The joke's on us

I recently attended a stand-up comedy night, a so-called diversity show featuring multiracial joke slingers. In one bit, a straight comic talked about the intimidation he felt around a big, burly guy at his gym—that is, until he found out the guy is gay. Get it? Gay men aren’t masculine enough to be intimidating. When the audience roared, the quip raised an ongoing question of mine: Is such homophobia the reason Chicago lacks a thriving LGBT stand-up culture?

Adam Guerino, 24, is one of several LGBT comics regularly working the city’s stand-up circuit. Guerino agrees that a field dominated by straight white men can be off-putting to queer audiences. “When gays go see a show, they may worry, and justifiably so, that they’ll find themselves the butt of jokes,” Guerino says. Bill Cruz, 32, agrees. An out Latino performer, Cruz says comics can sometimes be unaccommodating to minority communities. “You’ll find antigay sentiment at a lot of stand-up,” Cruz says. “There’s a certain amount of homophobia you can express that’s accepted. Sometimes there’s a lot of gay- and women-bashing.”

While lesbian stand-up comic Cameron Esposito, 27, reports nothing but gentlemanly behavior from her colleagues, she laments the lack of LGBT performers manning the mike and wonders if it speaks to our community’s own sensitivities. “I don’t find stand-up comedy difficult, but I’m aware that this is a crazy way to spend your day,” she says. “When you’re already starting with this really scary thing and you add any difference [like being gay], that can be really challenging. There is a vulnerability there, for sure.”

That vulnerability becomes all the more pronounced when a queer comic in a room full of presumably straight people outs himself. “Whereas a straight comic will say, ‘My girlfriend and I were on the bus the other day’ and then make a joke about the CTA, if you’re a gay comic, then it’s a gay joke,” Guerino says. Cruz notes, “There’s always this process of coming out in front of your audience. You don’t have to do that with a queer crowd, but [LGBT] audiences are tougher because having a queer event automatically politicizes it.”

While Esposito admits that coming out onstage can be awkward, she notes that if the jokes are good, the crowd will follow. “I almost always out myself onstage,” she says. “Sometimes people are a little bit confused, but I don’t feel that I get a lot of disrespect about it. An audience will go almost anywhere with you if you can bring them there.”

Two successful recent shows—Come Out for Change, an LGBT stand-up benefit at the Lincoln Lodge, and Lerman Holiday, a queer and mostly stand-up showcase at Annoyance—indicate that change may be on its way. But for the scene to grow, denizens of Boystown may have to step beyond Halsted Street. “It’s a double-edged sword,” Cruz says. “If you bring the acts to Boystown, there’s competition. You can sit down and watch a comedy show or go to Spin and Hydrate and party all night. It’s weird to fight for that queer entertainment dollar when the bars are so successful at it.”

All three comics hope queer-comedy seekers will join them for two events outside the ’hood: That’s So Gay, a night of queer stand-up at the Edge Comedy Club this weekend, and a queer comedy show (mikeyocomedy.com) happening downtown February 24. Bringing gay audiences to straight venues may hold the key. “I’m okay with grabbing the gay flag and running through all the straight parts of town,” Esposito says. “My ideal show is a mixed one where there are queer and straight people in the audience, and you’re not speaking solely to either community.”

Esposito hosts an open mike at the Town Hall Pub Friday 23. That’s So Gay happens Saturday 24.