When you think about traditional standup, a couple of things come to mind: a guy, a stool, a microphone, an empty stage. But at Emerson College, there’s more to it.
All semester students worked to plan and perform in the annual two-day Emerson College Comedic Arts comedy festival, ComEx!, which took place on April 10 and 11. The production ran the gamut of comedy types, from standup to sketch to improv. Shows featured elements such as group comedy acts, relatable characters, and costumes, providing an immersive experience for the audience.
Starting in 2019, ComEx! is made up of four different kinds of comedy shows: Best of Sketch, Rising Stars of Standup,the Improv Showcase, and the Clavelli Awards. The comedy extravaganza’s two-day itinerary is closed by the 23rd Jess Ilias Clavelli Award Competition. This year’s winners of the award competition were junior comedic arts major Gwendolyn Baily in first place, junior comedic arts major Ella Korson in second, and senior theatre and performance major Lucabella Sangin and junior comedic arts major Ella Shipman tied for third.
Each show had a different student producer, with one overall student executive producer. This year, that was Taner Kaynak, a junior comedic arts major. Each student producer was heavily involved in making the show happen, from being at auditions, to writing scripts, and promoting the event.
Kaynak took on the role of executive producing across all four shows. He said he enjoys the milieu of voices that participate in the show.
“ComEx! has a unique voice,” he said. “It’s an Emerson voice.”
Jayden Lopez, a sophomore comedic arts major, served as producer of the Stand Up showcase and also served as the event’s host. He said that he enjoyed the format and process of the show.
“I appreciate the structured freedom [of ComEx!] … We have the freedom to write our set, to build on it and punch it up how we want, but then we also have the structuredness of rehearsals,” he said. “This is your time to come in, feel how you feel, get a sense of how you want to perform these things, and then the day comes and you execute it.”
Freshman comedic arts major Bama Bardocz was the student producer for the improv showcase and for the Clavelli awards. They explained that they have been producing shows since high school and are used to the different moving parts. ComEx! is particularly special to them as it centers their passion for comedy.
“I am used to the chaos,” Bardocz said. “Because it is a two-day affair, everything can be very meticulous … The teamwork of staying on top of how each other’s shows are going has been very helpful and lets me keep my head held high.”
Sangin performed as part of the improv ensemble show on Saturday, and also competed in the Clavelli Awards. Despite being a theatre and performance major, Sangin has been involved in the comedy scene at Emerson since her freshman year. Recently, she took an improv class with Senior Affiliated Faculty Erin Schwall, and then served as her teaching assistant, which she said gave her the courage to participate.
“I was too nervous to do it. I was like, ‘I’m not good enough. There are so many comedic arts majors who deserve this opportunity way more than I do. I should stay in my own lane,’” she said. “And then this year, being [Schwall’s] TA and doing more improv has made me be like, ‘No, this is my lane, this is what I’m supposed to do.’”
For her Clavelli Award competition piece, Sangin did an audiobook improv set. From a moderator, she received a suggestion of a book title and genre, and a kind of character in which Sangin pretended to “record” an audiobook. The experience of doing such a spontaneous and audience-focused set connected to her theatre background, she said.
Sanguin recalled her immediate reaction after her Clavelli set.
“I went backstage after my set, and was like, ‘That’s the worst I could have done … and then I ended up placing, which was absolutely insane,” she said. “You know how the bronze medalist is the happiest? That was the case for me.”
The playfulness of ComEx! was felt across the board, by both performers and producers.
“The Emerson comedy community is very special to me. You’ll meet some of the kindest people, you’ll meet some of the funniest people,” Kaynak said. “It’s a semester’s worth of work in one hour for the showcases. So, we want [the performers] to succeed. We want to laugh.”
