Hardest/Most fun Rooms in your City

[Cupid Stunt]

we did the funniest person in your city thread. Now something equally useless.

Whats the hardest room in your city?

Whats the most fun?


AUSTIN

Hardest

Velveeta room....located on 6th street. varied crowds, usually drunk. Open mic usually has over 30 comics, so audiences can tire easily. Comics/Bartender will yell, boo, etc to n00bs. Dead air not uncommon. But the bartender/club owner is a great guy and is really diplomatic when setting up lists/set times.

Most Fun

Coldtowne theater...Cozy, hip, awesome. Primarily an improv joint, but all standup shows sell out (even open mic) at 5 bux a seat. Really small venue (underneath a video store...you can hear footsteps above you while onstage). Listmaster limits open mic to 10 comics in one hour & one headliner. Concision=success. This is the sort of place that makes you feel like you're really a part of a scene. I've never had a bad time here.

[Cupid Stunt]

My thread is dead.

[CarolineEAnd]

Baton Rouge (I'm about 99% sure none of the other BR comics are on here though).

Salami Vice puts on a GREAT show at Boudreaux and Thibedoux. There are usually some loud drunkards at the bar, but as long as most of the comics bring a bunch of friends it's fine. I've had only positive experiences there.

I haven't done Phil Brady's, but I've heard just AWFUL things about it. My hilarious friend Connor said he bombed and got heckled like crazy there. He said the room is almost entirely empty.

[drieux]

I think this is a good thread idea; I just think there are plenty of people who don't want to go on an internet comedy forum and declare some show in their city as "The Worst," for a variety of reasons - maybe a friend is one of the showrunners, or maybe there isn't that much stage time available in that particular city and they don't like the idea of declaring a specific show as awful and get blackballed for it.

But as far as the positive side, there are plenty of things I can say for rooms in San Francisco/the Bay Area:

Annie's Social Club, Tuesday nights: I'll admit I'm biased, because I'm one of the showrunners on this one. But we get around 50-60 people looking for spots each week, we often have an actual audience that turns out specifically for the show AND I think we draw some of the best talent - new and experienced alike - to the room. This has been my favorite open mic since I moved to the West Coast from the Midwest and we've had plenty of visitors from out of town - including AST'ers - who enjoyed it. It takes place in the back room of an old punk club, and somehow it works out perfectly.

The Brainwash - it seems like in every story I read about a comedian these days, the writer can't help but go for the "once did comedy in a laundromat" thing. But since the Brainwash has held the longest-running independent comedy open mic in SF for a decade, expect to see comics coming out of the city who can cite the place as one of their early spots. The place IS a laundromat, but it's also a cafe, bar and performance space. They even make a really solid burger, and there's comedy there every Wednesday and Thursday. EVERYBODY who does standup in the Bay Area has performed at the Brainwash.

Club Deluxe, Monday nights: started and run by Al Gonzalez and located right at Haight and Ashbury, this show gets packed audiences regularly, all the best local comics perform here and it's always a well-run show. www.liveatdeluxe.com

The Dark Room, every Wednesday, Thursday and some Saturdays: located in the Mission (right across from the Taqueria Cancun, which has some kick-ass burritos, by the way) this spot has turned into something of an alterna-comedy mecca for San Francisco. On Wednesday nights you can catch "The Business," featuring AST's own Bucky Sinister and three other amazing comics, Sean Keane, Chris Garcia and Alex Koll (recently seen on "Live at Gotham, btw) and special guests. On Thursdays catch a themed showcase under the "Things We Made" banner, started by Pat and Jesse. Some of the funniest local comics, like Janine Brito, Dave Thomason, Emily Heller, Joey Devine, Miles K, Adrian Palenchar and more each set up their own monthly shows with their own theme. And once each month is the big "Things We Made" Saturday night show. Awesome venue, great comics, always cheap at the door AND it's BYOB. Sweet.

http://thebusinesscomedy.blogspot.com/
http://thingswemade.com/HomeSweet/Home.html

So many other great rooms, too - Castagnola's at Fisherman's Wharf has been a blast, the shows on Pirate Cat Radio are fun, Rooster T. Feathers in Sunnyvale's Wednesday night mics are often great, and blah blah blah. If you're coming to the Bay Area and looking for stage time, head over to www.sfstandup.com and look under the "Stage Time" banner.

Just to end negatively, the worst open mic I ever performed at was at a joint called Stan's Tavern in Dorr, Michigan, back when I first started. ASR, be glad this one no longer exists. A comedy-loving, gentleman owner who decided to try comedy in his hillbilly, backwoods bar filled with redneck clientele. The only warning that a comedy show was about to break out was a photocopied sheet of paper on a bulletin board in the entryway that just said "Comedy, Wednesday nights." Before it ended, the show just became a weekly shouting match between the performers and whatever drunks were playing Golden Tee that week.

[ZachBroussard]

Baton Rouge (I'm about 99% sure none of the other BR comics are on here though).

Salami Vice puts on a GREAT show at Boudreaux and Thibedoux. There are usually some loud drunkards at the bar, but as long as most of the comics bring a bunch of friends it's fine. I've had only positive experiences there.

I haven't done Phil Brady's, but I've heard just AWFUL things about it. My hilarious friend Connor said he bombed and got heckled like crazy there. He said the room is almost entirely empty.

I have a weekly show in Brooklyn that toured through Baton Rouge, and we were lucky enough to play at Boudreax and Thibodeaux's... a really nice space, and the crowd was really great.
A++ Will do business with again

[Me, The JerBear]

My stories are all mostly a decade old but back in the day in Atlanta there was and still is as far as I know a club called The Uptown Comedy Corner. There was a couple of us that if we didn't get on at the Punch we would go down to UCC to play there. I wouldn't go as far as to say that the audience was automatically biased against comics of a certain color, but I think it would be fair to say they were less tolerant of a lack of talent than other places I played. That venue was the location of some of my best and worst sets back then. Needless to say I kinda liked the challenge. One of the first times I played there Bruce Bruce said to me during his set 'White boy, you [are] funny'.

Thanks dude!

[nixonjames]

This would be tough to say for Boston.

I haven't had enough broad experience to say for sure but so far a new one at Razzys was intense. There was a group of singing drinking runners taking up the space pre-show. Then yelling down the host... and the mic was duct taped together. Still a fun show to try to work with all that energy but definitely the toughest crowd to work with so far.

Tavern at the End of the World
has a pretty good show. there are times when some local yokels bring in 20 of their friends so they can feel funny... and if you're doing anything clever... skip it. but have also had some of the friendliest and receptive crowds at this mic as well.

I think what i'm getting at is that as I do comedy more and more it doesn't become so much a dead/live or hard/soft distinction but merely what open mics have the best likelihood to have someone there that isn't going up... it's great to perform for the same 20 comics a few times... but if they're the only audience members its harder to get any real feedback on that new tag you added to a joke you've been doing for a couple of weeks.

I have yet to have an 'awful' experience at a Boston open mic generally folks are receptive and will work with you.