Sets On State

The whimsically dark Nina Davis sits down for a pleasant interview as Charlie grills her with an unending barrage of hard hitting questions.

Ryan and Charlie crack open a bottle of wine and discuss developing joke structure and how Ryan is a hypocrite.

Lovable degenerate Brook Whitehead comes on the pod to talk starting in a small town and his growth since coming to Madison.

Esteban leaves his podcast behind as he leaves Madison, but first sits down for an exit interview with a new and more confrontational host to discuss a set.

Dan Bacula is one of the most prolific voices in the scene. He likes to hide his existential oddities behind a solid smile and a tie. We talk about his work-in-progress set, Aldi vs Woodmans, and robots laughing at humans. I also finally found out who was behind the only review of the podcast.

Samara's sarcasm always hits comedy high notes. We had a great and weird conversation, as expected. We talked about depression, diabetes, Madison open mics, and how sometimes her life sounds like bad prose. Also, she gets payback by asking a personal question to me.

Mike Jonjak's tormented soul stopped by to talk comedy. Besides being a great comic he's also the host of the Black Locust Open Mic, and makes the list every Wednesday. We talk about making the list, writing dark jokes for a mainstream audience, funerals, whether life should or shouldn't be preserved, and opening for Kyle Kinane.

A essential staple in the Madison comedy scene, Cynthia has been performing and producing shows since forever. She's one of the masterminds behind Madison Comedy Week. We sit down to talk about pretending to be someone else for fun, how stupid marriage is, being honest in stand up, and Adam Sandler's movie "Click."

Sara may be relatively new to stand up, but she's hilarious and it's really fun to see her fidgety energy and quirky wit on stage! She joins me at Madison's public library, where we talk about speaking in graduation, making friends at open mics, and basically every person in her family. I ask awkward and personal questions about Bat Mitzvahs and periods. Our conversation about her Pop-pop is specially endearing!

Craig Smith's meteoric rise in the Madison comedy scene has been a pleasure to watch. We talked the day of the finals of Madison Funniest Comic competition, where we were both performing. We talk about that first audience laugh, the relationship between rap and comedy, and how far curiosity can go.