Grandma’s Basement Eulogy #6: My Neighborhood Comedy Club

Grandma’s Basement Comedy Club Eulogy #6: My Neighborhood Comedy Club – by Phoebe Angle

One of our favorite comedy clubs in Boston will be closing its doors in a few short days. As such, we’re having a few comedians write eulogies about their beloved, Grandma(‘s Basement Comedy Club.) This is the 6th…

What if I told you that a place existed where everyone was welcome, even if you didn’t like each other, but everyone got their turn to speak? A place where everyone waited their turn. A place where everyone knows your name. You would say, that’s a pretty crazy thing to make up, you god damn weirdo.

Well, here is the thing, it did exist. Somehow, in the jock strap of Boston, Fenway, a part of the city void of culture and humor, in the last Howard Johnson known to mankind, there was a Tiki Bar, and in that Tiki Bar there was a stand up comedy open mic, and then later, weekend comedy shows.

This was the place that hundreds of hopeful stand-up comics over the years called home.

I would not consider it so much a comedy club, but a comedy entity.

The place was a tree house, some kind of anything goes social club. It is the only honest to god underground alternative comedy club I have ever been to. Run by the very comics who played there, and frequented by only people in the know. Only the dimly lit marquee said “comedy night”, other than that, it was just known as Grandma’s Basement, and it just closed.

I can’t claim to know the full history, as jumped on the comedy wagon just over 3 years ago. What I do know is the room was started by a comedian, and former radio host, Benny Bosh. A tortured soul with a unique life perspective. Then further cultivated by his roommate and friend, Tom Dunlap. Benny has since moved to China in pursuit of new adventures teaching English, and Tom moved to New York for comedy. These days it’s run by a truly captivating young comedian named Gary Peterson. The format for booking has changed a lot over the years, but it always remained the place to go to get your feet wet doing stand up. It was the first place I was ever asked to show.

Barry Tattle & the jazz band

The open mic on Thursdays was a show and go with no cap. Some nights I would walk in at midnight to see the list still going. Having begun at 8, with people arriving at 6 to write their names down. It would have 50 names on it by now, and who ever was hosting it that night, probably John Paul Rivera, would be powering on, like that was a normal thing to do.

Hosts would joke that there were three shows in a night. The first the earliest of the early birds when up, open mic comics who arrives around 5:30 or 6 in hopes of getting a spot before 10. The second people who showed up around 8 when the show stared, and were lucky to get their stage time before midnight. The third brought the liquored up wave of comics back from booked shows, determined to bring the stuff that the best comedy memories are made of. you never knew who would come through the door.

Weekends were showcases of comics performing not for money, but the love of the game, maybe a couple dollars if the door made anything that night. The talent range was anywhere from an open micer who had been at it for three months (who had 2 minutes of material if they had an hour) to national headliners (Pete Holmes being one of them.)

Me and Grandma:
I stated doing stand up because I had wanted to since I found out what it was. I would go to stand up at the Comedy Connection in Portland Maine starting at age 15. Through college I would drag my friends to shows, and watched every Comedy Central stand up special that came out. But for what ever reason, probably the same reason I don’t pay my bills on time, or maybe the same reason I hit snooze on my alarm clock even though I’m wide awake, I didn’t.

I thought you needed to take classes, I thought there was some sort of approval system you had to go through. It turned out baptism by fire is perfectly acceptable. A year after I moved to Boston, in 2010, I reconnected with a high school friend who had just started doing stand up, and I began going to his shows. I caught a couple open mics, and came as a bringer to bringer shows. The whole time thinking “do it, do it, DO IT!” then one day I did.

Tim Vargulish

My first open mic was Sally O’Biran’s. The host at the time, Josh Gondleman, (side note-the nicest person on the planet possible), let me do it. After weeks of stalking preparing to pounce, I flung myself on the stage. I got a laugh in my two minute set at open mic at Sally O’Brian’s. Two weeks later, I did it again, then a week later again, and then I was hooked.

I lived in Fenway, due to a very unfortunate dumping incident in 2009 that involved crying in a Uhaul, and drunk Red Sox strangers helping move my mattress into my building (… but that is a different story for a different blog.) I would walk by the Howard Johnson sign that advertised “Free Comedy Thursday Nights 8pm”… and think about it.
That and the free continental breakfast, maybe I could sneak some Cheerios and save some money.