Mo Mandel in NYC, Andrew Schulz on Tour, Jeffrey Gurian Releases Two Books, and More News From New York City Comedy

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 at New York Comedy Club, Gotham, Carolines on Broadway and more.


I rolled into Comedy Juice and I ran into Mo Mandel who’s in from LA shooting season two of his truTV show Comedy Knockout, a show he created and is hosted by Damien Lemon. Three comics battle to be the funniest and the loser has to make a public apology in a cold read, that was written by the staff accompanied by embarrassing photos. Some comics who’ve been on so far are Jim Norton, Kurt Metzger, Yamaneika Saunders, Lynne Koplitz and Michelle Buteau, They shoot it at the studios at 106th and Park and I will be going a day or so after you read this, so I’ll be able to report back more about season two!  Mo also has his first one hour special coming out on Seeso later in the summer called Negative Reinforcement.

Andrew Schulz was at Comedy Juice with Chris Distefano and they both told me that the whole first season of their IFC show Benders is now available on Netflix. Andrew has a tour which he’s called The HezzyTation Tour, which will take him from places as disparate as The Brokerage in Bellmore, Long Island to the Comedytrain International Summer Festival in Amsterdam.

Ronny Chieng from The Daily Show dropped in to do a set and told me it took him 20 years to get here after spending 10 years in Singapore and another 10 years in Australia, where he had four sold out global stand up comedy theater tours in Australia, Singapore, Malaysia and London, and now is trying to get known and do the same thing here. Good start by getting the Daily Show gig.

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I dropped by Gotham to catch my buddy Pete Dominick who was headlining there for the weekend. He spends most of his time up at SiriusXM doing his show Stand Up! With Pete Dominick on the Insight Channel. I asked him how he chose it and he said it took a long time, but it came out of his time on The Colbert Report and The Daily Show, because he wanted to provide NPR-like content delivered with a comedic flare. He envisions it as kind of like The Daily Show for radio. And he and his four person crew took the show to the Aspen Ideas Festival and are taking it to both political conventions as well.

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Ran into Matt Richards at New York Comedy Club, who told me he was really psyched about his first official headlining gig in Arizona at Rick Bronson’s House of Comedy. He did 7 shows in 5 days, and just got back. He also said he got a police escort into one of his shows. He had been hanging out outside the venue and got friendly with the cops who were there to keep order, and when it came time for him to go inside, the crowds were so big the cops escorted him through the crowd and into the club. He thought it was so dope.

Speaking of comics and cops, Agunda Okeyo, a comic and producer had a special show called The Sisters of Comedy at Carolines which was a predominantly black female show, except for Wyatt Cenac, and Judah Friedlander. It was a show co-sponsored by Black Lives Matter, and Chloe Hilliard was the host, along with comics Aminah Imani, Sydnee Washington, and half black half Swedish comic Sunda Croonquist, who brings a very different perspective to all she does because of her eclectic, and fascinating background. She even worked as a private detective before she got into comedy. Needless to say, the show got political at times, but was balanced by the humor. Wyatt Cenac said he was once followed by a cop and when approached was already over-prepared for a confrontation when the cop said to him, “Hey, you’re on The Daily Show right?” and Wyatt, still in confrontation mode spat out, “Yeah well I don’t have to,… I know my rights!”

sisters of comedy

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I popped by New York Comedy Club to catch the 2nd anniversary of Corinne Fisher and Blair Socci’s Nacho Bitches and boy was I glad I did. Killer show. The girls took turns introducing the acts, and in between acts, Blair and I went into the private office to chat about her MTV show Ladylike, a hidden camera prank show in which they flip gender roles. One of the main flippers is Matteo Lane who was also on the anniversary show and literally got screams of laughter from the audience both during and when he ended his set. I asked Blair what one of her favorite pranks was and she said when Matteo was trying to parallel park and was fake crashing into cars in front of and in back of the space, and she took over and properly parked the car for him, while people were watching intently. Corinne’s comedy partner Krystyna Hutchinson was also on the show and told me that not only are they doing Just for Laughs in Montreal, but also in Toronto, and that their last trial tour show for Guys We Fucked will be at SubCulture this coming Monday, July 18th, and I gotta be there. Kerryn Feehan was on the show and at one point took off her ultra-padded and expensive bra, to prove that she had small boobs, and threw it into the crowd. Now I know why she has a tattoo on the inside of her arm that says “Don’t Serve Me”! At the end of the show, Corinne and Blair were presented with a 2 year birthday cake. I really wanted a piece, but I had to leave!

I went to catch The Warm Up down at Karma Lounge put on by Sydnee Washington and Marie Faustin, who encourage the audience to enjoy their “prettiness”, … not in an obnoxious way, but in an endearing way. The two of them together are just too cute! They are two women who own their power and seem to be very comfortable with it. Khalid Rahmaan performed, so did Wendi Starling who copped to selling her underwear to make extra dollars, and when they asked her how much was the most she ever got and she said $300, Sydnee started pulling off her own underwear! Comedy is getting very interesting these days with girls just pulling off articles of their clothing during the shows. The room was ultra-packed with a very appreciative crowd, and the girls were on fire. Also on the show were Shane Torres and the headliner was Amber Nelson. Lots of female shows seem to include a gay male comic and this time it wasn’t Matteo Lane, but Oscar Aydin who I had first seen at Chrissie Mayr’s gay pride show at The Stonewall, but this night, he was wild and took his act into the audience for as long as the mic cord would let him go. He did his version of male cat calling to the men in the audience he found cute! Really fun show! These girls were killin’ it, and I will def be back!

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Frank Morano produces Joe Piscopo’s radio show on AM 970 The Answer which broadcasts from a studio near Wall Street.  Frank also has his own show which he produces called Morano In The Morning, and which airs on Sunday mornings from 4-8 A.M. and which I was honored to be a guest on this past weekend to talk about comedy and about my two new books! Frank told me that one of his greatest honors was having Joe Franklin for a fan. Joe would wake up at 4 A.M. just to listen to the show and would actually take notes and then call Frank with questions, and when Frank told me the story he did it in a very close impression of Joe’s voice.  Frank said that Bob Barker was his favorite guest along with Charles Grodin and Jimmy ‘J.J.’ Walker.

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My two new books coincidentally came out on the same day this past week. How that happens is anyone’s guess, but two different publishers chose the same day to launch my books? One of them is called Laughing Legends and features an intro by Chris Rock. It’s an updated version of my earlier book Make ‘Em Laugh on the history of The Comic Strip, the legendary club that has been open since June 1, 1976. The publisher decided to update the book since so many of the comics have gone on to do great things like Colin Jost, Jay Pharoah, and Jordan Rock for example. It’s available on Amazon and Barnes and Noble.

The other book is called Man Robs Bank With His Chin – And Other Unusual Stories Missed By Mainstream Media, and the intro is by Scott Dikkers, the guy who created The Onion. Years back, I was a writer/reporter for the legendary Weekly World News where I had my own column called “Gurian’s World of the Bizarre” which is where I learned to love the kind of strange and bizarre stories that appear in Man Robs Bank. Stories like “Man Slips On Pat of Butter, Winds Up In Next Town”, and “Rare Virus Sweeps Japan, Victims Too Weak To Bow.” That book is from Micro Publishing Media and is available on the MPM website.

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I have a couple unusual independent stories in this week’s column. Legendary author, actor, producer, director Bob Balaban directed a very interesting independent pilot called Fishkill which I had the pleasure of viewing this past week. It was written by a young woman named Lisa Davis and is about the Orthodox Jewish community that thrives in upstate Fishkill, New York. I went expecting a documentary type approach, but as soon as it opened on a Hasidic man in a room with a hooker, I knew I had the wrong idea. It also touches on themes of sex addiction, insecurities, gay relationships, and a beautiful young mom, unable to get pregnant again who befriends a transsexual woman. Next step, she said is pitching it to networks and streaming providers like Amazon and Netflix. Very exciting!

As the result of an appearance on Artie Lange’s show back in 2015, a young producer named Josh King wound up with a three picture deal from Avatar Entertainment. This is a story that will continue to unfold as it develops and as I find out more about it. One of the films is about a hockey player from Pennsylvania who had been a star player and winds up in prison due to drugs.

I met a young comic named Phil Korz at Broadway Comedy Club who told me a wild story. He had planned a four day trip to Cali to try and perform in as many venues as possible in four days. He did a set at The Laugh Factory for his first time, and after it was over he was approached by an older couple who enjoyed his performance. The man mentioned that he had suffered a couple of strokes during the past year, and Phil had gone to school for physical therapy, and part of his studies was how to work with stroke victims. For the next 30 minutes, Phil taught the man special exercises to help with his mobility and strength that he could do in his free time. As he went to leave, the woman asked him what he was doing tomorrow and Phil said he was leaving to fly back to New York. She told him to cancel his trip and to stay and come to their house in Hollywood the next day for lunch, where she disclosed the fact that she was a well known talent manager and offered him a place to stay and a career if he would work with her husband. I said to him, “So, what did you do?” He said, “ I missed my flight and never left California since.” And all I could think of was, “How come I never met anyone like that who needed dental work?”

It was a great week in comedy 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 Gurian with Andrew Schulz, Frank Morano, Mo Mandel, and  with Marie Faustin and Sydnee Washington.

jeffrey gurian and andrew shultz jeffrey gurian and frank moreno jeffrey gurian and mo mandel

jeffrey and maie

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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.