COMEDY : Bizarre Behavior Sets the Tone

He calls himself John Bizarre.

But the comedian, who is headlining at the Laff Stop through Sunday, is not so much bizarre as, say, unusual.

The tone is set as soon as he walks out on stage carrying what must be the world’s largest boom box blaring a ZZ Top tune.

“I came from New York and try to play music that will keep me from getting my butt kicked,” he tells his audience. Then he presses a button and out comes . . . a Mozart piano concerto, to which he dances.

At one point in his animated act, Bizarre dons a pair of Size 68 jeans, his body engulfed by the massive display of denim. “I’m just dying to wear these out somewhere,” he says, “like at a Weight Watcher’s meeting: ‘I haven’t eaten in two years!’ Or walk out of a sauna: ‘I fell asleep!’ ”

As Bizarre said in an interview: “I’m not like a guy who stands in front of the microphone and tells jokes. A guy standing there and not moving and taking big pauses gets boring. When I go to a show I want to see something happen. I like to see a guy jumping around or at least putting on a show that’s fun visually to watch.

“I like to give audiences their money’s worth.”

Bizarre, whose real name is John Viveiros, has appeared on “A&E;’s An Evening at the Improv,” “Caroline’s Comedy Hour” and “Comic Strip Live.” He boasts a varied comedy repertoire that includes making noises with his hands and mimicking the announcer at an Iron Maiden concert. Lately, he’s been ending his act with an improvisational rap song in which he rhymes the names of women in the audience.

An off-the-wall approach is what one would expect from a man who briefly hosted a weekly “talk show” at a place called Chuckles Comedy Theatre in New York. He called his show “The John Bizarre Flame Thrower Comedy Bash With Free Helium.” Explains Bizarre: “We used to give the audience balloons and we’d all sing Chipmunk songs.”

Comedy comes naturally to Bizarre. Even before getting into stand-up a decade ago, he was doing comedy as a disc jockey for an adult contemporary radio station in Long Island. He was more interested in doing comedy on the air than in playing the Barbra Streisand and Barry Manilow records on the station’s playlist and, he said, “I wrote pages of jokes.”

It was during his radio days that he became known professionally as Bizarre.

“Someone called me that years ago and it just stuck because I guess I was rather unusual,” he said, adding the unusual moniker has its advantages:

“People always remember it and they never remember my real name which,” he says, “really isn’t important.”

Bizarre likes to say he started in comedy the same month, in 1982, that David Letterman began his late night talk show. And, said Bizarre, “For my money, Letterman to this day is the funniest guy on TV. He’s a real hero of mine.”

Of course, Bizarre says, his high-energy comedy style is nothing like Letterman’s.

“I tell you who my style is most like: Daffy Duck. I’m a real fan of his, too. I do a tremendous amount of facial expressions in my act.”

Of course, no one can out-mug old Daffy.

“Oh, boy,” says Bizarre. “If I could make some of those faces.”

Who: John Bizarre.

When: Thursday, Oct. 10, at 8:30 and 10:30 p.m.; Friday, Oct. 11, at 8, 10 and 11:45 p.m.; Saturday, Oct. 12, at 8, 10 and 11:45 p.m.; and Sunday, Oct. 13, at 8:30 p.m.

Where: The Laff Stop, 2122 S.E. Bristol St., Newport Beach.

Whereabouts: From the Corona del Mar (73) Freeway, take the Irvine Avenue/Campus Drive exit onto Bristol Street and go south one block.

Wherewithal: $7 to $10.

Where to Call: (714) 852-8762.