Famous comedians Jim Norton, Keith Robinson and Robert Kelly performed in the Schine Underground last weekend, but lesser-known names will take the stage tonight.

Seven Syracuse University comedians will go head to head in the Last Laugh Ultimate Comedy Competition. The event is sponsored by Student Centers and Programming Services, University Union Comedy, Perc Place, South Campus Organization for Programming Excellence and the Jabberwocky Caf, and tickets are free at the Schine Box Office. Thirteen students competed in the preliminary round but were pared down by a panel of judges, said Paul Ryan, the competition’s organizer.

‘I was looking to do a campus-wide competition,’ said Ryan, a graduate student in higher education and administration. ‘My first thought was karaoke, but everybody does that, so my second idea was stand-up. We tried to make it kind of like ‘American Idol’ and tap into that theme, but it ended up being comedy.’

Students were judged on their originality, stage presence, delivery, humor and audience reaction during the first round and received up to 10 minutes to present their material to the audience and judges.

Many of the comedians involved were performing stand-up comedy for the first time. David Young said he has been doing comedy throughout his entire SU career, but this is the first time he’s even been able to enter a stand-up competition.

‘Comedy is what I want to do when I get older,’ said Young, a junior television, radio and film major, who is also involved in SU comedy group Zamboni Revolution. ‘I think that more relatable jokes are fun to tell because you get more people screaming as opposed to punchline jokes.’

‘We’re little virgins to stand-up,’ said Dan Gurewitch, a sophomore television, radio and film major and Daily Orange contributing writer. ‘I was just glad to survive and not get things thrown at me. I’m using it as an opportunity to experiment with my jokes.’

The winner of tonight’s competition will receive a $700 gift certificate to Drumlins Country Club. Ryan said that since the cost of putting on a stand-up competition is low, organizers had more money to spend on the prize. He said he wanted to come up with something appealing because he didn’t know how many students would be willing to go up in front of the mic.

‘I love comedy, but stand-up was one facet I had never done before,’ said Josh Simpson, a sophomore television, radio and film major. ‘It just seemed like I should do it.’

‘I didn’t realize how much fun it was until two days later,’ Gurewitch said. ‘Up until then I was too terrified.’

The comedians will bring their own styles of stand-up to tonight’s competition. Gurewitch said he is more physical and that he tries to mix things up with stories about parties, Australian slang, insecurity and the Twister game. Young said that his style is more dry and sarcastic than physical. Simpson’s style includes self-composed guitar songs, he said.

‘I wouldn’t call myself a political humorist, just random,’ Simpson said. ‘I bring in things from my imagination, and ‘What if?’ or ‘If I was God for a day’ stories.’

Ryan hopes to continue the competition for the next few years and is interested to see how many people show up to see the final round.

‘Having done one, I think that we can do next year even better,’ he said. ‘It’s a fun little competition that hopefully ends up well.’

‘The preliminary round went over pretty well,’ Young said. ‘I saw a lot of different faces that I usually see at comedy events. It’s a cool opportunity for people who have never done stand-up before.’

Published on April 20, 2004 at 12:00 pm