Jerry Seinfeld and Attell Do Surprise Sets, Bobby Lee Gives a Lapdance and More News From NY Clubs
Jeffrey Gurian 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. In today’s column, Jerry Seinfeld and Dave Attell do unannounced sets in New York City, Bobby Lee takes a lot of clothes off on stage, and more!
My dear friend Larry Miller was in town this week. I’ve known him for a very long time, and in fact, he was the first comedian that I interviewed for my book, Make Em Laugh, about The Comic Strip. Larry was my guest on SiriusXM’s Ron and Fez Show this week, and was hosting AXS TV’s Gotham Comedy Live. He also happens to be Jerry Seinfeld‘s best friend, so I asked him if Jerry was in town, and if he was going to go up on stage that night. Larry said that he was in town, but was very evasive about whether he would perform. Well, sure enough, Jerry Seinfeld showed up to open the show for Larry and it was amazing. The audience went insane and gave standing ovations before he even said a word.
Also on the show, was Steven Scott (Marvin Scott the newsman’s son) who is incredible at sound effects. He did a great set. Gina Yashere, who is an English comedian who is also Nigerian performed. She’s so great, people really love her. She confided in me that she’s been very sick for the last two days and really wanted to cancel, but realized how hard it would be for them to get a replacement at the last minute, so she showed up and did her set– that’s what a trooper she is! I wish she had told me she was sick before I gave her a big hug and kiss!
At the after party, I saw Rick Newman. He’s the founder of Catch a Rising Star, and a dear friend for over 30 years. He’s currently bringing amazing comedy entertainment into his new Stage 72 at the Triad Theatre on West 72nd Street! I also saw Jon Fisch who just got back from Skaneateles, where he was performing with Dan Naturman.
So many LA comics were in town this week, including my friend Bobby Lee. I hadn’t seen him for awhile, so I went down to Gotham where he was headlining, and I ran into another good LA friend, Cort McCown. He’s one of the Playboy comics from the Playboy mansion and he’s got a podcast called Insensitivity Training on Bill Burr’s All Things Comedy network. Cort just got back from Edinburgh, Amsterdam and London, and he is very open about his sobriety, and he shared with me that he is celebrating being sober 13 years. He said that 13 years ago, he almost OD’ed in the Chelsea Hotel, which is right next door to Gotham Comedy Club. As a gift of his sobriety, 13 years later, he performs at Gotham. Very meaningful.
Now, back to Bobby Lee. Bobby does the craziest comedy act. Angelo Lozada was the host of the show. He’s one of the best hosts around in New York and he’s been voted one of the top 50 Latino comics in the country. As he was introducing Bobby, Bobby walks up and starts insisting that Angelo include that he did a beefy jerky commercial in 1999 and Angelo doesn’t want to do it, so he starts screaming at him that it’s his show and Angelo has to do what he tells him to. Then on stage, Bobby was pulling up his shirt, showing his belly, playing a game called gay chicken (you can use your imagination) and even ended up giving a lap dance on stage– to a guy– where he takes off all of his clothes. He may just be the craziest act on the entire scene.
Bobby’s got a cartoon coming up called The Awesomes, which is a Hulu original. He plays Tim, a little Asian guy who turns into a sumo wrestler. Seth Meyers is the executive producer, and one of the performers, and Rachel Dratch is in it too. Bobby said he is also filming with The League on FX in two weeks. He told me he will be playing a Chinese guy with Down syndrome and he said he didn’t have to change his clothes and they didn’t have to put make up on him. They think he looks like a Chinese guy with Down syndrome already.
I ran into Tony Woods at The Stand that same night. Tony told me he wrote a children’s book! It’s called The Profound Pussy Book and contrary to what it sounds like, its all about pussycats. He wrote it for his sons, because when one of his sons was in the 5th grade, he didn’t know how to treat little girls. So Tony wrote this book as a kind of like a metaphor for how to treat little girls, by how to treat pussy cats. Tony was celebrating his 51st birthday, and had a spot down at The Cellar so after he had a few drinks at The Stand, I drove him down to the Comedy Cellar. His set was awesome even though he was kind of buzzed.
Dave Attell came in and did a surprise set and that was amazing. Marina Franklin was the host, and Attell got her to admit from the stage that she likes porn and she even admitted she digs interracial porn. She’s black and most of her boyfriends are white, so it makes perfect sense. We love Marina. She used to be known by the name “The Sexy Fairy!”
Now when he sees Mel, Mel asks him to stop telling that story!
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