D.L. Hughley radio show from the Radio 103.9 studios in Midtown. The plan was for me to drop by with some comedy material I had written for him. It was a nasty day. Pouring rain. But I go anyway. And when I get there, I open my bag to give him the material and my bag is empty. I thought I was in an alternate universe. I turned the bag upside down. Nothing. Classic case of self-sabotage. Left it sitting on my desk. Wound up spending two hours on the air with D.L. with the rest of his team, Steve Wilson and Jasmine Sanders patched in from LA.

The show is the most fast moving radio show I have ever seen. He has everything down to a science. And he asks his audience very thought inducing questions. Like if a woman has an affair with a married man, which produces a child, should the man have to pay child support? And people call in from all over the country with their opinion, and of course, D.L. engages with them in a humorous manner. It’s a really fun show. I went back the next day with the material and wound up being invited on for another two hour stretch.

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Broadway Comedy Club built a great room for doing podcasts and lots of comics are taking advantage of it. I went to check out the one by Greg Kritikos (AKA Greg The Greek), and he did a great one with Janice Messitte his partner in crime from Bagels and Baklava, a show whose name is a play on both of their heritages.

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Mike Bocchetti Gets Roasted

Mike Bocchetti celebrated his 25th year in the biz by being roasted at New York Comedy Club. No one really wanted to make fun of Mike but he called each person on the dais and insisted that he didn’t mind being made fun of because he’s used to it.

Pat Dixon was the MC and there was a great line-up of roasters including Mike Cannon, Corinne Fisher, Barry Ribs, Dave Juskow, AMarie Castillo and Irene Bremis. I showed a video of Mike that I made 25 years ago when he was much thinner. It was part of “The Men Who Series” a series of short films I made around 1992. It was a very fun evening overall. Besides the roasting, Mike got a lot of love.

Corinne Fisher was very excited about her first trip to London coming up for her and Krystyna Hutchinson to bring their Guys We Fucked show to The Soho Theatre for two nights. And they already sold out in the first week. Their new European agent was very happy about that.  AMarie Castillo is filming a half hour at Broadway Comedy Club also later this week and Janice Messitte will be hosting with Walker Hays and Mike Merkovich as the openers. She’s psyched to do her first half hour.

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Carlos Mencia was headlining Gotham so I popped in to check out the show, and was glad to see him looking more like himself and not the ultra-skinny guy I had seen before. It seems he had some sort of an accident and broke his foot. His mom told him he should cancel his shows, but his father, a guy who “lost a thumb and walked it off” said to him, “ You didn’t break your mouth did you?” So he showed up and did the show. It’s funny to watch him work because he’s very physical and cracks himself up sometimes to the point where he almost loses the ability to stand. His act is all about America being the greatest country in the world. It was his crowd and they loved him.

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New Club “A Touch of Texas” Opens Upstate

I checked out the comedy scene in Binghamton, NY this week with Stacey Prussman who was headlining a new huge club called Touch of Texas and which used to be called “Magic City.” It was a long drive, like three hours plus in snow and sleet, but it was interesting to see what comedy is like way upstate. Blue collar and very appreciative of New York talent. Some cowboy hats. Not as many beards as New York or as you might expect. The MC was a local comic named Teshawn Banks, a funny dude who used to live in Brooklyn, but wound up living in Binghamton. We drove back the same night, which was a mistake because seven hours on the road in the same day, in bad weather, is ridiculous, but it gave Stacey and I time to share inside stories about things I would never print in this column.

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HA! Comedy Club in Yonkers is doing great! And I got to see another comic I hadn’t seen before which is always really exciting for me. His name is Omar Thompson and he was mentored by Capone and Talent, two of the baddest dudes in the game. Omar’s been performing for about 13 years and has headlined Carolines and also has the big April 1st show at MSG with Tracy Morgan, Jay Pharoah, J.B. Smoove, Luenell, and Cipha Sounds on his resume. He’s got a good following and the place was packed to capacity, which made comic/producer Joe Conklin very happy. Omar’s got The Apollo coming up and he’s really likeable and very physical on stage, with a lot of Latin dance moves, and a bunch of accents, which people love.  I made the mistake of going into the men’s room and found my photo hanging above the urinal. Not the first time that’s happened to me!

After the show we were all hanging out in the lobby when I heard someone call my name. It was Greg The Greek, who said he was thinking of reaching out to me to tell me about an amazing thing that just happened to him and went viral.

It seems that Shia LaBeouf organized an anti-Trump demonstration out at Astoria Studios in Greg’s hood and all these people were repeating the phrase “He will not divide us” like robots, over and over again and it drove Greg and his friends crazy. So he and a group of guys went out to see what it was about. He and his friend Chris Fotiou who are both very pro-Trump wound up being videotaped for Alex Jones’ Info Wars, but were only identified as “Old School Astoria” and “Uncle Tony Redpill”. They want it known that it was them. Let it be known right here!

It got over 213,000 views in one night, and they were talking shit about Madonna, Meryl Streep, George Clooney, Mayor de Blasio, and more. Last week Shia got arrested for being in a fight with a Neo-Nazi. Greg’s joke on video about “he will not divide us” is that when Shia got to Rikers his butt cheeks will be divided.

And with that I’m OUT!!!


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 with D.L. Hughley, Mike Bocchetti, and Greg the Greek.

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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.