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COMEDY MATTERS ROUNDUP WITH NICK KROLL, BILL BURR, PAULY SHORE, JOE DEROSA, TODD BARRY, NORE DAVIS, MARINA FRANKLIN, CHUCK ZITO, PATRICE BENEFIT, AND SO MUCH MORE!!!
L-R – NAPOLEON EMIL, CHRIS MILLHOUSE, NICK KROLL , REGINA DECICCO, MIKE FEENEY, JAMES MATTERN AND YOU KNOW WHO IN FRONT BACKSTAGE AT CITY WINERY!!!
NICK KROLL DOES CITY WINERY
Chris Millhouse brings great talent to City Winery as evidenced by his recent show I attended with all the comedy stars shown above. He performs but doesn’t host, and often has uber-host James Mattern do the hosting honors. James always hosts all the shows for Chris Distefano and I assume he will be there when Chris does MSG on September 11th.
It was one hilarious set after the other and to top it off Nick Kroll closed out the show with such a killer set filled with very different and unique humor. I couldn’t even begin to describe it but that’s what Nick does because he’s so creative. The audience was really excited to see him as were the other comics on the show. Make sure to check out the 8th and final season of “Big Mouth” on Netflix! And celeb photog Marcus Russell Price was there to immortalize the evening and was the one who took that group photo above! Shortly after, he visited the Comedy Matters crib and we did our own unique shoot which you will see shortly!
Comedy Matters TV is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.Subscribed
ANNUAL PATRICE BENEFIT AT CITY CENTER
For the 12th year in a row, comedy exec. Maureen Taran and Bill Burr have brought over 2,000 people together at City Center to celebrate the life of the great Patrice O’Neal who left us way too young at only 41 years old. For those of us lucky enough to have known Patrice he was a trip!
I had the honor of being the third co-host on The Black Phillip Show, a radio show we did on XM radio before it became Sirius XM radio. It was me, Dante Nero and Patrice and we had a blast. That show touched a lot of hearts and minds and to this day, as recently as two weeks ago, I still get guys coming up to me to thank me for my input on the show. This phone call came from Patrice the first night we did the show together. If you listen till the end you’ll see that he called me at 4:05 A.M. to tell me how much he liked the show and suggested that we should do a show together. Truly one of my greatest honors!
I had such a unique relationship with Patrice and everyone involved knew it. At Patrice’s funeral, his wife Von came over to me and said “Patrice really loved you.” It was sad but definitely one of my greatest honors. Patrice was so much more than a comedian, To me he was a comedy philosopher!
That kind of response from Patrice didn’t come easy as any comic can attest to who went up against him, or got on his bad side. He and I never had any kind of adversarial relationship. It was pure love. As one of the only white guys that was ever honored for Black History Month ( true fact see the photo of the invite!) for creating comedy workshops for inner city kids, Patrice came to Gotham to inspire the people in the workshop.
Rich Vos was the perennial host of the event at City Center and he was sharp as ever. No one escapes his barbs! All phones went into Yondr bags so there was no photos to be had. Needless to say everyone killed. Vos opened with about 15 minutes. Cipha Sounds was missed and was not here this year on the ones and twos. Sean Patton was the first to hit the stage, and he did great, followed by Rosebud Baker who had an interesting take on abortion, and several jokes on her husband Andy Haynes, another great comic who I last saw when we did Subway Takes the same day with Kareem Rahma.
Thanks for reading Comedy Matters TV! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.Subscribed
Nimesh Patel had a strong set as usual after Vos introduced him as an Uber driver. He was followed by D.C. Benny who is a great story teller. Years ago I did a story telling show he was producing at a place on Houston Street called Madame X.
Greer Barnes is a force unto himself. He’s just so talented, not only with his jokes, but with the sound effects, impressions and accents he mimics so perfectly. His African accent totally kills, and when we see each other all we do is laugh. He has such a great spirit and was one of the few comics on the show that showed up at the after-party at The Stand where it’s held every year.
While at the after-party Bruce Hills, multi-year President of JFL Montreal, the largest and most prestigious comedy festival in the world, and most recently inducted into the Canada Comedy Hall of Fame, and even more importantly a friend of mine for 30 years, asked if he could take a photo with me, and honored me by saying I was “an icon!” At JFL’s 40th year festival, Bruce and I took a photo with my JFL VIP pass from 1992, which I treasure and is still in pristine condition.
But I digress! Back to the benefit, Vos announced a special guest and Stavros Halkias came out and did a really strong set which I was glad I got the chance to congratulate him on at the after-party. I love being able to congratulate comics when they kill, cause we all need to be reaffirmed. It’s an important thing to do, and not enough people do that. He lost 40 pounds on Zepbound which he described as a very disrespectful medicine. I think it was he who had the great line, “If you wait too long to come out to your grandmother, you’re going to have to do it every time you see her! “ Genius!!!
And then Bill Burr came out and destroyed the crowd as he usually does. First he went after Vos by sarcastically saying, “ Did you see all his jewelry? He looks very successful!” Every so often Bill laughs during his set like he can’t believe what he just said. I know him for so long. I know him since the days he had red hair!
And as long as I know him I still don’t know when he’s kidding with me. At the after-party at The Stand I was sitting alone eating at a table when I heard someone call my name. It was Club Soda Kenny, my longtime friend, who’s Bill’s security. I left my food and went over to say hi and share a hug and Bill was at the table sitting with Jodi Lieberman, Zoe Friedman, Maureen Taran and producer Masavia Greer.
I said hello to all, hugged Jodi, Zoe and Maureen who thanked me for coming every year, and I said hello to Bill but I didn’t sit down at the table. I just stood there and finally to break the ice I leaned over and said to Bill, “Congratulations on doing Broadway. How long were you in rehearsal? And he said something like “ I’m just relaxing and there you are crouching over to do an interview. You’re always working!” But he said it in a Bill Burr kind of way where you think he’s pissed off. So I said, “ I was just making conversation cause I think it’s so great that you’re on Broadway.” And then he paused, and smiled and said, “ I rehearsed for about six weeks!” So I knew he was just busting my balls like he likes to do.
Then he went off on my outfit cause I was wearing a leather blazer and he asked me if I was in The Ramones, and kept coming up with old rock references that I reminded him of. I told him that I always try and wear something he can make fun of! At that point, I was afraid to ask him for our usual annual photo, so I’m using some of mine from the past! (LOL)
JOE DEROSA SPECIAL AS A FILM
Sometimes I make a note in my phone when I meet someone I think is talented. I first met Joe DeRosa November, 2007 at Carolines during a comedy competition.
At the end of April, NY Comedy Club owner Emilio Savone texted me to let me know that Joe was premiering his latest special “ I Never Promised You A Rose Garden” at The Angelika Film Center as a film, and as usual he wrote “ It’s not an event unless you’re there!” , which always makes me feel special! ( No pun intended!)
The special is described as “ an all new hour of hopeless comedy derived from the dark mind of Joe DeRosa. Joe’s bleak outlook on society will actually bring joy to you in the dire climate we’re all living in.”
The description didn’t do it justice as it is a remarkable piece of work. So well thought out, so original, and so well rehearsed that it sounded like it was the first time he was saying what he said. I told him so at the theater, and had my chance to say the same thing to the audience on the mic at the Q&A that followed moderated by comic Nick Alexander, but the next day I felt I had to text him again. I wrote “Hey Joe, I hope you don’t mind me repeating myself but last night was so special. So clever, so intelligent, so well thought out and so well pereformed in such a natural way, not like a performance. Just needed to tell you that.” I got a heartfelt response.
A lot of Joe’s fans in the audience recognized me from my wild dancing debut in Joe’s music video for his band Salsa Windfall called “Mouth On My Money.” If you haven’t seen it yet this is your chance! We plan to do more!!!
And the after party at Joey Roses, ( Joe’s sandwich shop) was awesome and I ran into my old friend Pauly Shore there who was in town to perform at The Stand the next night which I of course attended! When Pauly saw me the first thing he said after introducing me to people as his agent, was “Baby and Max” which was a romantic comedy feature script I wrote that Pauly loved and wanted to star in back in the day! Just the fact that he still remembered that was so awesome! Maybe it could still happen!!!
Thanks for reading Comedy Matters TV! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.Subscribed
PAULY SHORE DOES THE STAND
The main room was packed with Pauly fans. He even did a little of “The Weasel” for them from his days on MTV, and the line-up was very cool with Todd Barry, one of the only guys who makes me laugh out loud, my old pal from Playboy Comedy Cort McCown who was in from LA, and new Dad Mark Normand who I’ve never seen have a bad set. Pauly was so funny and often does very self-deprecating humor, especially about his career. He said he wants to do more movies so maybe “Baby and Max” still has a chance! Noted film producer Noel Ashman has it listed on IMDb as being in pre-production! All we need is the money!!! $$$
GOTHAM ALL STARS
Always a good time at Gotham and I even have my own table #69, but it doesn’t have a number on it like all the other tables do, cause people keep stealing it! My dear friend Marion Grodin is always a great host and gets people in the mood to laugh, and this time it was Kyle Grooms in from Florida who it’s so great to see looking so healthy after he conquered his health problems! He always gets me when he describes how it was growing up in the hood with the name “Kyle”. As he says “ No one’s afraid of a guy named Kyle!”
Marina Franklin is always just so funny and so honest on stage and thankfully conquered her own health problems. She even announced her age which is a brave thing to do!
I was really excited to see Tommy Brennan who absolutely killed, and who I hadn’t seen since we filmed our pilot at Gotham called “The Raw Side of Comedy” which hopefully will finally find a home some day. Tommy was one of the stand-outs in the pilot!!!
COMEDY SHOUT-OUTS
Shout out to Tommy Gooch who saved the show by being so funny at Famee Furlane, a private Italian club out in College Point that I attended with entrepreneur Gus Podias!
Shout out to Nore Davis my old pal from Comic Strip days who I saw was performing at West Side Comedy Club so I made sure to get over there. Nore is also nothing but honest on stage as he discussed being in professional therapy, ( as opposed to street therapy!) dealing with grief and actually managed to make his Mom’s funeral funny. He’ll be shooting yet another special, currently unnamed, this coming November at a venue in Brooklyn.
And lastly a huge shout out and congratulations to Chuck Zito, the baddest guy on the planet, on his amazing documentary “ Chuck Zito – An American Story” that I was honored to be invited to by Chuck himself. More than 400 people showed up to the AMC Theater in Westbury for a one hour red carpet and screening of the film. I got to re-connect with actor/writer/producer Gary Pastore, actor/writer/director Willie Demeo who I know since he was in my film “I Am Woody” about a mob boss obsessed with Woody Allen, and the legend himself Bo Dietl who has the very first reserved table at Rao’s.
Chuck spent many years as the Pres. of the Hell’s Angels before he went on to become a famous actor in films like Carlito’s Way, The Rock, Homefront and TV shows like Law and Order, Entourage and his amazing turn as the head of the Italian gang in HBO’s hit show OZ. Chuck and I have been friends since he was bodyguarding Charlie Sheen so many years ago, and I brought that photo with me of the day we met. So wonderful that his 93 year old mother was there to enjoy the honor with him.
I actually have more but all good things must come to an end as they say! I’ll put them in the next column. In the meantime follow me on Instagram at @jeffreygurian and feel free to share this with a friend, and please consider subscribing! Due to the length : If the newsletter is truncated in an email, readers can click on “View entire message” and they’ll be able to view the entire post in their email app.
Thanks for reading Comedy Matters TV! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.Subscribed
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COMEDY MATTERS ROUNDUP WITH NICK KROLL, BILL BURR, PAULY SHORE, JOE DEROSA, TODD BARRY, NORE DAVIS, MARINA FRANKLIN, CHUCK ZITO, PATRICE BENEFIT, AND SO MUCH MORE!!!
May 27, 2025
L-R – NAPOLEON EMIL, CHRIS MILLHOUSE, NICK KROLL , REGINA DECICCO, MIKE FEENEY, JAMES MATTERN AND YOU KNOW WHO IN FRONT BACKSTAGE AT CITY WINERY!!!
NICK KROLL DOES CITY WINERY
Chris Millhouse brings great talent to City Winery as evidenced by his recent show I attended with all the comedy stars shown above. He performs but doesn’t host, and often has uber-host James Mattern do the hosting honors. James always hosts all the shows for Chris Distefano and I assume he will be there when Chris does MSG on September 11th.
It was one hilarious set after the other and to top it off Nick Kroll closed out the show with such a killer set filled with very different and unique humor. I couldn’t even begin to describe it but that’s what Nick does because he’s so creative. The audience was really excited to see him as were the other comics on the show. Make sure to check out the 8th and final season of “Big Mouth” on Netflix! And celeb photog Marcus Russell Price was there to immortalize the evening and was the one who took that group photo above! Shortly after, he visited the Comedy Matters crib and we did our own unique shoot which you will see shortly!
Comedy Matters TV is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.Subscribed
ANNUAL PATRICE BENEFIT AT CITY CENTER
For the 12th year in a row, comedy exec. Maureen Taran and Bill Burr have brought over 2,000 people together at City Center to celebrate the life of the great Patrice O’Neal who left us way too young at only 41 years old. For those of us lucky enough to have known Patrice he was a trip!
I had the honor of being the third co-host on The Black Phillip Show, a radio show we did on XM radio before it became Sirius XM radio. It was me, Dante Nero and Patrice and we had a blast. That show touched a lot of hearts and minds and to this day, as recently as two weeks ago, I still get guys coming up to me to thank me for my input on the show. This phone call came from Patrice the first night we did the show together. If you listen till the end you’ll see that he called me at 4:05 A.M. to tell me how much he liked the show and suggested that we should do a show together. Truly one of my greatest honors!
I had such a unique relationship with Patrice and everyone involved knew it. At Patrice’s funeral, his wife Von came over to me and said “Patrice really loved you.” It was sad but definitely one of my greatest honors. Patrice was so much more than a comedian, To me he was a comedy philosopher!
That kind of response from Patrice didn’t come easy as any comic can attest to who went up against him, or got on his bad side. He and I never had any kind of adversarial relationship. It was pure love. As one of the only white guys that was ever honored for Black History Month ( true fact see the photo of the invite!) for creating comedy workshops for inner city kids, Patrice came to Gotham to inspire the people in the workshop.
Rich Vos was the perennial host of the event at City Center and he was sharp as ever. No one escapes his barbs! All phones went into Yondr bags so there was no photos to be had. Needless to say everyone killed. Vos opened with about 15 minutes. Cipha Sounds was missed and was not here this year on the ones and twos. Sean Patton was the first to hit the stage, and he did great, followed by Rosebud Baker who had an interesting take on abortion, and several jokes on her husband Andy Haynes, another great comic who I last saw when we did Subway Takes the same day with Kareem Rahma.
Thanks for reading Comedy Matters TV! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.Subscribed
Nimesh Patel had a strong set as usual after Vos introduced him as an Uber driver. He did some questionable political material, which he played off by saying his wife was Jewish, a fact which he confirmed to me at the after-party, and he was followed by D.C. Benny who is a great story teller. Years ago I did a story telling show he was producing at a place on Houston Street called Madame X.
Greer Barnes is a force unto himself. He’s just so talented, not only with his jokes, but with the sound effects, impressions and accents he mimics so perfectly. His African accent totally kills, and when we see each other all we do is laugh. He has such a great spirit and was one of the few comics on the show that showed up at the after-party at The Stand where it’s held every year.
While at the after-party Bruce Hills, multi-year President of JFL Montreal, the largest and most prestigious comedy festival in the world, and most recently inducted into the Canada Comedy Hall of Fame, and even more importantly a friend of mine for 30 years, asked if he could take a photo with me, and honored me by saying I was “an icon!” At JFL’s 40th year festival, Bruce and I took a photo with my JFL VIP pass from 1992, which I treasure and is still in pristine condition.
But I digress! Back to the benefit, Vos announced a special guest and Stavros Halkias came out and did a really strong set which I was glad I got the chance to congratulate him on at the after-party. I love being able to congratulate comics when they kill, cause we all need to be reaffirmed. It’s an important thing to do, and not enough people do that. He lost 40 pounds on Zepbound which he described as a very disrespectful medicine. I think it was he who had the great line, “If you wait too long to come out to your grandmother, you’re going to have to do it every time you see her! “ Genius!!!
And then Bill Burr came out and destroyed the crowd as he usually does. First he went after Vos by sarcastically saying, “ Did you see all his jewelry? He looks very successful!” Every so often Bill laughs during his set like he can’t believe what he just said. I know him for so long. I know him since the days he had red hair!
And as long as I know him I still don’t know when he’s kidding with me. At the after-party at The Stand I was sitting alone eating at a table when I heard someone call my name. It was Club Soda Kenny, my longtime friend, who’s Bill’s security. I left my food and went over to say hi and share a hug and Bill was at the table sitting with Jodi Lieberman, Zoe Friedman, Maureen Taran and producer Masavia Greer.
I said hello to all, hugged Jodi, Zoe and Maureen who thanked me for coming every year, and I said hello to Bill but I didn’t sit down at the table. I just stood there and finally to break the ice I leaned over and said to Bill, “Congratulations on doing Broadway. How long were you in rehearsal? And he said something like “ I’m just relaxing and there you are crouching over to do an interview. You’re always working!” But he said it in a Bill Burr kind of way where you think he’s pissed off. So I said, “ I was just making conversation cause I think it’s so great that you’re on Broadway.” And then he paused, and smiled and said, “ I rehearsed for about six weeks!” So I knew he was just busting my balls like he likes to do.
Then he went off on my outfit cause I was wearing a leather blazer and he asked me if I was in The Ramones, and kept coming up with old rock references that I reminded him of. I told him that I always try and wear something he can make fun of! At that point, I was afraid to ask him for our usual annual photo, so I’m using some of mine from the past! (LOL)
JOE DEROSA SPECIAL AS A FILM
Sometimes I make a note in my phone when I meet someone I think is talented. I first met Joe DeRosa November, 2007 at Carolines during a comedy competition.
At the end of April, NY Comedy Club owner Emilio Savone texted me to let me know that Joe was premiering his latest special “ I Never Promised You A Rose Garden” at The Angelika Film Center as a film, and as usual he wrote “ It’s not an event unless you’re there!” , which always makes me feel special! ( No pun intended!)
The special is described as “ an all new hour of hopeless comedy derived from the dark mind of Joe DeRosa. Joe’s bleak outlook on society will actually bring joy to you in the dire climate we’re all living in.”
The description didn’t do it justice as it is a remarkable piece of work. So well thought out, so original, and so well rehearsed that it sounded like it was the first time he was saying what he said. I told him so at the theater, and had my chance to say the same thing to the audience on the mic at the Q&A that followed moderated by comic Nick Alexander, but the next day I felt I had to text him again. I wrote “Hey Joe, I hope you don’t mind me repeating myself but last night was so special. So clever, so intelligent, so well thought out and so well pereformed in such a natural way, not like a performance. Just needed to tell you that.” I got a heartfelt response.
A lot of Joe’s fans in the audience recognized me from my wild dancing debut in Joe’s music video for his band Salsa Windfall called “Mouth On My Money.” If you haven’t seen it yet this is your chance! We plan to do more!!!
And the after party at Joey Roses, ( Joe’s sandwich shop) was awesome and I ran into my old friend Pauly Shore there who was in town to perform at The Stand the next night which I of course attended! When Pauly saw me the first thing he said after introducing me to people as his agent, was “Baby and Max” which was a romantic comedy feature script I wrote that Pauly loved and wanted to star in back in the day! Just the fact that he still remembered that was so awesome! Maybe it could still happen!!!
Thanks for reading Comedy Matters TV! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.Subscribed
PAULY SHORE DOES THE STAND
The main room was packed with Pauly fans. He even did a little of “The Weasel” for them from his days on MTV, and the line-up was very cool with Todd Barry, one of the only guys who makes me laugh out loud, my old pal from Playboy Comedy Cort McCown who was in from LA, and new Dad Mark Normand who I’ve never seen have a bad set. Pauly was so funny and often does very self-deprecating humor, especially about his career. He said he wants to do more movies so maybe “Baby and Max” still has a chance! Noted film producer Noel Ashman has it listed on IMDb as being in pre-production! All we need is the money!!! $$$
GOTHAM ALL STARS
Always a good time at Gotham and I even have my own table #69, but it doesn’t have a number on it like all the other tables do, cause people keep stealing it! My dear friend Marion Grodin is always a great host and gets people in the mood to laugh, and this time it was Kyle Grooms in from Florida who it’s so great to see looking so healthy after he conquered his health problems! He always gets me when he describes how it was growing up in the hood with the name “Kyle”. As he says “ No one’s afraid of a guy named Kyle!”
Marina Franklin is always just so funny and so honest on stage and thankfully conquered her own health problems. She even announced her age which is a brave thing to do!
I was really excited to see Tommy Brennan who absolutely killed, and who I hadn’t seen since we filmed our pilot at Gotham called “The Raw Side of Comedy” which hopefully will finally find a home some day. Tommy was one of the stand-outs in the pilot!!!
COMEDY SHOUT-OUTS
Shout out to Tommy Gooch who saved the show by being so funny at Famee Furlane, a private Italian club out in College Point that I attended with entrepreneur Gus Podias!
Shout out to Nore Davis my old pal from Comic Strip days who I saw was performing at West Side Comedy Club so I made sure to get over there. Nore is also nothing but honest on stage as he discussed being in professional therapy, ( as opposed to street therapy!) dealing with grief and actually managed to make his Mom’s funeral funny. He’ll be shooting yet another special, currently unnamed, this coming November at a venue in Brooklyn.
And lastly a huge shout out and congratulations to Chuck Zito, the baddest guy on the planet, on his amazing documentary “ Chuck Zito – An American Story” that I was honored to be invited to by Chuck himself. More than 400 people showed up to the AMC Theater in Westbury for a one hour red carpet and screening of the film. I got to re-connect with actor/writer/producer Gary Pastore, actor/writer/director Willie Demeo who I know since he was in my film “I Am Woody” about a mob boss obsessed with Woody Allen, and the legend himself Bo Dietl who has the very first reserved table at Rao’s.
Chuck spent many years as the Pres. of the Hell’s Angels before he went on to become a famous actor in films like Carlito’s Way, The Rock, Homefront and TV shows like Law and Order, Entourage and his amazing turn as the head of the Italian gang in HBO’s hit show OZ. Chuck and I have been friends since he was bodyguarding Charlie Sheen so many years ago, and I brought that photo with me of the day we met. So wonderful that his 93 year old mother was there to enjoy the honor with him.
I actually have more but all good things must come to an end as they say! I’ll put them in the next column. In the meantime follow me on Instagram at @jeffreygurian and feel free to share this with a friend, and please consider subscribing! Due to the length : If the newsletter is truncated in an email, readers can click on “View entire message” and they’ll be able to view the entire post in their email app.
Thanks for reading Comedy Matters TV! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.Subscribed
Discussion about this post
CommentsRestacks
TopLatest
Nov 8, 2023•
COMEDIANS RULE THE GOLDEN GLOBES
Jan 31, 2024•
(L-R) Nikki Glaser, Chris Rock, Drew Barrymore, Jim Gaffigan, Adam Sandler
Apr 29•
Posted by Jeffrey Gurian on November 26, 2024
Dec 10, 2024•
2:10
© 2025 Jeffrey Gurian
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