Month: October 2008

The Wiseguys Rocky Mountain Laugh-Off is a stand-up comedy competition sponsored by Wiseguys Comedy Cafe in Ogden, Utah. Each year 15-20 comics both local and from all over the country bring their best stuff in a ‘knock down, drag out’ comedy competition with cash and other prizes awarded to the finalists. This year’s Laugh Off consisted of 9 shows in 6 nights and featured two of NashvilleStandUp’s favorite comics.

This years comedians were: Sina Amedson, Mike Anderson, Jesse Case (Nashville native!), Billy Wayne Davis (Nashville native!), Brett Hamil, Spencer King, Greg Kyte, Xun Lam, Dave Metcalf, Tony Moshetto, Shawn Ottey, Laura Park, Terry Sachs, Guy Seidel, Andrew Sleighter, Dan Smith and Steve Soelberg. Past winners of this comedy competition include Don Friesen, Bryan Kellen, Scott Bennett, Tracy Tufts, Collin Moulton, Andy Peters and Marcus.
On Monday, Oct 27th, the finale was held at the beautiful 800 seat Ogden Peery’s Egyptian Theatre with a special appearance by Marcus (winner of last year’s Rocky Mountain Laugh Off). This year’s winner was no other than Jesse Case!
Jesse reported on the event on his MySpace blog:

The judges were picked at random from the crowd. The extremely red state, Mormon crowd. Not particularly my demographic, as anyone who’s seen me can confirm. There were 17 comics from all over the place, most of which had to go through prior contests to reserve a spot in the competition.
The scoring was based on 3-tier system for stage presence, originality, and audience reaction, and each category was rated 1 through 5. Then the scores were added and you received your total score for that show. The highest number from all the judges tallies won the “night”, and they announced the top 5 comics per show.
Your rank from the show (1st through 17th) was then put down on another sheet of paper, and your total rankings were added up at the end of the competition. The LOWEST number then won the competition, like golf scoring, with prizes awarded for 2nd and 3rd as well. Confused yet? Me too.
Some of the funniest comics I’ve ever seen where in this competition. Andrew Sleighter, one of my favorite Seattle comics, was here. My competition room-mate, Brett Hamill, is a relative new-comer and is already becoming a monster on stage. Xung Lam and Sean Ottey are also great and came from Seattle as well. They always ensure I’ll be in the back giggling uncontrollably. We had a strong sub-group here. Sean has found himself lucky enough to be dating Laura Park, a Wisconsin transplant living in LA now. Super funny, super charismatic, and super awesome to eat Cracker Barrel with. She’s already making huge strides in this industry, and is continuing to. Last year she won best film at the Boston Festival.
Two Boston guys, Dan Smith, and Tony Moschietto, need to be checked out by you immediately. They’ve both been in comedy for 10 years plus and have more chops than a late 1800s hairdressing catalog. They’re side-splittingly funny and the fact that they’re not incredibly famous makes me lose what little faith in show-business that I had. They both have some of the best premises I’ve ever heard, ever, period.
The local guys are strong comics. I never knew that SLC had such a ha-ha scene. Spencer King, Dave Metcalfe, and Sina Amedson, to name a few, all did really well and are all very funny.
This is where the judging breaks down though. All of these guys should have done better. They should have placed better than they did. The fact that Andrew Sleighter, Dan Smith, and Tony Moshietto didn’t tie for first every night tells you that there are flaws in the system. Those guys are GREAT comics, and destined for great things. Andrew just moved to Boston and will eventually, like most Boston comics, transition into New York, where he’ll thrive. You can’t just give 4 random people score-cards and expect fair results.
The finale tonight was fun though. Everyone did well and fucked around because why not? Marcus (the winner of the competition from last year and 2nd place on Last Comic Standing this year) popped in to do the “stall set” while the judges where tallying the scores and we talked for a while after the show.

You can read the rest of Jesse’s story on his MySpace blog.
Congratulations to Jesse Case and Billy Wayne Davis both for representing Nashville well!
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