Overview of Colin Quinn & Jim Norton
This episode of We Might Be Drunk is a loose, fast-moving comedy hangout with Sam Morril, Mark Normand, Colin Quinn, and Jim Norton riffing on the old New York stand-up scene, brutal club gigs, audience reactions, and how comedy has changed from the 1980s–90s to today. The conversation is packed with road stories, Tough Crowd memories, nightclub lore, and plenty of dark, lowbrow jokes about farts, hecklers, and humiliating sets.
Main Topics Discussed
Old-school comedy clubs and brutal road gigs
- The guys reminisce about early gigs in places like:
- Nags Head, North Carolina
- Club Casbah, Wildwood
- The C-Room / Joke Joint / other “stay in the building” clubs
- Strip clubs, dance floors, and cruise gigs
- They describe how rough comedy used to be:
- Audiences that didn’t know a comedy show was happening
- Watching comment cards immediately after bombing
- Performing in strip clubs multiple times per night for the same crowd
- Staying in the owner’s house or above the club, making bombing extra awkward
New York comedy history
- A big chunk of the episode is a history lesson on New York comedy:
- Pips in Sheepshead Bay
- The Comedy Cellar’s early days
- Catch a Rising Star and the improv circuit
- The transition from smoky, rough rooms to the more “prestigious” comedy ecosystem
- They note how neighborhood clubs and old venues have changed or disappeared, and how that changes the feel of the city and the scene.
Tough Crowd and the old MTV/NBC-style panel shows
- A major theme is Colin Quinn’s Tough Crowd:
- Why he never wanted to reboot it
- The chemistry of the original group
- The pressure, improvisation, and lack of applause on the show
- How audiences and comics were less divided then than they are now
- They also discuss the early NBC version of Colin’s show and how the network reacted to the content.
Audience, crowd work, and comedy etiquette
- The comedians complain about:
- Too much applause
- Hosts overhyping comics with “special guest” intros
- Crowds being told to clap or cheer before a set
- The current obsession with crowd work and “content”
- Jim and Colin both prefer getting into the jokes without a pep-rally-style introduction.
Fighting, hecklers, and dangerous rooms
- Several stories involve hostile audiences and near-fights:
- A drunk heckler rushing the stage
- Bouncers not stepping in
- Comics getting attacked or threatened after sets
- Clubs where the owners or staff were more intimidating than the audience
- They also recall famous stories of comics punching hecklers or being physically threatened onstage.
Legendary comics and comedy elders
- They talk about older comics and peers, including:
- Patrice O’Neal
- Geraldo
- Bill Hicks
- Dennis Miller
- Brett Butler
- Bobby Collins
- John Mulrooney
- Pat Cooper
- Woody Allen appearing in comedy settings
- The tone is reverent but funny—especially when discussing how dangerous, brilliant, or unpredictable some of these comics were.
Notable Stories and Bits
Colin’s early bombing story
- Colin tells a vivid story about his first road gig in North Carolina:
- He bombed every show
- The owner and wife made everyone sit and read comment cards after the shows
- The cards were brutal, and Colin thought that was just normal show business
Pips chaos and the “mob audience”
- One of the wildest stories is about Pips:
- A show was interrupted by guys throwing chairs
- A comic was still performing outside the club near a truck while chaos unfolded
- Colin says this was the kind of experience that should have made him quit comedy
Pat Cooper at Pips with Woody Allen
- Colin recounts a legendary night where:
- Woody Allen performed stand-up at Pips
- Pat Cooper riffed brilliantly
- The production tried to get Pat to repeat his material for “reaction shots”
- Pat exploded on Ray Garvey and stormed off
Madonna and celebrity stand-up
- They laugh about Madonna trying stand-up and doing TV sets:
- She’s clearly a performer, but not a natural comic
- The guys question why a global superstar would put herself through the humiliation of stand-up
Tough Crowd’s original “mission”
- Colin emphasizes that the show worked because:
- No applause was allowed
- The panelists were expected to be sharp, not polite
- Nobody was there to pander
- He feels that atmosphere made the show special and hard to recreate.
Key Takeaways
- Comedy used to be rougher, smaller, and more dangerous. The stories make clear how much the club scene has changed.
- The Comedy Cellar became a special place because it stayed comedian-driven. It resisted industry pressure and preserved a real comics’ room.
- Original panel shows like Tough Crowd depended on chemistry and a specific era. They worked because comics were less guarded and more willing to attack each other in public.
- Both Colin and Jim are nostalgic for the old scene, but not sentimental. They respect the work, the chaos, and the absurdity of it all.
- They still prefer jokes over hype. Their biggest pet peeve is anything that turns comedy into a forced event instead of a set.
Best-One Line Energy
- The episode’s tone is basically: mean, historical, and very funny
- If you like:
- New York comedy lore
- behind-the-scenes club stories
- heckler fights
- O&A/Tough Crowd nostalgia
- old-school comic insults and riffing
this episode is loaded with it.