Weekend of laughs: Stand-up, improv, workshops highlighted at Uptown Comedy Festival

In 2017, Devin and Briana Mahoney were living in Los Angeles but looking for a change of pace. The comedy writer and his marketing professional wife wanted a slower-paced childhood for their two young sons, akin to the experiences they had growing up in Utica and Syracuse, respectively.

Opportunity came knocking in the form of Utica's historic Uptown Theatre. Built in 1927 and originally used for silent movies and vaudeville performances, the theater had recently fallen into disrepair and disuse.

“It was just kind of a perfect storm of us looking for a new thing to do and this building being available and needing new ownership,” Devin Mahoney said. “I grew up down the street, so I grew up going to movies here, and like most people from around here, I have a lot of great memories of when the theater was open.  So it's been really rewarding because so many people from around here have such an affinity for this place and everyone's really rooting for us to get it back open.”

In 2018, the Mahoneys returned home to Central New York. With a group of collaborators, including Devin Mahoney's writing partner Rego Marquiis, they formed Uptown Theatre for the Creative Arts (UTCA), a nonprofit which purchased the theater.

They have been conducting major renovations to restore the theater to its former glory, and producing stand-up open mic nights and improv classes and shows in the meantime.

Weekend show

This weekend, they are putting on the first-ever Uptown Comedy Festival to raise funds for their efforts.

The festival kicked off Thursday, and will run Friday, Saturday and Sunday. It features workshops, stand-up and improv performances from dozens of funny people.

“It’s going to be a nice mix of some of our local favorites, some really great national and even international talent, and then just some great comics from around the country,” Mahoney said. “It's going to be a nice mix of different kinds of comedy, too.”

You can purchase all-access day passes for $25, which will get you in the door for hours of shows each night this weekend. From 5 or 5:30 p.m. to 11 p.m. or midnight, UTCA will put on shows in both their smaller studio space (which Mahoney refers to as their improv headquarters) and the main stage.

Mahoney said that this is the first time the main stage has been used in about 10 years. The main theater is still a work in progress; due to inflation, the renovations have become much more expensive than UTCA anticipated. Briana Mahoney hopes the festival will shine a spotlight on the Uptown.

“We're just excited to be able to do this festival to show off the potential that this theater has, what we're capable of, what we can bring to the area and what we can offer,” she said. “To be able to actually do it in the auditorium and use this space the way it was intended, I hope that gets people excited, because we're so close to being able to move forward and finish the renovations in there. But we are still short on funding with costs going up, and we're really at a sort of crisis point of not being able to pull it off when we’re so close.  I hope to use the opportunity to help convey to people who are here, where we're heading and why it's so important.”

Bringing Hollywood to your hometown

UTCA has received grant funding from the New York State Council on the Arts to help with their renovations and to produce the festival. Additionally, the festival’s presenting sponsor is Amigos de Garcia, the production company of Greg Garcia, an Emmy-winning comedy writer known for creating sitcoms like “My Name is Earl” and “Raising Hope.”

Garcia shot his last project, the Amazon Prime show "Sprung," in Pittsburgh, a departure from the majority of productions which shoot in Los Angeles or New York City.

The festival opened Thursday with a screening of the show’s pilot and a Q and A session with Garcia. This kickoff event, entitled “Bringing Hollywood to Your Hometown,” featured a discussion with Garcia about shooting a television show in a less conventional locale.

Film Utica, the city’s first ever film commission, was officially formed in March in order to attract film and television productions to film in the city. The commission brought the Apple TV+ show Severance, executive produced by Ben Stiller, to Utica to film scenes at Union Station in May.

“Utica is a location-rich environment for filmmakers looking for the perfect place to produce their projects,” said Film Utica commissioner Paul Buckley in a statement. “Utica is limitless with properties dating back to the late 1800's to present day. In addition to the abundance of locations, the people of Utica get so thrilled to be a part of the production process. It’s exciting that UTCA was able to create this opportunity to showcase our city, and it’s another example of the great work they’re doing with the Uptown Theatre.”

The Pittsburgh-shot “Sprung” is single-camera sitcom based on the real-life circumstances wherein nonviolent offenders were released from prison early at the start of the coronavirus pandemic. The show follows cellmates Jack (Garret Dillahunt, who also starred in Garcia’s show “Raising Hope” from 2010-2014) and Rooster (Phillip Garcia) as they reenter the disorienting world of spring 2020.

Featuring Garcia’s signature offbeat humor (there’s a toilet paper heist in the pilot) and no-frills aesthetic, the show also stars “Raising Hope” alum Martha Plimpton as Rooster’s mother and Shakira Barrera as another inmate adjusting to her freedom.

Garcia said that his decision to shoot in Pittsburgh rather than Los Angeles was the culmination of a long-held wish.

“I grew up on the east coast, so when I create a new world, it always looks like the east coast in my head,” Garcia said.

Due to logistical and financial constraints, however, he has had to shoot in Los Angeles up until now. In scouting locations, Garcia found that Pittsburgh had both the aesthetics and the infrastructure, such as crews and soundstages, that he was looking for.

At the talkback after the “Sprung” screening, Garcia had not yet had a chance to see much of Utica, but he liked what he saw.

“We drove in from Syracuse yesterday, and as soon as I drove in I'm like, ‘Well, this is one of my shows. This has kind of the feel of one of my shows,’” Garcia said. “Absolutely. I mean, I feel like I could shoot a show here tomorrow. I have one show that I'm trying to get done that would fit here perfectly. So aesthetically, absolutely. Practically, I don't know. Sometimes there’s a lot of decisions for people other than me, as far as if it's going to work money-wise. But aesthetically, there's a feel and a charm and a history to this place that I feel would film great.”

Garcia said that the majority of his crew in Pittsburgh was local, and recognized the benefits that a production can bring to a local economy.

“When we come to town, we stay at the local hotels, we rent houses to stay in, and so we bring money to the economy,” Garcia said. “We rent out your business for the day, we pay everybody on the street money if we're going to be shooting on your street, etc. So there's money there. But obviously, what would be even better is if we're employing people.”

Although the ability to employ locals in a production crew varies based on the available labor force in the area and union regulations, Garcia said that it’s always the goal for him.

Bringing improv to your hometown

Mahoney worked for Garcia on one of his shows, “The Millers,” and worked in dozens of other writer’s rooms during his time in Los Angeles. He also has an improv background, and has enjoyed teaching improv classes in town and performing with the Uptown’s in-house team Bus Stop Robot.

“When we had the opportunity to take over the theater, it seemed like a natural move for us to teach and perform improv,” Mahoney said. “The whole time, I was working to become a comedy writer, it turns out I was really learning how to run a comedy club by spending all of my time in improv theaters.”

Trio, the festival’s headlining act, is an improv team comprised of Stephnie Weir (“MADtv,” “The Comedians”), her husband Bob Dassie (“Community,” “Monk”) and Frankfort's own Rich Talarico, who has written for programs such as “Key & Peele” and “Saturday Night Live.”

When he was coming up in the comedy world, Mahoney saw Talarico perform and admired him. Mahoney connected with Talarico upon discovering that he lived in the area, and Talarico has been teaching at the Uptown ever since. He will also lead workshops during the festival. Mahoney is thrilled to have this connection with Talarico and to be featuring his group.

“They’re improv-famous,” Mahoney said. “Not a lot of people know a lot of improvisers but in the world of improv, they're kind of heavyweights. So it was exciting to me to be able to bring them to Utica and showcase what top-quality improv looks like.”

This article originally appeared on Observer-Dispatch: Uptown Comedy Festival at Utica's Uptown theatre features local comics