The Naked Comedy Show, leaving nothing to the imagination, is making its Los Angeles debut at the Elysian, where comics will bare-it-all, literally and sometimes figuratively on stage Jan 17.
The stand-up show, which has a cult following in New York City and more recently in Philadelphia will be spreading it’s reach into Los Angeles where tickets for viewers 18-years-old and up are on sale starting at $40 a seat.
Comedian Billy Procida, who’s hosted the show sans clothes since 2022, says the nudity may be a gimmick to fill seats but it’s not a gimmick to get laughs. “If we all put our clothes back on, you’d be like this is a great lineup,” Procida told the Post.
“First and foremost, I book based on funny. I don’t book based on how hot I think you are or your body,” Procida said. “I’m not looking for models, I’m looking for good comics.”
Worrying about getting laughs with your clothes on is already a giant feat for even the most seasoned comic, but doing it naked poses an added layer of vulnerability, for male comics in particular, according to Procida, whose show has seen top performers from Comedy Central, Netflix and HBO.
“Particularly among the gender male comics there’s a lot of concern about the penis,” Procida shared. “They’re like, is my d—k gonna be too small?”
“The primary concern with the nudity is usually from dudes, usually about their d—ks,” said Procida. “Not to say that other people don’t have their variety of body image issues and concerns.”
But all that insecurity is great fodder for jokes, and can even be self-empowering to transform that personal fragility into laugh-out-loud material.
“My problem is that my balls are too big. This makes this weird optical illusion, it kind of makes everything look smaller than it actually is,” said Procida. “But instead of worrying about it, I just write a joke about it.”
Other novice nude comics have a different idea, they think taking a drug like Viagra will help bolster their bits on stage, however that approach often falls flat.
“They think that’ll make me look bigger, or make me get hard, or something. Or because it would be funny to be hard, but you have to get turned on for those drugs to work. Otherwise, it doesn’t do anything,” Procida explained.
Unless a comic has a deep-seated fetish for being naked on stage, getting a boner under the spotlight is virtually impossible. “You’re far more close to fight or flight than you are to an erotic headspace.”
While some comics make being in the buff a central part of their act, in most cases the goggling at one’s birthday suit wears off within the first 60 seconds of a ten-minute set.
One comic who was on her period, decided to do a tampon reveal as part of her act but it fumbled when she couldn’t locate the tampon string on stage and was left rummaging around her vagina before turning around and having to finish her set, Procida said.
While another act—that might as well go down in Naked Comedy Show history—featured a comic who squeezed a tiny set list into his foreskin and then pulled it out on stage with great humorous success.
Each show features about five or six well vetted comics willing to give the skinny in their skinny, but the real reason The Naked Comedy Show packs seats is because “as a nation founded by broods, who said the Christians in Europe were too kinky for them… there’s a sexual conservatism at the genetic core of our country,” said Procida, and that prude mentality is ripe for selling front row seats for a piece of counter culture.
“If public nudity was more normalized, I would not be able to charge four or five times the cost of a normal show ticket,” said Procida, explaining that American shame around sex is exactly why The Naked Comedy Show has been such a knock-out hit to begin with.
Unlike in New York, the first two rows of audience seating in Los Angeles will not be clothing optional. While that offering at his genesis location provides a rare opportunity for people to partake in public nudity. Whether the naked bodies invoke arousal though, is entirely unknown.
“I don’t know what’s going on inside everyone’s heads,” said Procida. “If someone’s being pervy in their head. I don’t think that hurts anybody, so long as they keep it inside their head.”
All that nudity should not be mistaken for obscenity though, said Procida, or for that matter a stripe show. “If I tell a 911 joke with my balls out and you get a little wet, feels like a you problem,” he said. “I don’t think I invoked a prurient interest… it’s not sexy. No one comes here and goes, this is a sexy thing. We don’t strip on stage,” said Procida. Adding that the comics undress backstage so “there’s not even the, oh, you’re watching me peel off my 2% Old Navy spandex jeans.”
What does stand to be hot is the lineup for LA’s inaugural performance slated to feature Martin Morrow (Netflix), Kylie Vincent (Comedy Central), Allison Rose (PBS), O’mar Finley (Skankfest) and James Tison (Out Magazine). Doors open at 7:30 p.m. in the “Skunk Room.”