Stand Up, Open Mic Nights Come to Grassroots

KSA partners with Yuk Yuks to bring professional comedians to Surrey campus

The Kwantlen Student Association has been focusing on improving student life at KPU by hosting monthly stand up comedy and open mic nights on the Surrey campus. KSA events coordinator Matt Hunt says the events are aimed at getting more people into the Grassroots cafe, which has had difficulty pulling students to its corner of the campus.

“When I was hired [by the KSA], one of the things I was asked to do was try to encourage as many events as I can in the Grassroots,” says Hunt.

The stand up nights are presented in collaboration with the Canadian comedy establishment Yuk Yuks, with Yuk Yuks sending local comics to the university at a significant discount. The first night was headlined by Steph Tolev who won best female comedian last year at the Canadian Comedy Awards, while the second show on Tuesday Nov. 22 featured James Kennedy and James Hammond. As of now, there’s no schedule on who Yuk Yuks will be providing for future events.

“The Yuk Yuks name tends to draw people a little better than just saying “University Stand up,’” says Hunt.

The comedy nights at the Grassroots are a new occurrence, and as such word has yet to spread through the KPU community. Kennedy and Hammond were greeted by an audience of maybe twenty people at the Nov. 22 show—not including those in line for coffee—and not all of those in attendance came to the cafe that night expecting a comedy show.

Those who were there for the laughs tended to favor the back of the room, leaving plenty of empty space. Being professionals, Kennedy and Hammond rolled with the less than ideal audience situation and delivered routines that had at least one reporter in the audience laughing, if not too many else. Still, stand up requires energy from the audience and even the best comics can’t usually compensate for a mostly empty room. The night’s performers were visibly and vocally relieved when their time was up.

“Comedy is the type of thing that, if you can’t fill the room, it’s just not going to be as much fun for everyone,” says Hunt. “That’s just like with any comedy club. If you have ten people in the crowd you just don’t get that energy.”

Hunt is confident that the stand up nights will find their audience, and points out that the open mic events faced similar struggles filling the room when they were first introduced at the start of the semester. He says the buzz for events at the Grassroots will “come with time,” but for now Hunt will be busy promoting the events with signage around campus, as well as addspace in local newspapers to draw crowds from outside the university.

“I think if people know that every month we’re doing a standup comedy thing with Yuk Yuks, people will come and it will build and build,” says Hunt.

In contrast to the stand up show, the more established open mic held on the following Thursday enjoyed a packed room, with hardly an open table to be found. Beer and coffee were flowing and there was no shortage of performers ready to get on stage to show off their talents. As usual, opening for the evening was Hunt himself performing a few songs, along with campus multi-faith chaplain Ethan Vanderleek.

“I have quite a musical background myself so having my own open mic was kind of a personal goal of mine as well,” says Hunt.

After Hunt and Vanderleek opened with their tribute to Leonard Cohen, the night was filled with a wide variety of performances including singing, rapping and beatboxing, guitar, piano, ukulele, slam poetry, and stand up comedy. Some of the performers were professional musicians while others had never performed in front of an audience before.

“Kwantlen doesn’t have a ton of interactive things going on and I think that’s one thing we’re trying to change,” says Hunt. “Obviously being a smaller university with a very diverse group of people, it’s tough to have everyone want to do the same thing and I think that’s what’s good about music. It’s the language of the world.”

This month wrapped up the last of the recurring Grassroots events for 2016. Hunt says that the events will be on hiatus for the month of December due to low foot-traffic on campus for the winter break. Both the open mic and stand up events will be back on in January. Anyone interested should check out the KSA event calendar for details.