We’ll call Wednesday nights in L.A. “Double Header Comedy Night” from now on.

I hit Tom Arnold’s show at the Laugh Factory at 8pm and then cruised over to the Improv for Comedy Juice at 10pm. It was a stellar night of comedy led by newcomer Hannibal Buress. He performed at both places last night and just killed it both times. I put his Fallon set in the video bar so you can get sense of how funny this dude is. Comedy Nerds will tell you, we get this weird Spidey Sense-like tingle when we see someone who has the goods. And this guy has it.

It was also fun watching Tom Arnold perform at his regular show at the Laugh Factory and then tighten it all up for a killer 15 minutes at the Improv. The guy just knows how to entertain. It’s fun.

Chris Hardwick is quickly becoming one of my favorite comedians. He did a set last night at the Laugh Factory. If you have G4, he hosts Web Soup. The guy is a web leader as far as comedians are concerned, so I dig that. But he’s just flat out funny.

Pete Holmes hosted Comedy Juice and was stellar once again. It’s a bummer that both he and Hannibal perform in NYC. I need to get to NYC for a comedy trip. There’s basically two things I need to do before I die (well, there are more than two, but these are important). I want to take the entire month of March off and travel the country to watch college basketball. Culminating the trip at the Final Four. And I want to go to NYC for a week and just watch comedy shows all over the city. That would awesome.

Comedy Juice was recording a compilation CD last night, so stay tuned for more info on that.

The Laugh Factory is making a push for having the strongest weekday line-ups in the city with the addition of weekly shows hosted by Kevin Nealon (most recently on Weeds) and Mary Lynn Rajskub (Chloe on 24). Add in Tom Arnold’s show and Jay Davis’ “Life of the Party” show and you have some serious name recognition powering the traditionally slower weekday nights. I’ll be honest…I think it’s smart.

Let’s think about this for a minute. Jay Davis is a promotion machine. He’s been doing it his whole career dating back to his night club days. So he puts people in the seats. Not to mention, all the big name comics want to do his show…because he puts people in the seats. Tom Arnold’s show has steadily grown. With show producer Joel Mandelkorn and club owner Jamie Masada booking great line-ups, I don’t see any reason but continued growth. Now Masada continues with the celebrity hosted show (think Jon Lovitz) by recruiting the great Kevin Nealon and Mary Lynn Rajskub. Name recognition alone will bring a crowd for at least a little bit and you know Masada can get good comedians.

The addition of Mary Lynn Rajskub as a regular at the Laugh Factory is interesting. I have never seen her perform (going to the show tonight though) but it seems she does more of the alternative comedy shows like UCB and Largo. It’s cool that she is doing everything. To me, comedy is comedy.

Masada’s strategy here stands in stark contrast to the Improv’s more recent strategy of outsourcing their promotion to up and coming comedians during the week (with the obvious exception of Comedy Juice). And I’m really not sure if the Comedy Store has a strategy.

The question will be if regular folks will pay $20 for a ticket to see these shows during the week…plus a 2 drink min….plus parking. You aren’t getting out of there for less than $75 if you bring a date. That’s an expensive Tuesday for the working man who just wants to go laugh with his girl. It certainly doesn’t make live comedy as accessible as going to a movie…which is where it needs to be. At the same time, Masada owns the business and he knows his cost structure, so he can do what he wants.

The Laugh Factory calendar for September looks like this:
Tuesdays:
8pm – Kevin Nealon
10pm – Jay Davis’ Life of the Party

Wednesdays:
8pm – Tom Arnold’s Laughing with the Stars

Thursdays:
8pm – Mary Lynn’s Star Studded Comedy Show