Stand-Up Downfall? : Comedy: Decline in club attendance in O.C. and nationally tied to recession, glut of cable shows and mediocre performers.

Anyone looking for evidence that the comedy biz is changing need only peek ahead to Jan. 12, when the Brea Improv brings in Finis Henderson for a whole month.

First of all, the Improv (like most local comedy clubs) usually brings in comics for one-week stands. Second, Henderson isn’t really a comic at all--he’s a musical impressionist, someone who offers dead-on takes on everyone from Michael Jackson to Frank Sinatra.

And that’s no booking fluke. Another “one-person show,” this one starring comic Ritch Shydner, comes to the Irvine Improv for two weeks in January. The Brea Improv recently closed a weeklong engagement of the “Three Headed Comic,” in which Doug Benson, Don Barnhart and Jim Hope bring a tag-team approach to the traditional three-comic lineup. And “Mothers and Other Goddesses,” a revue-style show starring Edie Matthews and Maree Catalano, played every Monday in November at Bruce Baum’s Comedy Crib in Fullerton.

In the ‘80s, stand-up comedy was hailed as the new rock ‘n’ roll, and monologuists were the ones who practiced stand-up in its purest form. Comics and comedy clubs were a growth industry, but now the business of being funny has finally met the realities of the more austere ‘90s.

“People in the industry are just strapped,” said Barry Weintraub, a comic and San Francisco radio host who also publishes Comedy USA, an industry trade directory that lists both comics and comedy clubs. “We’re sensing that more than ever this year.”

Nationally, club attendance has fallen sharply at even the prestige venues, a situation blamed not only on a delayed reaction to the nation’s economic woes, but also on everything from too much stand-up on cable TV to too many mediocre, sound-alike comics.

The result, say many observers, is a shakeout among clubs and performers and a new premium on variety skills (such as juggling and ventriloquism) that used to be shunned by comedy purists. The fact that the Improv, probably the top West Coast comedy chain and a onetime bastion of straight stand-up, is experimenting with its bookings is a sign that the business is undergoing a fundamental change.

Improv clubs in Brea and Irvine were down in attendance about 40% to 50% from April to September this year, according to manager Robert Hartman, although audiences started picking up again after the presidential election. Big names have continued to do well, Hartman said--popular comic Dennis Wolfberg recently sold out a weeklong engagement in Brea--but audiences for comedians without that level of name recognition have been down.

As for the rest of the 15-club Improv chain, “We’re definitely off, there’s no doubt about it,” said owner and impresario Budd Friedman. “There aren’t that many guys out there who can really put (customers) in the seats.”

“The clubs are basically having a bad time,” said Kelly Craft, who operated the two-night-a-week Comedyland club in Huntington Beach until closing it in October.

She and husband Brian Craft decided to close the club primarily to devote more time to more profitable projects, including promoting private comedy events as well as motivational seminars. They had enjoyed “five solid years” with the club, but audiences began to decline this year. “I think it took a long time for the economy to hit laughter, because people need it,” Craft said.

In Los Angeles, the spring riots contributed to a general drop-off in business, said Jan Maxwell Smith, owner of Igby’s Comedy Cabaret in West Los Angeles. “The combination of the recession and the physical fear of going out” have contributed to a year in which audiences are down about 50% from past levels, Smith said.

Again, big-name comics (such as George Carlin) have drawn well, but “business has not come back to pre-riot levels,” Smith said. The club has had to resort to “papering”--that is, offering free or discount tickets on certain nights to pump up alcohol sales, in an attempt to at least break even. Still, “this has not been a break-even year,” Smith said.

Comics themselves are hurting as well. While an elite corps of big-name comedians continues to draw crowds, many experienced but lesser-known comics are finding it harder to make a living. Not only are there fewer clubs nationally, but many of the ones that remain are paying less money or otherwise cutting expenses--hiring two comics instead of three, for instance, or making comics pick up their own travel tabs.

“I remember when I was starting out, it felt like there was a handful of comedians and thousands of places to perform. Now, it feels like the other way around,” said Reno Goodale, a comic from Hollywood who has put 10 years into the craft.

“There was a time when I could be out (touring) three weeks out of the month, easily. Now it’s more like one week, or two.”

Goodale thinks the overexposure of comedy on TV is a big part of the problem. Cable TV especially is heavy with stand-up shows: “Comic Strip Live,” “Evening at the Improv,” “Caroline’s Comedy Hour,” “Comedy on the Road,” “Campus Comedy” and regular pay-TV specials such as “Women of the Night.” Comedy Central, VH-1, MTV, HBO, A&E; and Showtime all feature regular stand-up in some form, not to mention such network showcases as “The Tonight Show,” “Late Night With David Letterman” and “Arsenio.”

“I think people are much less likely to go outdoors and pay a cover charge when they can see the same guy on television for free,” said Goodale. Also, he added, “people have become a bit desensitized to comedy. They’re looking for something a bit different, anything but a guy with a plaid jacket and a microphone.”

TV is “burning out the industry,” agreed Kenny AAbrey, a comic who lives in Garden Grove. The onslaught of comics on television, coupled with the glut of one-night comedy “clubs” in bars and hotels, has contributed to comedy overload and a general lowering of the stand-up standard.

“We’re kind of wedged in between Monday Night Football and mud wrestling,” AAbrey said. “From my point of view, the problem is, as long as comedians are used to pimp alcohol, you’re going to be seeing comics who have a tremendous grasp of the obvious.”

Many comedians he sees recycle the same jokes based on a limited set of pop-culture references. “If I had a nickel for every guy that picked up a wig, stuck it in his armpit and said, ‘Hey look, I’m Madonna’ . . . “ he said, letting the thought trail off.

As clubs have turned to papering and other ways to get people to come in, the general quality of comics has dropped, Weintraub agreed. “What the clubs get are bodies to buy drinks,” he explained. “It’s no longer people who love comedy as much as people who are looking for something to do.”

The result, he said, is comics who cater to a “lower common denominator.”

Whatever the cause, the public’s declining interest in live comedy is creating renewed interest in variety-type entertainment as a way of breaking up the steady stream of straight monologuists. In fact, if you listen to club owners and others in the comedy business these days, sooner or later you’ll hear the term “new vaudeville,” the current catch phrase for people who mix laughs with juggling, magic, ventriloquism, musical spoofs or impressions.

Among purists, such acts (along with prop comics) used to be considered the bottom feeders of the comedy-food chain. A few years back, straight monologuists were the kings of what was considered cutting-edge performance art. Now, old-fashioned show-biz skills are making a comeback as club owners have discovered a new appreciation for old tricks.

“It doesn’t mean that monologuists are going to go away,” said Smith, owner of Igby’s. “I just think there’s a great opportunity for the performer who does more than straight stand-up.”

In addition to comics with variety skills, the current situation may be a boon to female comics, a turnaround from the old days when women used to have trouble cracking the male-dominated field.

“There’s still plenty of venues for me, because luckily I’m a woman, and every club wants to book a woman at least one or two weeks out of the year,” said comic Kathleen Madigan. “If I was 25-to-30-year-old white male middle (act) I might be worried, because there’s a million of them, all going after the same jobs.”

In addition to adding variety-style acts, clubs are exploring other ways to shake up the standard three-comic lineup. The Improv chain has experimented with putting three equally billed comics in a “tag team” format, in which all three comics are sometimes on stage at one time.

The Improv also has been at the forefront of developing one-person shows that can play a club for months on end. According to Hartman, a one-person show is not simply an extended headlining set, but a themed show with a beginning, middle and end. Rick Reynolds and Rob Becker are two comics who have developed tremendously successful one-person shows in the past two years.

(Becker, in fact, was scheduled to bring his show to the Irvine Improv last spring following an engagement at the Dallas Improv. But the show was so popular, it has played there ever since. It closes Sunday, then is scheduled to open in Washington in February. Dana Gould also recently has developed a solo show that just closed a well-received run in San Francisco.)

Finis Henderson’s monthlong stand at the Brea Improv is further indication of the trend--the club is even installing an improved sound system for the engagement. Also, popular comic Ritch Shydner brings his one-man show to the Irvine Improv for two weeks in January.

While Hartman believes top comics such as Richard Jeni, Paula Poundstone and Wolfberg will continue to draw crowds, the Improv chain is continuing to “mix it up” when it comes to filling out its schedule.

“We’ve cut our stable of comedians in half,” Hartman said. “We’ve been booking a lot of special events lately.”

Although Orange County lost its Comedyland outlet recently, it has also gained a brand-new full-time comedy club, Bruce Baum’s Comedy Crib in Fullerton, which opened in September. While the club is having some difficulty drawing on the weekdays, according to general manager Scott Dickerson, weekends are doing well and he expects business to pick up after the holidays.

“It was really a tough time to open. If I would have had my choice, I don’t know if I would have opened then,” Dickerson acknowledged. “But we made it through the first couple of months and we’re doing OK, so I think we’re going to survive.”

Unlike other clubs contacted for this story, however, the Laff Stop in Newport Beach has not lost much ground because of the recession, says manager Karen Deason.

“Basically, we’re doing just fine,” Deason said. “Election Day was kind of slow, but otherwise our numbers are about the same.” Consequently, Deason said the club has not changed its regular lineup of comedians.

Comedy in Orange County is finding some new outlets. The Orange County Crazies, the Santa Ana-based improvisational comedy troupe, continues to perform revues at its Santa Ana base.

Some coffeehouses, such as the Blue Marble in Costa Mesa, offer comedy or improvisation on a regular basis. And music clubs or concert halls such as the Celebrity Theatre in Anaheim, the Coach House in San Juan Capistrano and the Rhythm Cafe in Santa Ana sometimes offer big-name comedians.

While there have been some early signs of an economic turnaround in the United States, “comedy, I don’t believe, will ever come back to the levels that we experienced in the late ‘80s,” Igby’s owner Smith maintained.

Others, looking down the road, see a possible bright side to the turndown in comedy. “I would love to see the return of variety nightclubs. I hope it happens that way,” said AAbrey, who sometimes includes music in his stand-up act. “I would love to see a show with a jazz band, a comedian and a singer.”

A shakeout was inevitable, says Goodale. Cable TV is going to push the business “to its next evolutionary stage, like the Ice Age killed off the dinosaurs,” Goodale said. “The clubs are going to have to evolve some way, to bring people back.”