Comedian Bobby Miyamoto dispels the myths about air mattresses and why Houston is so special. Check it out.

8:02

Before I even start tonight let me apologize to a reader that made a comment on last week’s LCS live blog about how we deleted all the comments that didn’t match with my opinion. I think her name was Tara, and if i could paraphrase, she said something like why would i think anyone cares about my opinion and I think she also called me shallow.

I’m not repeating these things to set up a comeback. I’m doing it because we never, ever delete negative comments. So, Tara (if i’m getting the name right) believe me when I say your comments must have been deleted along with the immense amount of spam comments we get. Please feel free to make similar comments or the same and we’ll post them. I don’t care that you disagree with me or you think I’m shallow. You have an opinion about stand-up comedy. I think that’s good. Ok, enough of that.

8:09

So we’re finally in Vegas for the first round of semi finals. Richard Belzer and Steve Schirripa are our judges for the night. Adam Hunter is the first comic up.

Hunter’s got great energy. I like his “I root for the underdog” joke, like “the black hockey player … or the Asian guy in porn.” His jokes come quick and hard, like a semi automatic. Both judges seemed to like him and I gotta say, I can’t help but like him as well. Here’s some Hunter on Showtime’s White Boyz in the Hood.

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It was reported today that Toronto comedian Guy Earle will face a human rights tribunal after insulting a woman at a Vancouver stand-up show. The woman, Lorna Pardy, complained that she and her friends faced “a tirade of homophobic and sexist comments” while attending a show at a Vancouver comedy club.

Earle, who was the emcee at the show, claims the woman and her friends walked in, sat in the booth closest to the stage and began heckling him and other comics.

“Two of them started making out, flipping me the bird and saying I hated lesbians,” he told the National Post. “They were drunk, they were being jerks and I was very rude and visceral to them because, like I said, if you have a heckler what you want to do is put them in their place by offending them, so I tried to hit them where it hurts and the only thing I had to key on was the fact that they were lesbians.”

Earle compared his situation to Lenny Bruce, who was jailed for obscenity in the 1960s. “And we’re still fighting the same battle. I know it’s a fight I can never win. But I’ve got to keep fighting.”

No audio or video is available of the alleged incident. But there is this video of Earle stating his case:

Some words of advice to those who might be especially sensitive to remarks made at a comedy club: don’t heckle and ask the host or hostess not to seat you up front.

Since June 17, Harland Williams, Lowell Sanders, Avi Liberman and Dan “Slick Lips” Naturman have been crisscrossing Israel, bringing some good ole’ American humor to the masses in the name of the Crossroads Comedy Tour.

Liberman created the annual tour in 2004 to benefit the Crossroads Center for At-Risk Anglo Youth in downtown Jerusalem; they provide “social, cultural, educational and therapeutic services to close to 1,000 English-speaking youth each year who are addressing problems such as drug and alcohol abuse.”

Fun, right? Anyway, peek at some photos of the comics in Israel.

Harland Williams looking like a total bad ass at the Wailing Wall

Avi Liberman, Dan “Slick Lips” Naturman, Lowell Sanders and Harland Williams looking decidedly non bad ass

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Starting today the search for the next great Friars’ Club Roaster begins. Auditions will be held at Gotham Comedy Club in New York. The 18 semi-finalists will go on to perform in one of three Roasting events to be held at the exclusive Friars’ Club throughout the summer, with the finals airing on Sirius Satellite Radio.

As the semifinals are held throughout the summer, you’ll be able to view clips of each roaster and vote for your favorite, so check the website once in a while and vote. Competition is leading up to their planned Roast this fall, which will feature the Today show’s Matt Lauer as this year’s honoree.

In the meantime, check out Sarah Silverman in some hot Pamela Anderson roast action.

Comedian Auggie Smith used to be a card carrying — well, t-shirt wearing — liberal. Not anymore. Pandas, beware. Check it out.

The Comedy Central Insider just posted some shocking photos and revealing details about what really happened at June 20’s Comedy Central Park (a big outdoor show in Central Park) featuring Stephen Lynch, Mike Birbiglia and Julian McCullough. Spoiler alert: nothing really out of the ordinary happened. We’re just trying to keep the magic alive, ya know… add some spice to our relationship. Anyway, go look at some photos and some first-person details about the show.

It might not be everyone’s favorite form of live comedy, but apparently ventriloquists are making a comeback. The Daily Herald in suburban Chicago just ran a story about the recent surge in demand for puppet-wielding funny people.

Ventriloquism fell out of favor during the 1970s as variety shows became less popular. But thanks to the continued success of guys like Jeff Dunham, whose Comedy Central special was one of the highest-rated on the network, other shows started looking for chances to show off ventriloquists. Last year, David Letterman had a week-long ventriloquist special, including acts like Otto and George, who x-rated to the end, had to figure out a way to clean it up for the network.

“Ventriloquism is such a simple form of comedy, but it always works,” Eric Stangel, a head writer on Letterman’s show told the Herald “You know you’re going to have a big guy with a smaller guy saying things he shouldn’t say, but it’s still funny. It was not the kind of thing you see on other shows.”

Here’s a question. Does it matter how much the human’s mouth moves in a ventriloquist act? It seems even the ultra popular ventriloquists’ mouths move quite a bit (see clip above). Isn’t that like the main talent of a ventriloquist? Doesn’t that diminish the value of ventriloquism?

Quickly-rising comedian John Mulaney has his doubts about how realistic Law & Order is. Check out what has become a hit bit for Mulaney. Enjoy.

After 18 years, Toronto’s Laugh Resort is hosting its final shows this week. The club was home to many independent comics in Toronto. Most other clubs in the city sought exclusive deals with comedians.

The club used to regularly book comics like Adam Sandler, Ray Romano, and Ellen DeGeneres, but has not had the same success in recent years since it moved to a new location at the base of a Holiday Inn.

The club’s owner, Jim Vanderberg, hopes to find a new location, but seems resigned to the possibility that these shows could be the last.

“Who knows? I’ve got a bit of a vision to find a bigger space and start doing some of those shows that seem to only happen when Just For Laughs pulls into town for a few days, once a year,” he told the Toronto Star. “Whether we open in some other fashion or let it go, it’s been fun.”