(Maurice C. Jones/Broadside)
This year, Mason will send three student comedians off to the D.C.’s Funniest College Competition. For the tenth year, the D.C. Improv Comedy Club is hosting the event, waiting eagerly to hear the funniest fresh, live comedy from local students.
The competition typically includes students from six nearby universities: George Mason, American, George Washington, Howard, Marymount and Maryland. Each university chooses one or two of their best performers and sends them off to the competition.
On March 1, Mason hosted its own preliminary round in order to determine which aspiring comedians could make their audience laugh the most. Set up in the Johnson Center on a Friday night, six comedians were asked to show their sense of humor in a five-minute time limit, lined up with two featured comedians who introduced and concluded the show.
Instead of picking two this year, Mason judges chose three people for two slots.
Among the winners this year was a two-person act, performed by students Matt Pechiney, Film and Video Studies major, and Chris Lancashire, Government and International Politics major. The pair performed a duet of sorts, with Pechiney serving as the guitar player and Lancashire performing the vocals.
(Maurice C. Jones/Broadside)
Their unique approach to stand-up comedy got a great response from the crowd as they came onto the stage in a rather convincing drunken stupor, singing about a fictitious girl by the name of Brittany.
“One time while we were hanging out, we just started making fun of drunk people and thought it was a good idea. It was pretty much the next day when we signed up on a whim,” said Lancashire, a first-time comedian here at Mason.
“I was hanging out with a lot of people that were doing stand up comedy, so I wrote some stuff, and I wanted to go up and do it. But then the place that I was going to got closed down, so I never got my chance,” Lancashire said. As it turns out, his first time on the stage, here at Mason, was a winning one.
Pechiney, on the other hand, is not new to the contest. “Last year I did the competition. I got to the finals, and that was weird. I had a good time last time, so I have confidence that I’ll have fun again,” Pechiney said. Pechiney and Lancashire both admit that the lines in the two-man performance were partially improvised.
In addition to the first two-man performance Mason has ever sent to the competition, Martin Phillips will also be returning to the competition with his own comedy style. “I’m happy I made it into the finals this year because if in 2012 I made second in D.C. and then I don’t come back, that doesn’t look good,” Phillips said.
For Phillips, it wasn’t quite as simple to put himself on stage as it was for the duet. “I’m really shy, so it took me a while to get on stage, but when I transferred here I got with a place called the Epicure Cafe,” Phillips said, explaining how his performance began there and then branched out.
Mason held the winning position in 2011 and the contestants hope to claim the spot for Mason once again. The winners themselves receive an interview with Tommy McFly on radio station 94.7 FRESH FM, as well as an endless supply of POPCHIPS for a full year. In addition, the winner will be given a free gig hosted by The D.C. Improv, which has housed big name comedians such as Dave Chappelle, Bill Burr, Rob Schneider and Gilbert Gottfried.
The finals will be held at The D.C. Improv on April 11.
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