Clean Stand-up Comedians for Massachusetts Corporate Events, Conferences, Country Clubs and Fundraisers

The cost of a comedy show depends on location. Almost all of us from The Ivy League of Comedy are in the New York City or Los Angeles area. If we can drive there and not stay overnight, it's less expensive. If we have to fly and stay overnight, we have to build that into the cost.

The cost of a comedy show for a theatre depends on how many seats.

The cost of hiring a comedian for a corporate event depends on when, where, how many attendees, and which comedian. We're not all the same price. We are quite good at meeting a variety of budgets.

The Ivy League of Comedy's fees for comedy shows for non-profits are much, much lower than for for-profit organizations and industry groups.

And most importantly, I'm not greedy. There are agencies that take most of the money for themselves and pay the comics very little. So the $5,000 (as an example) that you're paying? They're offering the comic $750. I'm a comic and I've seen that happen frequently. I don't ever want to be one of those selfish greedy awful guys. I'm not secretive. I'll tell the comic what the gig pays. There's nothing in my agreement that prohibits a comedian from discussing pay with the client.

Recently I had a comic tell me that for all the work I was doing on a particular gig I should take 15% instead of 10%. I appreciated the offer, but I refused. I got into this business by accident, basically to provide clean comedy shows and to get myself and my friends more work. Not to get rich. I make most of my money when I'm on stage.

So to not really answer your question, the best and easiest way to find out the cost of a comedy show is to call or write The Ivy League of Comedy and ask. I'll ask you where, when, for whom and how many and give you a quote.

Most comedians charge an additional fee for travel, but we at The Ivy League of Comedy generally like to quote a flat fee because that makes it easier for you, even though it adds risk for us as airfares and hotel costs change. But it also avoids any sort of figuring out what the costs actually are, if a comedian is coming from, or going to, somewhere other than home. And sometimes comics want to stay with a friend even though we tell them we'll pay for a hotel.

Oh, here's another example of my lack of greed. I booked a comic for a charity gig. I paid for the airline tickets. Then she booked a comedy club gig for the next night and said she'd split the airfare with me. I said no, you got another gig, that's great, let me just change the return date. I did have her cover the slightly higher cost for changing the ticket, but it was way less than half. She did the work to get more work and both of us were happy with that. Though I did appreciate her offer to split the airfare.

The wiseass answer is: That depends. Are you in New York or California? Unfortunately, most comics do gravitate towards the two cities that provide the most opportunities. Not only to get noticed by industry, but also to have lots of performing opportunities. There are a lot of comedy clubs in New York and Los Angeles, and they typically have a lot of shows every week and many comedians in each show. Your local comedy club has maybe four or five shows a week, it's the only one in town, and the show is two inexperienced local comics and someone who came in for the weekend.

When I'd been performing for only a few years I went on a trip to Europe. I performed and the audiences really liked me. More than I deserved, frankly, for my level of skill at the time. I found out that there were only two open-mic nights a week in that decently-sized city. No wonder they liked me. In just a few years I'd gotten more stage time than one could get in a lifetime in that city. In NYC if you hustle you can get to several open-mics a night, every night of the week.

(FYI: "stage time, stage time, stage time" is to comics what "location, location, location" is to real estate.)

My record for the most booked shows in a night (booked professional shows, not open-mics) is six. That's less than half the actual record for NYC.

So to get back to your question. I, or you, might find a comedian in your area who is a decent professional. And if you're looking for someone decent for a fundraiser, that'll probably be fine (but not as good as getting a really good comic who performs full-time and gets on stage a lot, in front of tough audiences). I suggest that you vet the comic as best you can.

But if you're looking for a comedian for a corporate event, one at which the audience didn't choose to be there, has already been sitting all day listening to strangers lecture them, and they'd really rather be at the bar bad-mouthing their boss, or flirting, or back home with their family, then that's a tough audience and you want someone with a lot of experience. Not a teacher or accountant who moonlights as a comedian.

There are a lot of talented musicians, many of whom work part-time as musicians and don't perform that often. That really doesn't work for comedians.

Sorry for the long answer, but I had a lot to say.

Oh, and if you have a local comic in mind I'm happy to offer my thoughts, even if you don't have the budget to even consider working with me.

Oh, absolutely, if we're already traveling to your area, every show we get lowers everyone's cost. Often when I book one show I'll start looking for more in the area before I buy an airline ticket. And you can help with that. Do you belong to a country club? A house of worship? Do you have a favorite charity that could put together a comedy show fundraiser? We're happy to provide guidance.

Comedians from The Ivy League of Comedy perform all over the world. Small towns, big cities, it doesn't matter. You'd be surprised how affordable a great comedian can be.

And no, we're not coming from NYC to tell jokes about subways and how much our rent is. We know that a joke about a $4,000-a-month apartment with no room for a couch isn't going to get a laugh when the audience pays $2,000 a month for a whole house. We know you'll think we're idiots. We don't want that.

Oh, absolutely! Virtual comedy shows are significantly less expensive than in-person shows. The Ivy League of Comedy's virtual comedy is way less expensive than even performing in person just across town.

The appropriateness of a comedian's material is often a main concern when booking a comedian for a corporate or charity event. And it's why I got into this business. People were saying "You're clean but the other comics at the club weren't. Where are the all-clean shows?" There weren't any, so I started putting them together and founded The Ivy League of Comedy.

We do shows in churches and synagogues, including for some very devout audiences. We've been doing this a long time. We're all very experienced clean comedians.

If you're looking for comedians who can customize their jokes for your event or organization, comedians from The Ivy League of Comedy can. I (Shaun Eli, the owner) really don't like making fun of anybody in the audience unless the person being made fun of specifically asks for it in a private conversation. Most people really don't like being picked on, and one never knows until afterwards. And you can't always tell. So the best solution is to avoid picking on audience members.

Yeah, that's kind of the point! There's nothing inherently funnier about dirty or edgy comedy. Sometimes a curse word helps a joke, but if the joke can't survive without it, it's probably not a very good joke.

Sometimes the laughter comes from the shock value of a dirty word or phrase rather than from something funny or clever. That's not what we at The Ivy League of Comedy do.

Most of us in The Ivy League of Comedy are also excellent emcees/hosts, and at least one of us is a trained auctioneer. Please mention this up front. I once showed up at a charity gig and most of the way through the show they asked me to auction off a couple of items. I'd never done it before and frankly I was a bit nervous. But I came up with some jokes that worked well for the items being auctioned.

They had me auctioning off the items that nobody bid on in the silent auction, and they were quite happy with how it worked out. I think we sold all but one, and remember that these were items that nobody had bid on.

Typically we at The Ivy League of Comedy recommend three months in advance, but it depends on your event. If you have a last-minute need, call (don't email or text) and we'll see what we can do. Often the bigger issue is allowing you enough time to market your event to your audience/subscribers/congregation/donors. And three months is good for that.

Yes, The Ivy League of Comedy gives you a complete, turn-key event. We handle it all and make it as easy for you as possible.

Depending on your event, it might be beneficial to have more than one comedian. A corporate event is typically one comedian for maybe a half-hour. A golf club show or a charity fundraiser is often 3 comedians for a 90 minute show.

But it doesn't have to be the typical comedy club structure of an opener for 15 minutes, a middle act for 30 and a headliner for 45. That's just how comedy club shows in America have evolved, partially just because of the economics of running a comedy club. And audiences have grown to accept it (not like they have a lot of choice). The Ivy League of Comedy shows are all headliners. All very experienced comedians, any of whom could easily perform great material for over an hour. It doesn't cost that much more money to have a way stronger show. In fact it may not cost any more money, because the guy in charge isn't greedy. He isn't lusting after a bigger boat. He doesn't even have a boat.

Sure, but tell us in advance! No comedian wants to be about to go on stage and be handed a list of topics to avoid, and have to remember this when they're performing. The comedians from The Ivy League of Comedy have decades of experience and a lot of material on a lot of different topics.

Stand-up comedy shows are not for little kids, because they won't understand the show and they'll get bored. For a clean show, our best estimate is 14 and up, with the proviso that a 14-year-old probably won't appreciate the show as much as the adults will. But in general we at The Ivy League of Comedy try to avoid cultural references that only certain groups or ages will understand.

So far in more than two decades running The Ivy League of Comedy, a comic getting sick has happened only a few times (we're healthy people; we get a lot of sleep). We have a roster of good, responsive comedians so when it has happened we got someone else very quickly. If a comedian cancels, I never want to be accused of bait-and-switch so I will try to get someone at least a little more famous, even if I lose money on it.

And here is something we do that no one else does, and it's in my contract. My contract says that if we show up with fewer comedians than the contract calls for, we will endeavor to give you the same length and quality of show, but will pro-rate the fee based on the number of comedians. What that means is, if it's a 90-minute, 3-comic show, and someone gets sick at the last minute, we will give you the same 90-minute show but you'll pay only 2/3 of the price. That's one great benefit of my working with true headliners: we can all perform top-quality material for much longer than we're expected to.