ron shillingford [email protected]
Organising a comedy festival is no laughing matter but that has expertly been done by promoters Rod Jefferson and Brad Watts who next week host the Laughter Lounge’s first ever event of its kind.
When the monthly Laughter Lounge series started in October 2010 at Margaritaville, the crowds were modest and so were expectations, but it has escalated to a comedy festival faster than delivering a complicated punchline. Damon Williams was the first comedian and he has selected the acts ever since. The other performers with Williams are Deon Cole, Michael Colyar and the multi-skilled Chastity Washington.
“We have spent the last year and a half planning the festival,” said Jefferson. “The Laughter Lounge concept was created to build a foundation for a comedy festival. Laughter Lounge is just one phase of many. Laughter Lounge started to see if Caymanians would embrace comedy here. They definitely have. Laughter Lounge has a very strong following now with room to grow.
“There is no reason to promote the tourism product of comedy by having a festival if Caymanians do not support it. The idea of comedy as a tourism product was the basis of the comedy festival idea. I was listening to Austin on Crosstalk one day and he was talking about everyone on the Island being good ambassadors and how important it is for tourism. That gave me the idea to create ambassadors for the Cayman Islands.
“Comedians travel the world, have radio shows and have many followers on all of the social networks today. Every comedian talks about Cayman on their radio shows or social networks when they are coming here and about their trip when they get back. Damon, for example, is on the Tom Joyner Morning Show in Chicago. He reaches 9 million listeners every day.
“When Damon visits to perform, Tom Joyner discusses his trip to Cayman and how he loves it here on the radio to all those listeners. You can’t pay for that kind of positive feedback. Another phase was to make this a comedy hub where comedians want to perform.
“Brad and I go out of our way to make sure all the comedians have a great experience while visiting Grand Cayman. This has transitioned into other comedians constantly calling to ask if they can perform here because a fellow comedian told them how much they enjoyed Cayman. Now that we have comedians calling us we think this phase is going in the right direction. This festival is not the final one, it’s more of a test run for a bigger one later this year.”
Positive feedback
Williams has been a big conduit of the evolution. He has the final decision on all the acts. “He is considered to be a very clean comedian,” said Jefferson. “Comedy is very subjective to the person and their culture to what they feel is rude or offensive. We trust his many years of experience combined with his many trips to Cayman to know who can perform here without being considered rude or offensive. There is no way to please everyone who comes to a comedy show, but we have gotten about 98 per cent positive feedback so far.
“Damon is celebrating his birthday on this trip and Deon is a good friend of his who also has a birthday next week. We’re not sure how many comedians will grace the stage because we are getting lots of calls from people wanting to come down to celebrate with them. Michael Colyar was here last year. He heard about Laughter Lounge from Chris Spencer who had performed here and Colyar mentioned to Damon that he would like come too.”
Williams expects Chastity Washington to go down a storm. He said: “She is energetic and combines music, dance and even impressions. She is relatively new but has a well polished act.”
The event starts on Wednesday at Stingers with a launch party, includes star deejays from the US and includes a free show on Thursday at Karoo in Camana Bay. Friday’s gig is at Vivendi in the Strand and it all wraps up at Vivendi on Saturday with a party after at Royal Palms.
“We wanted to give people who may not have had a chance to see our show a chance to see it and we like to do positive things while having fun. We always donate part of our proceeds to non-profit organisations. I can comfortably say we gave the majority of our profits from all shows so far to non-profit organisations. We will team up with the guys at Karoo to donate part of the proceeds from food and drinks during Damon’s show on Thursday to a non-profit.”
Highlights of the festival start even before the performers land because Williams will do a set on the Cayman Airways flight from Chicago.
“I am a big fan of Michael Colyar and Deon Cole and I am curious about the one woman show by Chastity Washington and her impersonations,” added Jefferson. “Damon is a close friend of ours and we’re looking forward to the birthday/masquerade party we’re doing for him on Saturday at Elements. We called in a few favours to get the guest deejays to come down. They are Kool Ant (T-Pain’s tour DJ), Supa Star J Kwik (Gucci Mane’s DJ) and there’s the return of Poison Dart.
“Interest in this festival has been amazing. We had so many requests for tickets and gift certificates for Christmas. Everybody has been asking when is the next show. We wanted this to be affordable for everyone, so we have an all access pass to all events of three shows and five parties for $65.”
For more information contact [email protected] or 925-9637
For more information contact [email protected] or 925-9637
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