History

Six Classic Insults by Mark Twain, In Honor of his 177th Birthday

By Nicholas Phillips Fri., Nov. 30 2012 at 11:44 AM
Categories: History, Jesters
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Mark Twain insulted everybody. He was incredible.
The great Missouri sage Mark Twain went after everybody: Congress, the French, Christians, school boards, mankind, the French.

(He liked insulting the French).

In honor of his 177th birthday today, we give you six of our very favorite Mark Twain disses.

Classic Twain Insult #6

"The average American may not know who his grandfather was. But the American was, however, one degree better off than the average Frenchman who, as a rule, was in considerable doubt as to who his father was."

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Congress, insults, Mark Twain, the French
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Jesters

Tommy Johnagin, Standup Comic from Southern Illinois, Lands Pilot Deal with NBC

By Nicholas Phillips Fri., Oct. 5 2012 at 1:14 PM
Categories: Jesters
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NBC is giving St. Louis standup Tommy Johnagin his own show
Tommy Johnagin -- a standup comic who grew up across the river in Benton, Illinois -- has just landed a pilot deal with NBC.

"I'm very excited about it," he just typed up in an e-mail to Daily RFT.

We found out about it from the industry website Deadline, who wrote this morning that this is a pretty "rare" deal for a standup comic to get these days.

The show, as it's conceived right now, will chronicle:



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Benton Illinois, NBC, pilot, pregnant girlfriend, Tommy Johnagin
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Jesters

[VIDEO] Nikki Glaser, Standup Comic from Kirkwood, Was on Conan Last Night

By Nicholas Phillips Wed., Sep. 19 2012 at 7:00 AM
Categories: Jesters
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Nikki Glaser doing her act on Conan, 9-18-2012
Not only is Nikki Glaser a regular at the venerable Comedy Cellar in New York these days (which is the club into which Louis CK descends during the intro to his show)...

And not only is she about to co-host a new program on MTV called, "The Nikki and Sara Show"...

Which happens to be based on her podcast, "You Had to Be There"...

But also, she did a five-minute set for Conan on TBS last night.

Enjoy.

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Comedy Cellar, Conan, Louis CK, MTV, Nikki and Sara Show, Nikki Glaser, TBS, The Firebird
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Jesters

David Koechner, Professional Ham, Once Considered Running for Office in Missouri

By Nicholas Phillips Tue., Aug. 21 2012 at 11:26 AM
Categories: Jesters, Missourah
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Image via IMDB
Did you know this guy grew up in Missouri?
We've seen this guy David Koechner all over the place: Anchorman (as Champ Kind, the sportscaster whose tagline was "WHAMMY!"), The Office (in which he played Michael Scott's buffoon friend, Todd Packer), Saturday Night Live, etc.

But at least we here at Daily RFT were gobsmacked to learn that this guy hails from central Missouri, went to Mizzou, was once charged with felony cocaine possession in Columbia (it was a crap charge), and for a time, considered running for political office in the Show-Me State.

We learned it all from comedian Marc Maron's podcast, WTF. The Koechner episode was uploaded last Thursday, and contains his memories of what it was like growing up in the small town of Tipton (between Kansas City and the capital):

I always knew I was different. You don't want to say 'black sheep,' but I knew I had to get out of town. I knew there was something else going on. I knew I had a different desire.

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Anchorman, Dave Koechner, Marc Maron, Saturday Night Live, Second City, Tipton, WTF podcast
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Jesters

Last Week's Funniest Tweets by St. Louis Funnypeople

By Nicholas Phillips Mon., Jul. 2 2012 at 9:30 AM
Categories: Jesters
Every week or so, Daily RFT sifts through "the Twitter" for choice nuggets by St. Louis comics and comic-aspirants. Here are a few that tickled us recently.

Max Fitzgerald

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Josh Arnold, Matt Conty, Max Fitzgerald, Sean O'Brien, Zack Stovall
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Jesters

Last Week's Best Tweets by St. Louis Comedians

By Nicholas Phillips Mon., Jun. 25 2012 at 9:00 AM
Categories: Jesters
Every week or so, Daily RFT is going to sift through "the Twitter" for choice nuggets by St. Louis comics and comic-aspirants. Here are a few that have tickled us recently.

Dayo Adesokan

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best tweets by comics, Dayo Adesokan, Erik Anker, Joe Murray, Jon Venegoni, Matt Conty, Scotty James, Steve Poggi
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Jesters

MTV Picks Up Late Night Show Starring Kirkwood-born Comic Nikki Glaser

By Nicholas Phillips Thu., Jun. 21 2012 at 9:00 AM
Categories: Jesters
Image via
Sarah Schaefer (left) and Nikki Glaser (right) jumping into the late-night fray
This autumn, Jon Stewart, Chelsea Handler and Conan O'Brien may be getting a lil' STL-flavored competition in their late-night time slot. (If that sounds obscene to you....GOOD).

Nikki Glaser -- a 28-year-old Kirkwood native, standup comic and Instagram enthusiast -- will be co-starring in a new weekly program on MTV called, The Nikki and Sara Show.  It will air at 11 p.m. (though the station has not announced what day of the week).

Her co-star is Sara Schaefer, former blogger for Late Night with Jimmy Fallon. The two Voltronned up last year to create the podcast, "You Had to Be There," on which they discuss their lives and interview big-name comedians (guests have included Jim Gaffigan, Michael Showalter, Judah Friedlander).

They've already been written up in The New York Times, but in case you're not sure of what Glaser and Schaeffer are capable of as a team, they're the ones who put out this video: 

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Justin Timberlake, MTV, Nikki Glaser, Sara Schaefer, The Nikki and Sara Show
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Jesters

Comedy Central Returns to Missouri Legislature, Finds More to Ridicule

By Paul Friswold Fri., May 4 2012 at 1:11 PM
Categories: Jesters, Missourah
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Spoiler Alert: They don't make Brown look good.
Hot on the heels of Stephen Colbert's Tuesday night bit on Missouri's destined-to-fail "Don't Say Gay" bill, Jon Stewart sent Aasif Mandvi to the Missouri House to speak with Rep. Wanda Brown (R) for a bit that ran last night. The topic? Civil rights, namely Brown's law protecting gun owners from ever being fired from their job for owning guns. As noted earlier this week, our legislature may not always accomplish much but they sure do entertain the rest of the country.

Video after the jump.

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Aasif Mandvi, Jon Stewart, Representative Wanda Brown, The Daily Show
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Politics

Stephen Colbert: Missouri's "Don't Say Gay" Bill Would Make Us "The Don't-Show-Me State"

By Nicholas Phillips Wed., May 2 2012 at 9:00 AM
Categories: Jesters, Politics
As we reported last week, the "Don't Say Gay Bill" -- proposed by Missouri House Republicans and designed to severely restrict discussion of homosexuality in public schools -- is still in committee. No hearing has been scheduled. It has zero chance of passing anyway. But our lawmakers have achieved at least one thing: They've rendered our state a national laughingstock:


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Don't Say Gay, Representative Steve Cookson, Stephen Colbert, the Colbert Report
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Jesters

Kathleen Madigan: Missourians Don't Feel "Crazy State Pride"

By Nicholas Phillips Mon., Apr. 23 2012 at 11:37 AM
Categories: Jesters
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St. Louis native Kathleen Madigan
Kathleen Madigan -- native St. Louisan, former Houlihan's server and now one of the most successful comics in the country  --  recently reflected on her home state in an interview with Boston Magazine:

Ninety percent of us in the Midwest don't come from someplace "cool" that we feel attached to, so we don't have an attitude about it. We don't have that kind of crazy state pride like, there was this guy in Texas who right before he was executed, yelled "Go, Cowboys!" There's no way that anybody from St. Louis, right before you kill him, is going to yell "Go, Rams!" It's just not going to happen.

Correct. "Go Cards!" -- maybe.

By the way, to all you comedy nerds trying to revitalize the St. Louis standup scene by hosting open-mics in weird venues: Have you pulled it off at Taco Bell yet?

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chili cheese burrito, chilito, Dallas Cowboys, Houlihan's, Kathleen Madigan, Rams, Standup Throwdown, Taco Bell
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