Great Point & Groucho
by Sarah Teach
Our spit of sand will be howling with laughter this weekend when the
Nantucket Comedy Festival returns to Jetties Beach for the fifth year in a row.
And there won't be a laugh track in the house, with the festival featuring national
headliners who have proven over and over that they can crack a whole room
'til tears stream down every face within. Festival founder Kevin Flynn explains
the atypical appeal of the Nantucket Comedy Festival: "Lots of comics love the
fact that there's no agents or managers here. Everybody comes out to have a
good time." Anyone who has experienced this "comedian's comedy fest" knows
that its own brand of uniqueness seeps onstage, bringing funny to an unprecedented
level.
Bringing back A Night of Funny Women and the Boston vs. New York Comedy
SmACKdown (pun intended), the festival has also been brewing something brand
new in which no one has been able to imbibe since the early nineties. The stars
of SHOWTIME's smash hit A Pair of Jokers, brothers and comedians Dennis and
Brian Regan will reunite in celebration of their show's 20th anniversary. Flynn
praises Brian Regan, saying, "I think he's the best standup working today." But
Flynn isn't the only one offering such high accolades; Regan is this year's
American Comedy Awards' Comedian of the Year. Everyone who has been
through the seventh grade knows that crude humor is the easiest way to make
any given person laugh. Brian Regan has spent the last couple of decades showing
that he is a rarity among modern comics: he eschews profanity and R-rated
jokes in favor of tickling the deepest roots of the craft. Flynn continues, "Brian
does his big tour thing, and he sells out all over country. We're talking 3,500-seat
venues every night. Now you're getting to see him with just 400 other people on
Nantucket." The Regan brothers share a stylistic element of goofiness while still
offering different perspectives, with the lisping Dennis slanting offbeat and Brian using observational humor marked by expression-based delivery.
Starting the festival will be Thursday evening's A Night of Funny Women (at
which men are enthusiastically welcomed!). Flynn explains the evening's origin: "I'm not a big fan of segmenting comedy, like calling it black comedy or gay
comedy, because comedy is supposed to be this unifying thing. But when I was
first setting up the festival, I had a lot of guys in the lineup and I thought, how
can we highlight women in comedy? And I'm telling you, something magical
happens when it's all women on stage. I think a lot of [Nantucket] women with
their lightship baskets think [the Comedy Fest] is Bud Lite and chicken wings.
But you come and realize it's a bunch of really funny, intelligent people, and it's
a very social time." Hosting this year's Night of Funny Women is Sirius XM radio's
Karen Morgan, who recently came away from the Improv Comedy Club's national
contest bearing a blue ribbon. Headlining the night is Patty Rosborough, who
co-hosted Comedy Central's Short Attention Span Theater with Jon Stewart, and
has been featured on VH1, SHOWTIME, and many more notable networks. We'll
have Boston-based comic Christine
Hurley, first runner up in Nickelodeon's
Search for the Funniest Mom in
America. Hurley performed on the
island a few weeks ago as part of this
summer's Jane Condon & Friends series.
We'll also see the self-titled "Comic/Actress/Mom" Kerri Louise, a
finalist in the second season of Last
Comic Standing, as seen on Comedy
Central, VH1, Oprah, Dr. Oz, The
Apprentice, as well as her and her husband's
show, Two Funny, on Women's
Entertainment.
Kerri Louise's husband, comedian
Tom Cotter, who been winning on this
season of America's Got Talent, will hit
the stage the next evening to represent
Beantown in the Boston vs. New York
Comedy SmACKdown. This highly anticipated
event divides six national comedy
headliners into two teams and pits
them against each other in a comedy
face-off. Are you part of the Red Sox
nation or are you in ranks with The Yanks? It's time to show your true colors!
Brian Regan
The SmACKdown's layout is just as innovative
as its featured contestants, who address the audience from the middle of
a boxing ring. Alongside Tom Cotter, we'll see Boston epitomized with Steve
Sweeney and Jimmy Tingle taking a bite out of the Big Apple. All the New
Yorkers treading on Massachusetts soil will love seeing Patty Rosborough storm
the stage for the second night in a row, joined by national headliners Greg
Warren and Kyle Grooms in a fight for total Bostonian destruction. The comedians
will start talking smack at 7 p.m. on Jetties Beach Friday night, so get tickets
now!
Presenting Saturday night's Evening with Brian Regan will be Dan Wolf,
Massachusetts State Senator and popular CEO of the Nantucket airline Cape Air.
Despite the big names highlighting the festival's lineup, the Nantucket Comedy
Festival is more about enjoyment and togetherness than celebrity status or trust
funds. Flynn says, "One of the original reasons I started the festival was to bring
together the year-round and summer communities for a laugh. Tickets are very
affordable, considering it costs $75 off-island to see Brian Regan. I have worked
with my sponsors and the community to try to keep costs down while still bringing
in someone like Brian Regan. We've been able to do that so far, especially
with the help of ReMain [Nantucket]."
But the benevolence is just beginning. The Comedy Festival's primary beneficiary
is Standup & Learn™, the first stand-up comedy curriculum developed for
high school students that encourages creative expression through comedy writing.
You may remember the program from previous years by the title ProjACK
Comedy. Flynn weighs in on the name change: "We realized that the program
was going to have impact off the island as well. Other institutions [besides
Nantucket High School] started asking about it and wanted to implement it. [The
name] ProjACK Comedy makes sense here on Nantucket; but in New York, most
people don't know what ACK stands for. So we branded the program; now
we're developing it even further, and it keeps getting bigger and better." Most
recently, excitement started buzzing around Standup & Learn™ when special
needs students in New York City were able to take the course and cap it off by
performing in Chelsea's legendary Gotham Comedy Club. "They knocked it out
of the house," says a grinning Flynn, who cannot conceal his pride in the students.
He continues, "I think the Comedy Fest will always take care of the students
here on the island, but it turns out that we came up with something that
others wanted. It definitely grabs kids' and teachers' interests." Collaboration
between professional educators and renowned comedians has developed a solid
curriculum that is constantly being updated and improved. The program is currently
being taught as a class at Nantucket High School, The Gateway School in
New York City, the Deveraux Glenholme School in Washington, Connecticut, and
at the Cape Cod Conservatory.
Tickets selling out fast at NantucketComedyFestival.org, so get yours right
away at www.NantucketComedyFestival.org ! Bring your kids, bring your wife,
and bring your husband, because they're making everybody laugh out here.
