So, what's the big deal with comedians and cars, anyway?
Most stand-up comedians spend roughly 60 percent to 70 percent of their work time traveling.Especially feature level comics who make so little money that traveling in the car is still the cheapest way. Some features even live in their carsand dream of just breaking even.
When comics finally get to headlining status and beyond, they may fly to gigs versus driving. Because all comics start out on the road, all comics have stories about their cars.
Friday is National Name Your Car Day,and with that in mind I asked Goonie's Comedy Club headliner Tommy Rymanand feature Mike Croninabout their cars.
Cronin: "My brother and I have named our carssince high school. We used to have this green Camry that we called the Emerald Dragon. Then he got a gray Camry and called that the Gray Ghost. My car now started as the Blue Baronand I ended up getting a DUI because I lost a tire and didn't realize it, but I was driving on three wheels. So now it's called the Tricycle. My brother's new car has a great name. When he first got it he almost hit about five or six squirrels and he calls it the Squirrel Master."
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Ryman said he hasn't named his car. He explains that his parents weren't really into cars. In honor of Friday's holiday, Ryman will give his "Hobbit Green, Honda Accord" a nameat the show at Goonie's Comedy Club that night.
Ryman and Cronin both began stand-up comedy in the very unfunny setting of a college classroom as part of a college course. It didn't go well for either of them, but the kept at it and it paid off.
"I took a TV and film comedy class and for the final we either had to write a paper or do stand-upand I did stand up in front of the class," Cronin said. "It didn't go great. My teacher was an old guy and was friends with Milton Berle. Six or eight months later I went to Go Bananas, a comedy club in Cincinnati, and signed up at an open mic."
For Ryman, "I was taking a career prep class where you were supposed to write a monologue, but because I really loved Mitch Hedberg, I asked the professor if I could do a stand-up set instead of a regular monologue, and she said sure. Then, the next week I went down to Acme (in Minneapolis) and did my first set."
Ryman quickly became an Acme regular, was a semifinalist on Last Comic Standingin 2014 and won the distinction of being named The Best of the Midwestat the 2015 Gilda's Laugh Fest.
