Comic Strip Live

I used to watch this every week with my mom, surprised she let me watch it actually, even though most of the comedy was pretty tame. I have a VHS tape FULL of episodes I recorded off the TV (Wayne Cotter era), some episodes even have commercials. This show rocked and was my first real experience with stand-up comedy. I haven't watched the tape in ages, but I remember some guy who played an acoustic guitar and did a john denver parody, carrot top with junk all over the stage, jeff foxworthy, mark curry, bobcat, Steve oedekerk, and Gilbert Gottfried to name a few. the music and dress styles are total early 90's and it's still pretty funny stuff.

I only remember Wayne Cotter as the host, so I guess I only saw the last three seasons. But it was on FREE broadcast TV and it was an amusing way to end a night. I still remember a hilarious five-minute set Carol Leifer did, during the final season I think. Cotter was a very genial host and they got quite a few A-list comics. I have very pleasant memories of this syndicated show.

I appeared on "Comic Strip Live" in 1989 and 1990 when John Mulrooney was the host. At that time it was taped at Igby's in West Los Angeles. In 1991, they changed hosts and venues. Gary Kroger replaced John and they started filming it at The Laugh Factory in Hollywood. Along with "An Evening at the Improv", it not only gave young comics a chance to be seen on television every week, but is now an archive of stand-up in America. These shows were for many, their first appearance on national TV. It was a lot of fun and really helped comics put together television length sets and material. Although The Laugh Factory remains, Igby's is now long gone and it sure would be nice to see the old place again if these shows were released on DVD.

Our entire family used to gather around the TV every Sunday night to watch this show. We mostly watched the first two seasons, at Igby's with the brown haired guy. I forget his name, his hair was parted in the middle, very 80's looking.

We taped several of the episodes, but most of that got accidentally recorded over. So we lost all the great skits by Steve Odekerk (sp?) who would later do all the "Thumb Movies" (Thumbtanic, Thumb Wars, etc...) and also directed the 2nd Ace Ventura movie. I think he's also involved in the kids show Jimmy Newtron. We saw Tim Allen & a truckload of other popular stars.

I'd LOVE to get my hands on a copy of those shows, so if anybody has them, please contact me =)