If you’re looking for comedy this week, you’ve come to the right place: The Bentzen Ball is bringing nationally recognized standup acts into town by the truckload for four days of comedy. We’ve already written about it here; you can also check out our interviews with performers Sarah Silverman, Patton Oswalt, Lizz Winstead, and Tig Notaro. Ticket prices range from $15 (for most one-time shows) to $110 (for a weekend pass). The festival runs October 22 through 25; click here for a full schedule.
Elsewhere, you can see Kathleen Madigan, who appears regularly on The Tonight Show and Comedy Central and holds an American Comedy Award for funniest female standup. (Lewis Black has called her the funniest woman in America.) She’s doing standup at the Birchmere Thursday, October 22, at 7:30. Tickets ($35) can be purchased here, or click here to find your local Ticketmaster phone number.
It’s almost too easy to make fun of daytime soap operas, but not so easy, perhaps, to improvise one. Catch an “episode” of Washington Improv Theater’s soap satire, innocently named Bitchwood, on Saturday, October 24, at 11. The fall “season” began last week, but no worries: Like any good drama, they’ll catch you up before it begins. Tickets ($10) can be purchased here; it’s held at Source.
If you’re in the mood for some smarmy, pseudo-hostile one-upsmanship, check out Michael Ian Black and Michael Showalter, performing at the Sixth & I Historic Synagogue Wednesday, October 28, at 8. Their act spawned the show Michael and Michael Have Issues, which just ended its first season on Comedy Central. Tickets are $30, which you can get by calling the Sixth & I box office at 202-408-3100 or through Ticketmaster here. Word to the wise: you can avoid Ticketmaster’s $9.70 convenience charge if you call the box office directly.
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