Inside the Business of Comedy in 2026 with Emilio Savone

15:31Emilio Savone:You know, and spot pay can vary anywhere from 50 to a hundred bucks, depending on the night a week. Sometimes it's more if it's on the weekends. But if you're doing a headlining show, well then most of the time, you know, that's going to happen outside the city because a club outside the city can't fill a Tuesday night with just doing a showcase show because they don't have enough comedians to do that. So if you want to get Chris DiStefano to come and do a show in, you know, in, you know, Topeka or somewhere in like Wichita, right? Well, you have to talk to the agent. You have to put together an agreement and a contract.

16:06Emilio Savone:There's going to be expenses involved because now the focus is on making sure that that comic has security, make sure there's green room costs. There's a rider that there's food. They're getting a big part of the door. They're going to get about 90 % of the door. So you're not going to make as much on the actual tickets. so you have to kind of offset the fact that you're not making enough on revenue with expenses that the comic would have to clear before they get to bonus after their guarantee.

16:33Luke Girgis:So it's a completely... Hang on, slow down, slow down. So I've got a bunch of expenses, the flights, the accommodations, food, whatever. You're saying that the comic does not get paid until those expenses have been recouped? They get a guarantee. They get a guarantee.

16:47Emilio Savone:And it's called a versus deal. Yeah. So if you're a comedian who is a big, big draw, you know you might get like a 10 to 20 000 guarantee for a weekend at a club and then it's called versus 90 and it's some some comics is 70 some get 60 some don't get a percentage some get a bonus structure based on amount of tickets sold so like let's say you sell you know 300 tickets you'll get a 500 bonus let's say you sell another 300 you'll get a thousand dollar bonus you know That usually in many ways benefits the club to do it that way because once you do a – if you do a versus deal, like let's say you do a versus 90 % deal, the second that comic makes enough – sells enough tickets revenue -wise to clear their guarantee and the expenses, then every ticket sold after that, they get a piece of 90 % of.

17:39Luke Girgis:Yep.

17:39Emilio Savone:So a comic on a weekend, like at our club in Stanford, we have comics that'll make 40 to 50K in a weekend. Right? And the venues? But again, it's different because at my club in New York City on a Tuesday night, we'll have comics who will sell out six shows on the weekend, but they're coming in doing 10 to 15 minutes. Yeah. And I'm not expecting them to promote the shows. We get to promote it. They're on our lineup. But I'm not expecting them to do anything other than just go and perform. And also a lot of times they might cancel last second. So you have to put disclaimers in the lineup like, hey, you know, any subject to change.

18:19Emilio Savone:And so you have to also be careful as a club how you're marketing that because if you're going in heavy on one comic and they don't show up, you might get screwed, right? So that's why you want to be like kind of very careful in how you promote a lot of this stuff. but if it's a headline so that's why the comic's not getting paid like a headliner because there's no real expectation from them other than just to show up and do their spot but the second they're headlining a show well now there's certain costs that need to be covered the focal point is on them like I'm not going to charge comics costs or the agent involved for a$50 spot on a Tuesday night and it's a totally different language so again I have three bookers at my club I have a development booker.

19:01Emilio Savone:I have a showcase booker. And then I have a headlining booker. And our showcase booker is speaking a totally different language than our headlining booker. And one thing I always want, what I want is I want my bookers to know the entire language. There's all these different variations of the language, all these dialects, if you will. And I had no idea how to book these headliner shows until COVID. Because COVID forced me to have to like deal with like a lot of the agents. And agents, I think, get a bad rap. The reality is, man, if you get a good relationship with the agents, it makes your life so much easier because then it just – now you can just go to an agent and say, hey, send me over your roster.

19:44Emilio Savone:Who's available? It becomes very, very plug and play. Yeah. And I'm also on the management side. So you don't want – like I have no issues when clubs hit up my comics. In fact, I do get annoyed when agents and managers get upset when a club owner reaches out to a comic. I think that's a little absurd. However, I can understand the protectiveness because the last thing I want is for a club to ask a comic a question that makes them kind of feel uncomfortable that, you know, when it comes to money on the road, right?

20:13Luke Girgis:Well, the thing that exposes the talent is that they can often agree to things without thinking it through.

20:19Emilio Savone:Or they just don't want to be the bad guy.

20:20Luke Girgis:Yeah.

20:21Emilio Savone:So you don't want to put the comic in that position. So when you have a relationship with the agent, a good relationship with them, you know, there's an understanding like, hey, like everyone wants to do right by the comic. And it's our job to discuss the business side of it. Right.

20:33Luke Girgis:Yeah.

20:34Emilio Savone:So, again, it's like totally, totally different. So just kind of reiterate the point, you know, like if like, you know, like again, like Chris, you know, we're really close with Chris and we've managed, you know, we've worked with Chris on the management level on the Chris DiStefano on the management level. We've worked with him on the record label, the whole thing. But even if I'm going to book him on the road, you know, I will reach out to his agent. Now, of course, I might say to Chris, hey, Chris, we'd love to have you at our Stanford club, you know, but I'm not going to send him a deal. I'm going to send it to his agent, who's Michael Berkowitz, and say, hey, Mike, you know, we'd love to have Chris here, you know.

21:08Emilio Savone:So there's like a – so it's totally different. But the economics are totally different. And listen, there's a good debate what's more – what's better for a club, to run a showcase-style club or to run a headliner club? I mean I think if you're in New York or if you're in LA without question a showcase club but we do a lot of headliner stuff too you know in New York too because I want to be able to give someone like a Jessica Kirsten you know the opportunity to make some really good money at the club and still get to work her hour you know but I think at the end of the day like it's rare to be able you it's you You can't run showcase clubs at the capacity that we do in New York city.

21:47Emilio Savone:It's impossible. That's why when everyone talks about these other cities that are blowing up for comedy, which is phenomenal. And I'm a huge supporter of Austin comedy. I love the comedy scene there. It just will never replace New York because there's not enough people. There's well, I don't want to say never maybe, maybe, maybe more people will move. There are more comics, but the amount of comics that are here, the amount of people that are here, then you just can't get exhausted by New York City if I'm in Austin for five days I've seen it all I'm ready to go home yeah I mean you've been here how many times you visit you've probably gone to places I'm here about four times a year you probably are constantly seeing new things yeah it's rare to get that yeah and when you come to our club in the city you're not going to see the same comics whereas i think in a place like austin right now you probably are with the exception of like a lot of the bigger guys i like to come by for a week or so and that's not me shitting on austin austin is awesome i want i wish there was more austins out there that were bubbling up joe de rosa who was a comic i managed to move to austin you know he's getting all his reps in at the mothership uh he's working the creek in the cave like he's taking kind of that new york city mentality and is bringing it to Austin where he's popping around to all the clubs.

23:05Emilio Savone:But time will tell whether or not Austin could sustain all of these venues. You know, whereas you have a place like the mothership, the hope is, is that, you know, what's the saying? Rising tides lifts all boats. It's soon to be seen whether or not the mothership is going to do that in Austin. Whereas in New York that happens. I think clubs like ours and like the cellar and like Gotham, I think they do that. I think the more A-list clubs there are in New York creates more opportunities for other clubs to open up.

23:39Luke Girgis:Do you think Austin has overtaken LA in the pecking order of comedy cities?

23:45Emilio Savone:I think in terms of, God, it's a tough question. I'm going to say no because LA's got three great comedy brands. They got the Improv, they have the Store, and they have the Laugh Factory. and now downtown LA is starting to blow up as well. I think in terms of, in terms of like gritty comedy, in terms of like the pure, pure comedy, maybe because again, like when I go to Austin, Austin reminds me the most of New York where you can bounce around to five different clubs within like a three block radius and you can do multiple spots. You can't really do that in LA, but I still think, you know, LA, New York are the top two places for stand-up.

24:29Emilio Savone:I think Austin is still formulating what it is. And I think, unfortunately, there is kind of this riff right now happening where it's like the mothership almost versus everything else.

24:45Luke Girgis:Who sees it that way? Is it the comics or the club owners?

24:49Emilio Savone:I think the perception. I think there's a perception of Austin that there's a Rogan style of comedy that's happening that's the Kill Tonys of the world and is Rogan and is like this kind of like hardcore extreme comedy. And then there's like this in a progressive town like Austin and like there's this pushback against it. I think Austin is struggling with accepting the fact that there's the mothership in some way. Not the clubs. I think. It sounds like you're talking about the clubs. No, no, no, no, no, no. How do I say this? I think, for example, like you take like, I don't know if like Moon Tower is doing stuff with, you know, or doing stuff with the mothership.

25:33Emilio Savone:You know, I don't think like South By is doing stuff with the mothership. I think there's a lot. I think there's almost. South By is or isn't? Is not. I don't know if they are or they're not.

25:41Luke Girgis:That's because, so I've been to South By more times than I've been to anything else. and you just, I don't know why Mothership would do anything with South By because they're full every fucking night.

25:55Emilio Savone:No, for sure. But I just feel like they're almost kind of like an island by themselves a little bit. And I don't want to speak for other club owners there because I really have no idea. I mean, the only really other club owner that, well, I mean, the Vulcan over there, I know the owner of their Nick is at the Mothership all the time. He has a great relationship with them. And, you know, Rebecca at the Creighton Cave, I mean, she's like the mother of comedy. I mean, and again, she would be someone that I think you should talk to. But she is, you know, I don't think she, I mean, she's supportive of all things comedy.

26:24Emilio Savone:It's just, it just feels like Austin is still trying to find its voice as to what it is as a comedy scene. You have a lot of independent shows. You have a lot of random shows. You have shows that are happening in houses. You have like still this true to form what Austin is, is being weird. But now you have this institution. It's like they took the comedy store and the comedy seller, they rolled it all up in one and they just put it right in the middle of Austin. Yeah. And it's like, I don't, I feel like there's almost like, it seems like there's a little bit of resistance towards it by some of the more like true people, like the true like artists in Austin, the comics in Austin.

27:09Emilio Savone:And then maybe it's because it's not a hard, not an easy place to get into. Maybe it feels a little Boise club. Maybe because like it feels like it's infiltrated the scene. I don't, I don't really know, but it does feel, it just feels to me like as, as much as it's been so helpful and so great for the scene there, it's kind of viewed as like this kind of shocking type of place. it's kind of like made people think. And I also think because people think Rogan is kind of like this, like extreme guy when he really isn't.

27:45Luke Girgis:He's a polarizing figure though.

27:46Emilio Savone:It's a very polarizing place I think for people.

27:48Luke Girgis:Yeah.

27:49Emilio Savone:You know, I think Kill Tony is a polarizing show for people, you know, and in the rub of it all is like these guys, it was all born out of LA. It all came from the store.

27:59Luke Girgis:So I can't see, I haven't seen the data, but I can't see a way that the mothership hasn't been economically fantastic for the other clubs in Austin. I just can't envision how that would happen because you get all these new comics in. They're not only going to work the mothership. Surely they would go around to other clubs. People would go to Austin for the mothership and then they would also go and check out other clubs. Are they not experiencing an economic uplift?

28:21Emilio Savone:If I had a club in Austin, first thing I would do is I would build a relationship with the mothership.

28:30Emilio Savone:And I would see what they're doing and I would not copy it. I would do the opposite way. And what I would do is I would create a community, my own kind of community, and I would see it as an opportunity to say, OK, they're getting weekend headliners like these guys or these comics, and there's all these other comics that can't get there. So I'll have them. You know, I would do everything in my power to create something that is kind of like another another way of doing it. but I wouldn't do it in a way to almost like be like, you know, we're, we're different than, I wouldn't be like trying to be different in a way to be like, they're not great.

29:12Emilio Savone:I would be saying, no, the mothership is awesome and we're awesome too. And this is why.

29:17Luke Girgis:Sounds like the approach you've taken in New York versus the comedy seller.

29:21Emilio Savone:Yes. The exact same way. And I do think the mothership, if you're not thinking that way has crushed you. I think if you're not thinking that way It's probably hurt you Because it's frustrated you It's made you feel probably less than It's probably made you feel like you're not getting as many options You know like You know you're probably People are probably saying I can't be with you and I'm sorry I got three spots at the mothership Right? And you've been there for 20 years and now you're like well fuck Exactly So again I do think initially When the mothership opened It probably hurt a lot of the clubs there.

30:01Emilio Savone:But I think now I would hope it's helping because, but here's the difference too, right? I think people that are going to mothership probably live like an hour. Some people might be living two hours outside of Austin, right? So if I can't get tickets to the mothership, I'm probably just not going to come to Austin. But you're not coming to New York to go see a comedy show. You're here just to be in New York. And if you want to go to a comedy show and you try to get into our club and we're sold out or try to get in the cellar. and they're sold out, well, you're probably still going to go to a comedy club.

30:32Luke Girgis:Yeah.

30:33Emilio Savone:You're just going to go to a different one.

30:35Luke Girgis:That's a really good take. I hadn't thought about that. I didn't realize that there was a long commute to getting to Austin as kind of like a customer behavior.

30:42Emilio Savone:Well, what I'm saying is that I guarantee you the mothership are pulling people from like two hours away, three hours away. They're building their whole reason to come to Austin to go check out the mothership.

30:51Luke Girgis:So maybe it's a lot better for the restaurants around there than the other clubs.

30:56Emilio Savone:Yeah. So, so yeah, I think what the mothership is doing is yeah, probably building a better economic situation for sixth street. I will tell you that like sixth street, for example, I remember, you know, uh, you know, every, you know, it's on sixth street, which can be a really could be, you know, sixth street used to be the place back in the day where all this stuff was happening in Austin. Then it became kind of like a real dirty place and kind of real kind of crime at night and kind of nuts. And I'll tell you the last time I was in Austin, which was a few weeks ago, sixth street felt great.

31:25Emilio Savone:so in some way I think the mothership is kind of cleaning it up but just to put like a little you know just to kind of you know put a little uh ribbon on it I think a place like the mothership is amazing I think it's great for Austin I just think Austin is still trying to find its full voice and what it is in the comedy scene and I think LA has its voice I think we have our voice we have our institutions you know I think Austin's still trying to feel it so has it overtaken LA as like the number two comedy scene no in my opinion it has not so so in australia we have huge tall

32:00Luke Girgis:poppy syndrome you familiar with that you have what tall poppy syndrome you familiar with that that is where um as soon as someone starts to become successful in australia everyone starts to hate them yeah and i think it stems from our very small population because there's you know there's not much money to go around there's not many opportunities to go around so one person being successful kind of means that somebody else can't be in a small population like that. It's pretty savage. It's even worse in New Zealand where the population is even smaller. And I don't see that at all in America, really.

32:33Luke Girgis:Most places where I look, like everybody has this like, you know, abundance kind of view where it's like, you can be successful and I can be successful and we're all good. I don't actually, the exception to that is probably the comedy scene. And I feel like the way you're talking is rare in the, in not with the comics, but with the

32:51Emilio Savone:owners club owners rare in that what i'm not if they're doing you have it exactly yeah if you're like oh that's because i'll tell you why because i come from a promote promoter's background you know so you know like my you know again like take the ticketing for example you know and listen the reality is this like you know my ticketing my you know at the end of the day you got to run culture matters community matters you know i don't care how good your marketing is and how good all this other stuff is if you're not utilize if you're not doing things the right way inside the club and your staff isn't doing things the right way you can sell a boatload of tickets the reality is if the shows suck and the club's not being run well customers are just not going to come yeah my success or my club's success my team's success yeah the ticketing is a huge part of it but the bigger part of it is you know my whole thing is get people in the door but how do we keep them in the door our bread and butter is that we've kept people in the door but i have a promoters mentality.

33:50Emilio Savone:So that ticketing platform is a perfect example of how we conduct ourselves because we have other clubs using it. And why do we want other clubs using it? Because we feel like we've tapped into something that is really, really useful. And I want other clubs to be able to share in that because it makes for a better comedy scene, not just in New York, but anywhere else. So again, Brisbane, for example, we're working with guilt-free comedy, um, you know, this, this club out in Brisbane, uh, that, uh, you know, um, that this awesome guy, Tony runs, you know, he heard your podcast. He hit us up, you know, we met, we talked and we're doing his ticketing, but I also like basically like serve as a consultant for him.

34:34Emilio Savone:You know, I put him in touch with agents. I do, you know, I'm not getting extra money for that. Why do I do that? And I'm not doing that because I'm like some kind of saint, but I'm doing it because I love comedy. I know the plight of a comedy club owner. I understand like how difficult it is to do it. And I think I tapped into something or my team has tapped into something that can help him. And of course, business mind or business wise, 100%. I'm also looking at it like, hey, you know, the more tentacles that we can have in all these different places, the more it benefits comics I manage. the more benefits comedians I work with, the more benefits agents have relationships with.

35:11Emilio Savone:Of course, it's all calculated in a way of like, I'm not just doing this because I wanna be a great guy or a good guy. I'm also doing it because business-wise, I'm thinking, how is this gonna benefit the overall everything that I'm doing? But that also, that helps everything. I mean, that could help everyone and anyone, right?

35:28Luke Girgis:There's two things aren't opposed to each other. You can be a good guy, you can like helping people and collaborative, and there can also be a business benefit.

35:36Emilio Savone:hundred percent and I think a lot of people don't know that I feel a lot of people like you know are almost they they almost feel like embarrassed that they're able to make money off of something that like art yeah it's like don't look at it like that if you can make money then you can pay people more and then you can pay the artist more you can pay your staff more there is a that that's that's like how you build economies yeah yeah you know what I mean like for real yeah like nothing gives me greater, um, nothing makes me feel better than knowing that I have over a hundred people that work at all my clubs and they're all able to support themselves, support their families.

36:15Emilio Savone:We have people working in our office that get healthcare and all that stuff. None of that would happen. They get health insurance. None of that would happen if we didn't create all these other revenue streams, you know, whether it's through the ticketing that we do, whether it's through like you know you know what we charge at the door and all that stuff i mean the way we do our loyalty programs all this stuff our record label everything the money on netflix

36:38Luke Girgis:so in 2024 they did 49 specials which was like double the year before that and they grew grew again in 2025 the top tier comics are earning anywhere between 20 to 40 million dollars a special yeah but everybody else is getting about 100 to 200 000 a special to me that's just covering costs i don't know how how much does it cost to record a special i mean if you're gonna do a

37:00Emilio Savone:special like look it varies but like if you're gonna do like a proper proper proper proper prop like netflix hulu i mean look we we've done netflix specials we've been involved in netflix specials where we paid you know we've charged we've we've spent 50 to 60k but that's really really really on the cheap i mean in truth you're going to be spending anywhere from 200 to 300 thousand dollars if it's a special that's going to go like on a hulu or it's going to go on a

37:28Luke Girgis:netflix you know when netflix are giving comics 100 to 200 thousand dollars they're barely covering

37:33Emilio Savone:the cost yeah totally so it's very different so that's more of a licensing fee so the way netflix was doing it i don't know if they're still doing this to be honest but when they were doing their netflix as a joke series comics were getting you know around 200 thousand dollars a special and it was a two-year licensing agreement but there weren't really strict stipulations on the cost of production. So I think in that scenario, a lot of comics were getting away with doing, you know, 50 to 100 K in costs for production. Cause again, it was, and it wasn't like you had to get anything okayed by Netflix.

38:05Emilio Savone:So you basically could film a special, have it ready-made, send it to Netflix, and they would just license it for two years. Whereas you take some, a company like a Hulu where they might give like a, you know, a comic that isn't at Dave Chappelle's level, but someone that's like, you know, a hot comic who sells well, but they're not Chappelle, they might give you a million bucks, right? But they're going to say, hey, out of that million, you got to carve out this much for production. For production. Yeah. And there's certain stipulations to it.

38:35Luke Girgis:Yeah. And so if you're doing the license deal or you're getting the cheapest special. Is it still worth it?

38:44Emilio Savone:I mean, I think it is. Why? Well, because let's say you're spending$100 ,000 on the special. So let's say your net is$100 ,000 as a comic. And obviously you pay 10 % to your agent, your manager, if you have a lawyer that was working on the deal, that's another 5%. So you're bringing in more. Then you're making$75 ,000 on it. And then, of course, you've got taxes and all that stuff. But you're not going to make really$100 ,000 on your YouTube special. Even if you sell, even if you get like millions. Shilted more than that. Well, Schultz though, he did a paywall.

39:20Luke Girgis:He had both.

39:22Emilio Savone:Well, but he made, and again, I don't want to speak for Andrew, but I'm pretty positive because he took it off of, I think it was going to be on Amazon. Then Amazon had all these, they wanted him to cut a bunch of stuff out. And he said, screw it. He basically bought it back from Amazon and then he was selling it for like five or 10 bucks on his website.

39:40Luke Girgis:But then he had the, he then put it on YouTube with a whole bunch of ads in between. So he ran both races Made a fuckload of money

39:47Emilio Savone:Andrew Schultz is not going to take a licensing deal for 200 grand That's true So if you're a comic who's going to take a licensing deal for 200 grand You're not Andrew Schultz So yes, Andrew Schultz, Chappelle, those guys Of course you're not going to do that licensing deal But if you're a comic who's going to take that licensing deal What you have to decide is What's more important for me right now To be on Netflix To make maybe 100k, 50k, 75k When it's all said and done versus putting on YouTube. And really the only purpose of putting on YouTube is that you hopefully can get multi-million views and it helps you sell tickets.

40:25Luke Girgis:Yeah.

40:26Emilio Savone:Well, it seems like... Because Netflix is not going to help you sell tickets. Putting your special, let's be very clear here, putting your special on HBO, Hulu, Netflix, it will not help you in any way sell tickets. What? I thought that was the only reason you would do it. No, you only do it so you can say you had a Netflix special. It does not help you sell tickets.

40:46Luke Girgis:Why do you want to say that if it doesn't help you sell tickets?

40:48Emilio Savone:Well, because it's, you know, there's validation in it. It's like, oh, I got a Netflix special. I mean, look at, so again, so there are comics we've worked with who had a choice. Do I put this on YouTube or do I put it on Netflix? And we were like, put it on Netflix because what if you put it on YouTube? And let's say you don't get five to 10 million views, right? Because there was a narrative going around where Sam Morrill, Mark Norman, Shane Gillis, these guys all were kind of the first to do the YouTube specials. Yeah. And they all got like 10 to 50 million views. And then it kind of – that didn't really happen.

41:25Emilio Savone:That hasn't really happened that much since. So if you're a comic who has a chance to put your special on Netflix through a licensing deal or on YouTube, what if you don't get 5 to 10 million views on YouTube? then it's kind of viewed almost as kind of like a dud, right? But if you put it on Netflix, it's a Netflix special. No one knows the difference of what you got paid. Like you do because you're in the comedy business. But to the usual regular person, they're like, oh, shit, this guy has a Netflix special. And then the next time you do a special, notice how many comics do a Netflix special.

41:57Emilio Savone:And then in their next special, they'll put it on YouTube. Jim Gaffigan just put a YouTube special out. Yeah. Right? So it's a brand perception play. Totally. And YouTube is kind of viewed. YouTube right now is kind of viewed as the comedy club, the online comedy club. It's where you go to really reach the real comedy fans right now. Whereas doing a Hulu Netflix special is like doing the theater.

42:22Luke Girgis:And I feel like the frequency of specials is just so much higher now. Like comics are putting out one.

42:27Emilio Savone:Everyone wants a special. Everyone's doing special.

42:28Luke Girgis:But they're also like the same comics are doing one a year. Like there seems to be a lot. Is the quality going down? is what it means to release a special different now than it was for releasing?

42:40Emilio Savone:Totally, and there should be a different name for it. They should just call it something different. You know, it's like, you know, a lot of it's about just getting clips. A lot of it is just, you know, about driving traffic to wherever you're trying to drive traffic to. So, for example, when you are doing these Netflix Hulu specials, you know, a big part of the conversation around it is, you know, for the comic, is they want to be able to clip it up and put it on their own YouTube.

43:02Luke Girgis:Yeah.

43:03Emilio Savone:That's a big thing now And if they don't allow you to do that Well then they gotta pay you more money So again Why these Netflix is a joke Licensing specials were kinda cool Cause one you get to be on Netflix Okay Two it wasn't a very long term deal You get it back in two years You can resell it or you can repurpose it You can do whatever you want And three you can still clip it out So it's a little bit of a hybrid model

43:28Luke Girgis:It's kinda no loss And then they pay for the production So you get your production cost covered

43:32Emilio Savone:Well, I mean, you're paying for it, but what they give you covers it.

43:36Luke Girgis:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

43:37Emilio Savone:But I bet there are a lot of comics that did those Netflix joke specials where they got paid$200K. I bet a lot of them didn't make money. They probably broke even on their production, and they just did it just to have that Netflix special out there. And then they could clip it up. They can use that. They can also use some of those clips to monetize it too.

43:59Luke Girgis:Yeah.

43:59Emilio Savone:There's all these little things they could really do.

44:01Luke Girgis:you know so yeah it's interesting like when you said a different name because i feel like when artists release an album musicians they release an album that is like this is my heart and soul you know i'm presenting it to the world this is everything and then they came up with a different name for songs that they were just having fun with and they called it a mixtape or they call it a cover or they call you know they had these other things and so as a fan you knew how to

44:28Emilio Savone:interpret the work well here's the look but here's the thing here's why so many specials exist now and this is where comedies change big time you know like Seinfeld I mean I remember Seinfeld and Louis like had a kind of like a debate over this years ago where Louis was like you always have to have new material and Seinfeld's perspective on that was always like that's crazy like you can't come up with new material every year like you know back then you could do your old material right because there was no internet really exactly so now you know a comic the whole reason why a comic is doing a special is just to put to rest the material they've been working on for the last year year and a half and then once they do the special they're done and now they come up with new stuff so that's kind of my point it's almost maybe they should call it i don't know what name they could call it but it's almost i don't know maybe they should call it like a record on a record or recording or something.

45:25Emilio Savone:That's really what it is. Think about in a band, a band does an album. They tour the album. Well, it's kind of backwards. The band will do the album first and then they tour the album to promote the album. And then they do another album and then they'll play the new music on it, but they have the luxury of playing some of the hits.

45:43Luke Girgis:Yep.

45:44Emilio Savone:And then after a while you compile 20 years of music and then you're probably playing only the songs that were really good. Yep. That's not how it is in comedy. It's the opposite. It's the opposite. Comedy, I'm on the road in the clubs to build up to my special. I do the special, and then you're never going to hear that material again. People don't want to hear the same joke twice. So when people are like, there's so many specials coming out, I think to the regular person who is not in comedy, they're not realizing like, it's not that these comics are trying to oversaturate. It's not that they're trying to exhaust you.

46:17Emilio Savone:It's just they're done with that. You've seen that material before. They got to put a ribbon on. They got to put a bow tie on. You know? Do you think comics are less restrictive about burning their material these days?

46:31Luke Girgis:I was talking to Kyle at Don't Tell, and his model is that he pays – he books the arcs on these pop-up comedy shows, and then he gives them an extra chunk of change to be able to own the clips that they record, and then he releases them. Yeah. And my question was, well, aren't they worried about burning their material? He goes, no, they don't give a fuck anymore. They just want volume of content out on the internet.

46:51Emilio Savone:They've gotten a lot less restrictive with it, and nothing is more frustrating than when a comic still has that old-school mentality. I think comics really have to, and I think a lot of that comes from their reps, their agents, their managers. I think a lot of them are so protective of their clients, you know, and I think they're gripping the bat too tight. Kyle's 100 % right. But I also think comics feel this way because they have been exploited by a lot of bad, you know, bad doers in the past who are, like Kyle, you know, and again, Kyle and I talked about this. Like Kyle is, you know, comes across as the kind of guy and he's told me if a comic doesn't want something up there, he won't put it up.

47:29Emilio Savone:So it's really – so I get why comics can be that way because they might be like, hey, I'm working on a special and this joke is going to be in there. So they become less restrictive. You have to be less restrictive because the internet is such a big part of it now. The reality is, you know, the fans don't care. even though I just said comics are pumping out specials because their work there because once they do a special they're done with the material I don't necessarily think they have to think that way I don't think fans care anymore about hearing a lot of the same stuff so I do think comics need they are finally adapting this or adopting this idea of like hey it's okay to put stuff out there it's not going to affect me getting a late night set it's not going to affect me on my special If anything, it's used as a promo for people who want to come and see you do more long form comedy.

48:22Emilio Savone:So, yes, 100 percent. It's become less restrictive, but there is still it hasn't fully evolved yet. But I think where the protectiveness comes from the comic is that, you know, comics get very weary of people putting their stuff on their on on on a different platforms, YouTube. Right. So that's where comics become very, very cautious, which I don't in any way begrudge them for. They should. So like a comic might be like, yeah, I don't care about my stuff being out there as long as it's on my stuff. but if I work a club and they put something on their YouTube that I didn't approve, well, I have an issue with that because they're exploiting my material without my approval.

49:08Emilio Savone:So we do the same stuff. We're running a whole YouTube outfit at the club. It's a big part of our business right now in terms of what we're trying to grow. Are we monetizing it right now? Not really. The goal is to monetize. And then once we do monetize, we're going to share in the monetization with the comedians. But the comics, we tell them what's happening. We book them specifically for those shows. So if you're a comedian and we're going to do a show that we want to put on YouTube, we'll say to them, hey, we're going to be doing a show. The goal is to get material for YouTube. There's going to be a monetization.

49:41Emilio Savone:Basically, we're looking to monetize. It's almost like we're setting it up like a headlining show. Not a headlining show in terms of them performing, but there's an agreement. If we make money, this is what your percentage is. we're going to approve all the clips by you we're going to make sure that you approve everything but once it's approved you know then we put it on our youtube and then we share in the monetization yeah whereas i think a lot of places they might not do that and that's where the comics i feel like are like hey i don't want my stuff out there i didn't give you approval it sounds like a no

50:16Luke Girgis:for your business to make almost every set recorded and then you can go to a comic even after outside of these pre-approved shows you would go to them after and say hey that clip was really sick can i either buy that off you or can we upload it and share in the revenue that's

50:33Emilio Savone:exactly what we do we record every single show we have a whole production team every comic that performs at our clubs it has their own file um it's basically like their own server they have a link to. And within 24 to 48 hours, their entire set, everything literally appears in their folder. And then, you know, and then, you know, we have a record label and then we also obviously are doing the YouTube stuff now. So if something really hits, we will approach them and say, hey, you know, you had a really killer set. Would you want us to put this on our YouTube page? Or do you want us to package this as like an audio play and we can submit this to Sirius XM as a track and it's just another way to generate revenue for the comedian and for the club so again but

51:15Luke Girgis:again i think what's stopping you guys from uploading five clips tonight because that seems like a huge competitive advantage for you guys and you could have a pretty fucking monster youtube

51:22Emilio Savone:channel over the next couple years well what what what well what prevents well one i mean what can prevent you is you just have to go through the approval process yep you have to approve with the comics yeah and and again that's what i mean a lot of comics are like they get like they get protective of what you're putting up and whatever so sometimes it will do it like we just did a show youtube show where we had five six comics on and it took like a month for us to go to to get the clips that we needed to put up in the sets because there was so much back and forth they're like well i didn't really like this joke it didn't really go well or this didn't really play i don't want this out there and so a lot of it is us putting like the comics mind at ease like dude don't it's great it's fine like it's gonna sound good yeah it looks good it's gonna work you know so i've got an idea for you it's almost like we're like editing it

52:13Luke Girgis:with them yeah i've got an idea can i share an idea yeah sure so if you almost built like some automated crm where you had this part like call it like a pre-agreed pipeline where every clip i'm going to that's approved by us and then later approved by you we'll give you a thousand dollars but we get the full ride for it or something, whatever. Sure, sure. Pick up a number. So you've got these clips that are just being pumped every single night. You're probably getting 20, 30 clips a night, whatever. And then you have this – you could build this with AI pretty easily. You have these clips get automatically populated into this dashboard.

52:50Luke Girgis:Someone in your building who has taste goes through and goes, these three, these five are mad. You click them and then it goes automatically notification to the comic and the comic says, hey, if we post this on our YouTube, you'll get this$500, this$1 ,000, whatever on this agreement, sign and accept and it's done. And you could have that whole thing automated every single night. You would be a fucking monster on YouTube in two years. Well, listen, one fucking brilliant idea.

53:16Emilio Savone:Two, I mean, that's kind of how it works with the audio that we've been doing. But again, we've been doing this for years. The YouTube stuff really is kind of like something that we've been focusing on over the last six months. But 100%. And that's really where we're going with it. But what's good is though, But here's the thing, because it's still so new. Yeah. Like now the comics are doing this with us. They're seeing the benefit. You know, like Katie Boyle is a comedian that we work with. Katie, her clips and her sets on our YouTube page has compiled like over 7 million views. And her subs now on her YouTube channel is increasing.

53:51Emilio Savone:Yeah. And she's seeing more and more people watching all her stuff. because if you're someone like Katie, you're going to get more views on our channel than you are on your own.

54:00Luke Girgis:But it's even better than that. No, no.

54:02Emilio Savone:So my point is, but now someone like a Katie, someone like a Paul Verzi, they've been doing this with us. So now that trust is there. Yeah. Right? So now it's not going to be that difficult the next time we want to put their stuff up. So they'll be like, oh yeah, cool. You got my approval. It takes a minute to get that trust.

54:20Luke Girgis:I got you. But one thing the comics don't probably know is that you can recently YouTube have released this collaborative post feature where it can almost be on both channels.

54:30Emilio Savone:A hundred percent. Now, now I don't, it's not quite the same, not the same. The collabs on YouTube is still not as effective as it is when you collab like an Instagram. Yeah. But yes, you can collab on YouTube for sure. Yeah. But again, it's just, it's all new stuff and you know how it is with new stuff. Everyone's going to be a little weary. Everyone's going to feel like, well, I don't want to be taking advantage of us. I want to make sure I'm not being exploited. Even like with a club like us, it has a really great relationship with all the comedians. I just, you know, I think, I think, you know, comedians and rightfully so are very protective of their stuff.

55:03Emilio Savone:But to your point, they're not like it used to be, you know, especially the younger comics. The younger comics don't care. They just want their stuff out there, you know.

55:13Luke Girgis:I mean, my, my, okay, you're paying a comic 50 bucks for a spot and they're releasing their clips on fucking Instagram all the time anyway. Yeah. And so if I'm a comic that's getting 50 bucks a spot and then I get home from the New York Comedy Club one night and I open up my phone and it says, hey, for an extra 500 bucks, this can go on the New York Comedy Club channel. Do you want to do it? And I've already released that clip anyway. I don't know how many comics would take note of that.

55:36Emilio Savone:True. But my mind goes, well, isn't it better to have like – so what we do is we do splits with them, right? Yeah. My view is, okay, I can give you 500 bucks right now. Fine. But wouldn't you rather just get a percentage for perpetuity?

55:47Luke Girgis:Yeah. That's what I would rather do. Well, I think that's actually a better deal for the comics, for sure. But I want that for the comics.

55:55Emilio Savone:Yeah, but I wonder if - Because I want that for the comics. You know why? Because I know it's going to happen. What's going to happen is, and this will happen 10 years from now, when they become the next Kevin Hart, you're probably going to get an email from an attorney or something saying, hey, we don't want you exploiting this anymore. You only paid us$500.

56:16Luke Girgis:Yeah. But this is the catch-32 because I actually think the split is the better long-term option for the comics for sure. But I also think they're less likely to have, say, an instant yes than$500 in their account right now. A hundred percent.

56:31Emilio Savone:$500 right now, they would take all day, every day. Yeah. But I'm, again, thinking more in terms of long-term. But also, I want to have partnerships with them. Yeah. And this kind of comes to my whole thinking and really my whole team's thinking of like, you're right. Like from a business standpoint, it benefits the clubs and us way more to do it that way. But I –

56:59Luke Girgis:Particularly if you're only selecting the clips you want. It's not all your clips. Like you go through and you go, we want these three. So you're kind of limiting your risk. It's not like you're going to be pumping out$10 ,000 a night on paying for these clips. No, for sure. You should be very selective. yeah no for sure i know i just always like i mean listen luke honestly i mean a month from now don't be surprised if we're doing that bro i can i can build you this fucking platform in a day but also

57:24Emilio Savone:no don't totally but also like again i think i like the idea of us being a venue where comics are like oh shit like i'm still getting paid from a youtube clip from like a year ago yeah

57:34Luke Girgis:i mean maybe i think that's fucking maybe there's a mix of both maybe it's like 500 now and then in And then after X amount of revenue, you do it like a promoter deal, maybe. For sure.

57:42Emilio Savone:Well, on the show, when you do a YouTube show with us, we pay you more. Yeah, yeah. You're getting paid more just to be on the show. Again, but it's still so new. We're not really making money on it. But let's say a year or two from now, we're really making good money on it. Dude, I'll be the first one. I will assess it. I'll say, you know what? I would be the first one to go to a comic and say, hey, we'll give you$500 to$1 ,000 for this. And then once we make X amount on it, it'll go into a split with you.

58:08Luke Girgis:So I think if you can put together a fund, let's say you put together like 50 grand, 100 grand as an experiment fund for the next year or so, in two years, you will have the biggest comedy channel on the internet by some distance. I'm planning on having that anyway. Yeah.

58:24Emilio Savone:But yeah, the way - It'll be a huge revenue channel for you. That's totally smart. Yeah, totally. Yeah. But again, our approach has always been, no, you're 100 % right. That's really, really smart. But again, it's just still so new for us. And we just kind of look at it like, hey, we want to work with the comics we want to work with. We want this to kind of be a collaborative sort of partnership. We want everyone to understand the long-term thing. Let's limit liability and risk and cost and all this stuff. But yeah, I think what you presented is very good.

58:52Luke Girgis:I'll invest if you do it. I mean, let's talk about crowd work clips. So a lot of comics are blowing up with crowd work clips. Are they making the club experience worse because the crowd now think they're part of the show when they show up?

59:08Emilio Savone:No, not really. I think crowd work clips are kind of, I think it's a little bit more of a thing of the past now. I don't think it's become as big of a thing as it once was. But to your point, why do comics like doing crowd work clips? Because then they don't have to burn material.

59:22Luke Girgis:Yeah, and they get content for there online. And it's a clip.

59:25Emilio Savone:You know, it's a what, a minute clip? A two-minute clip? I mean, it's not like the whole set was crowd work. Why is Matt Reif, you know, telling the LA Times

59:32Luke Girgis:that he doesn't think the comedy community likes him

59:35Emilio Savone:because of his crowd work clips um you know yeah matt so you know a lot of like pure comedy fans that i or comics that i know they all respect matt um they all like think how can you not respect what he's done the numbers are enormous numbers are enormous but there is a certain snobbery to comedy you know the back of the room there's those purists that you know there's a certain thing you have to do as a comedian that if you don't do it it's almost like you're not gonna get the respect comedy is like magic right so comics when they're in a room watching another comic and they see matt doing his crowd work to them they're like he's the audience thinks what he's doing is genius but they're like what he's doing is not difficult right they're like he's not really saying anything what's really his perspective he's a good-looking guy who's flirting with these women at the show it might seem really like you know off the cuff and really like authentic to the audience that night but if you go to every one of his shows he's it's a formula that he has so the reason why he's probably not getting the respect is because what he's doing is almost like bubble gum it's like it's like boy band stuff it's like it's like you know in sync and backstreet boys they didn't get respect because it was all produced it was they were put together for sole reason for commercial reasons and there's comics out there that are so much funnier that are not getting any of the credit they should and big part of it is jealousy a big part of it is like fuck this guy's been doing he's 29 years old whatever he was making no money I've been doing this for 20 years I got into all the big clubs I went through the whole system I had to get in the back of the line I had to take a number I fought I fought I fought and still I'm not making the living that I should be.

1:01:29Emilio Savone:This guy comes out, put a couple, he puts a couple crowd work clips on up. Tik TOK blows them up. And he went from making$40 ,000 a year to 30 million.

1:01:39Luke Girgis:Yeah.

1:01:40Emilio Savone:So he's not viewed as someone who paid his dues now. But here's what's tough for a guy like Matt. It's almost like not his fault. Cause I guarantee you Rife. And I don't really know. I don't know Matt personally. I guarantee you he would love nothing more Than to be able to go into a comedy club And really work his shit out But how can he do it He's Matt Reif He's massive Dave Chappelle can do it But Dave's earned that right Dave's

1:02:12Luke Girgis:If Matt called you up tomorrow And he said hey I want to do a whole bunch of spots this weekend Would you say no

1:02:17Emilio Savone:Of course but he would be freaked But it would be very difficult for him to do that Because the audience would have this expectation of him And maybe he's not there yet to work on material in a way to still like be like really funny. Whereas Chappelle. You think he's in his own head. Yeah. Look, there's a lot of these big social media comics. I'm not calling that a social media comic. Yeah. There's a lot of these really big social media comics that are terrified to do stuff live because you're on a tight wire up there. I mean, there's no net to catch you. Chappelle is one of the best. stand i mean he's he's earned that credibility with the audience with his fans he can be on stage and try stuff i mean he's just he's honed it down whereas matt you know is still relatively young he's still relatively i mean he's been doing comedy for you know good amount of time now but he he didn't build his bones as a stand-up comic per se because of his material really he did it because of these clips whereas a guy like Chappelle Chris Rock Bill Burr I mean these guys are I mean they're they were when they popped they were ready you know like they had already been beaten up they've already gone through the ringer I mean think about a guy like Louis I mean Louis wasn't really selling out anything until he was like his mid-40s first time Bill Burr did Mass Square Garden I think he was 44 42 you know Matt Reif sold that Didn't he sell out like six MSGs or?

1:03:47Luke Girgis:Yeah.

1:03:48Emilio Savone:He's like 27, 28.

1:03:50Luke Girgis:I think he's done. I've got it written down here somewhere. He did. Where did he do it? Where did I write it? It's just crazy money.

1:03:57Emilio Savone:Again, let's liken it to music, right? I mean, how many like brilliant like guitarists might see like some band with like Poison?

1:04:06Luke Girgis:Matt did$57 million in just one tour in 2024. Just one tour.

1:04:11Emilio Savone:So it's like Poison, for example, the band Poison. I mean, I don't know. I'm asking. Are they like the best artists in the, like, are they that great of artists? Was, you know, was their drummer the best drummer of all time? Was Brent Michaels the greatest singer of all time? And they were like a hated band in the 80s by like Motley Crue and Guns N' Roses and all these guys. They're viewed as just these guys playing like fluff music and they appeal to like a female audience, right? Whereas Slash is like legitimately one of the greatest guitarists of all time, right? So it's no different in comedy, you know?

1:04:43Emilio Savone:But what's been really interesting though.

1:04:45Luke Girgis:This is new for comedy.

1:04:46Emilio Savone:It's always been the case in music. But here's what's interesting about comedy. And I think this is cool. You're seeing, though, these purest comics now stepping out of that bubble and playing the online game. And it's made them better. You know, like one of the most pure comics out there is Sam Morrill. Sam is as purest as it gets. He's a joke writer. He's a fucking gym rat. He's one of the best comics out. And he recently, now over the last three, four years, sells a shit ton of tickets. Why? It's because he's putting his stuff online. You know, he's stuff that he would probably never thought a million years he'd be doing.

1:05:22Emilio Savone:He's doing things, you know, that guys like Matt Reif is doing to get his stuff out there. Now, he's not like giving in on his – he's not giving into his principles as a stand-up, right? But he is – guys like Sam are now playing that – they have to. You have to play that game because if you're not, you're not going to sell tickets. But if you ask any of these comedians A guy like Sam Orrell Hey man, would you love nothing more To have to deal with that part of it? You say 100%, the last thing I want is to do that I just want to be in the clubs And just perform and just do my theater shows And do whatever But there's a new bubbling There's this whole new sector of comedians And I'm not putting Matt Reif In this category Because Matt has been doing stand-up for a while But there's a lot of these social media comics who've never performed at a club before.

1:06:16Emilio Savone:Are they comics then? Are they stand-up comedians? They're not stand-up comedians. They're just comics, I guess.

1:06:21Luke Girgis:Yeah, they're just funny content creators.

1:06:23Emilio Savone:And there's comics now that we, again, have worked with at our headliner clubs because they sell tickets, which I give so much respect for. Like, hey, I really want to know how I can break into your clubs in New York because I kind of want to get away from this thing I've been doing, and I just want to become more of a comic. and that's what rife means what rife is saying is that i'm not viewed as a real comic because i didn't like struggle or suffer as which he did by the way the guy did struggle so but i didn't get the validation people don't think i got validation because i'm funny they think i got this validation as fame because the right clips hit and my crowd work stuff hit and i'm not making i'm not doing this based on my material i'm doing it based on this thing that i do the chit chat what which

1:07:15Luke Girgis:isn't easy by the way definitely not otherwise otherwise there'd be heaps more matt riffs i i can't think of a comic recently well it was just one more thing i'm so sorry but every comic i know

1:07:27Emilio Savone:well not every comic but like the comics that i've talked to that are real hardcore pure comic people they all respect matt they really do like you know like i'm really close with chris and like Joe DeRosa they all they they fucking they think he's fantastic I love him I think he's awesome I think I think guys I think he's good for comedy it's a different kind of it's like he's a different genre more people that want to go see Matt Reif hey man are gonna probably want to go see someone else who's doing something similar to what he's doing there's nothing wrong with it I think comedy can be just like any art form could be really fucking snooty yeah and they need to get over it They need to get over themselves.

1:08:04Emilio Savone:There's a lot of ways to consume comedy. I'm telling you, man, it's like a fucking whirlwind. We are involved in so much stuff between management and road rooms and New York and this. My day is like living through like a schizophrenic fucking – it's like – literally I feel like I have like 18 different personalities throughout the day because I'm talking to different people that have different views on different things depending on the venue and where it is and what we're doing. And it's like – it's nuts. It's art. Booking the club in the Upper West Side is different than booking the one downtown because you've got to think about the audience and this.

1:08:39Emilio Savone:We can't book that comic because that comic might kill the show, even though they sell tickets. We've got to put them at Stanford because they can sell tickets. You know, it's just like, I get it, right? But it's like, I don't know. I just wish it was as simple as like, hey, man, people find it funny. Do they like it? Do we really have to overanalyze this?

1:08:58Luke Girgis:Hey, tell me about your bookers. You said you've got three. are they and this is a question for you and tell me what is industry standard in new york do bookers just get paid a salary or are they incentivized on success uh i mean depends on the clubs you know i don't know how clubs do it but like you know we so we have three bookers who are phenomenal

1:09:18Emilio Savone:we have candy claire joe checkman and uh and uh claire livingston um candy claire and then we of Claire. So that's always confusing for people. But, uh, so candy is really kind of like our, our, our head booker. I mean, she's been on this for years and she's, she's like an institution in New York and she's been doing this for like 20 something years. She knows everyone and everything. So, you know, you know, obviously she gets, you know, we, we pay them a salary and we always give bonuses at the end of the year. It's, it's kind of difficult to kind of incentivize someone like a candy on a commission because it's showcase.

1:09:52So she's not really, it's not like,

1:09:56Emilio Savone:and she's not someone that really cares about whether you can sell tickets.

1:09:59Luke Girgis:Yeah.

1:10:00Emilio Savone:Her whole thing is if you're funny.

1:10:01Luke Girgis:Her success is laughs per minute probably.

1:10:03Emilio Savone:Her success is, no, her success is curation. Yeah. Her success is, yeah, her success is are you funny? Are you getting laughs? Are you saying something? Do you have a perspective? Do you have a point of view? You know, so, you know, whereas our headlining booker, you know, her success is when she books Stanford and she books Atlantic City, her success is purely predicated on ticket sales right so it's a little easier to give that person a commission because again we need that club to you know you're booking it for people who can draw because New York is just different you know the club thankfully is going to be full you know because it's a New York comedy club we build a reputation up you know you're going to get all these great comics you know we we have our own way of promoting and all that stuff so and then And so, but just to answer you pretty much straight, yes.

1:10:53Emilio Savone:Our bookers, they are incentivized because they're either going to get a bonus or they're going to get some kind of commission structure. And then obviously they are getting a salary as well. Now, we pay our bookers well. A lot of clubs don't. You know, a lot of clubs because people, it's weird. having a good booker is the most important thing you can have at a club but yet so many clubs pay them the least because it's such a desired thing to to want to do right so it's almost like a lot of like people want to be book they want to be bookers right and a lot of people want it because they love comedy it comes a lot of clout so it's almost like you know you know if you want to get in the music industry and you get to work for sony they're probably going to pay you shit for the first few years but you get to work for sony yeah yeah yeah right so it's kind of like that the booking level it's like now we don't really subscribe to that view because in our view booking is very very important and we want you to be paid well to be able to do it well i think

1:11:48Luke Girgis:you pay someone well if they're good like i don't mind not paying somebody at all if they're just starting and you're training them because this is an internship this is like i'm sure i'm giving

1:11:58Emilio Savone:you a free education right now for sure i mean even that though we don't really do it we used to do interns but my partner scott is not a big fan of it because he comes from the music side and he saw like the pain that he had to go through being an intern. And his view is, hey, man, I'd rather just pay somebody and make sure they're good. Yeah. You know, then having some like intern like, you know, follow us around. Like we don't have the time to try to teach someone how to do something. Like we'll teach them, but we want them to be really good and hold them accountable. So let's pay them.

1:12:26Luke Girgis:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

1:12:26Emilio Savone:So we've kind of. I'm the same now.

1:12:28Luke Girgis:Yeah.

1:12:28Emilio Savone:We don't have any interns. You know, like we've had people be like, hey, I'd love to intern for you. And we'll say, well, let's just interview you first because we'd rather just pay you. I mean I think we should have interns but he's

1:12:39Luke Girgis:so I had this big chat about this with Warner Bailey who runs this media business called Artists vs. Assistants so that's an episode that we filmed it's not out as we're speaking now but it's coming out before this episode and we had a big talk about this and he was saying he was like no I don't believe you shouldn't, I don't believe in unpaid internships but he did it, I did it your partner Scott did it yeah everybody I know that's successful ate shit for free for a long time and learned it um but the counter argument to that now is now I'm in a position to take unpaid internships and I just don't want to deal with it anymore I'd rather just like Scott said pay someone good and just get the job done in a good way yeah and here's another example too like

1:13:24Emilio Savone:you know everyone you know you know the minimum wage thing right like I have no problems with raise a minimum wage you know it you know it creates it it creates it makes everyone look the last thing you want is someone to be like i'm only getting paid nine dollars an hour so he gives a shit but the minimum wage goes up then you people are going to be holding one it's a more desired job people want to work there they're going to be held more accountable and you can hold people more accountable yep if you're an unpaid intern and you fuck up you can always you know at the end of the day it's you're still unpaid yeah yeah you know but if i'm paying you we have an agreement i am paying you um there's a great scene in madmen that they've been running where uh where um john ham's character is talking to um you know uh one of his employees and she's saying to him like you're not grateful i don't feel appreciative and he's like that's what i that's the money i pay you you know that's what the money's for you know what i'm talking about yeah i too he's like that's what the money's for he's like what do you want you want me to give you like a cookie he's like you want me to like i'm just paraphrasing but it's one of my favorite scenes because it's like that's what the money's for why do you need me to validate you

1:14:40Luke Girgis:you're getting paid are you not honestly i i wholeheartedly agree with the sentiment but it's so wrong and i i've had to learn because i'm not good at words of affirmation is not something i'm good at with my staff and i've had to learn it i went to a fucking communication class to get better at it. Like it's so strange to me because when somebody pays me, that's the way I receive it. That's what the money's for. I'm happy. I don't give a shit. If you don't talk to me, if you pay me, we're good. Right. And so, but other people aren't like that. Most people aren't like that.

1:15:10Emilio Savone:I sent that to my girlfriend. Yeah. We're not going to say her name, but, um, and she hated that clip. She hated it. I thought she was going to like it, but she hated it. Most people hate it. She's like, what a dick. I was like, no, I go, I agree. Like, it's a bit extreme, but you get the nuts and bolts of it, right? Yeah. So I guess the point is, well, you know what? There's a good reason, though, for it, too. Maybe, you know, we've all done the unpaid internships. Maybe because we don't think that way now because we look back and realize maybe it was a little fucked up. Look, I don't know.

1:15:41Luke Girgis:I don't think it was fucked up.

1:15:42Emilio Savone:I don't think it was fucked up either. I think you've got to cut your teeth and you have to, like, really, really, like, grind it out.

1:15:47Luke Girgis:Do you know when Warren Buffett tried to get an unpaid internship when he was just starting out trying to learn investing? He said, I'm happy to work for free. And the fax he got back or call he got back said, Warren, at free, you're still overpriced. Oh, my God. That's so good. And I'm like, that is actually unpaid internships. You spend a lot more time investing in them than they give you back. Yeah. And so, yeah, that hits me a lot. And ever since I heard that, I've been a lot more hesitant to do the internship thing.

1:16:16Emilio Savone:Yeah, I mean, listen, there's a lot of ways to look at it. You know, I think a lot of people, you know, there's like this kind of like thing going on right now. There's kind of like perception of like, you know, the younger people, the Gen Zers, they ask for too much. They're not willing to cut their teeth. They're not willing to put in the hard work. Right. But I could combat that with saying, you know what, I don't have any problems with that. if someone has the gumption or they feel like their value is a certain level speak your mind and if i'm gonna pay you that what you now have done is you've given me basically carte blanche to be on you like fucking white on rice you've shown the floor you expect we are gonna get this much value that's what i need from you yeah because i'm prepared to give you this that's not good enough for you well guess what now the room for error is very minimal and if you don't come through if you don't make it happen then you're not gonna so it's like be careful what you wish for yeah and again i have no issues with that i dig it you want to like put your money where

1:17:12Luke Girgis:your mouth is let's go yep yep i agree what's the single best piece of business advice you've ever

1:17:19Emilio Savone:received you know i don't even know i don't know if any i've heard this from multiple people just keep it simple just keep things very simple don't don't don't don't don't kind of like you can you can get out of your lane and you could try different stuff but always have like something that's foundational to go back to have kind of like your go-to well type of thing right so like for us the clubs is kind of like always like our it's our main foundation okay we keep things very simple everyone's always like why don't you serve food why don't you do drink specials. Why don't you do signature cocktails?

1:17:57Emilio Savone:Why don't you do this, do that, do that? I'm like, I'm like, because people aren't coming here for all that other stuff. They're coming here for the comedy. They're coming here for the plastic cups. They're coming here for the experience, which is dark room, litany on sign and, and simple drinks. You know, if they want a steak dinner, they can get that anywhere else. They do not get it here. Now we will try things that maybe isn't, you know, out, which is out of our kind of thing, right? Like, like the, like the, like management management is new to us, right? We're doing management. It's going really well, or we really like doing it.

1:18:34Emilio Savone:But if God forbid something happened to it, let's say we stopped doing it. We have our go-to, which is the clubs. So it's like, so, you know, and, you know, I've had multiple, you know, club owners, you know, Al Martin used to say this all the time to us, you know, he's like, cause we'd always got out now, why don't you do this? Why don't you do that? Why don't you, he's the guy who owned New York comedy club before us. He was like, guys, he's like, just keep it simple. He's like, you're just going to like create too many headaches for yourself. You know, having all these things, it's just, you know, just, it's just keep it simple, you know?

1:19:03Emilio Savone:And I tell that to everyone because, you know, and that's really one of the gifts of having partners, you know, you know, you know, Scott and I work really well together and, you know, and, and Jim is, you know, really like the other partner and every, all these other things that we do but you know i without question would probably add a million things to the club that probably would be unnecessary uh and he kind of likes to keep things simple and i think i even him out because if it weren't for me we probably wouldn't do a lot of the things that we do because he would just want to stay in this one lane per se not that he's not thinking big stuff you know but like he's more simple and I tend to go a little bigger on stuff.

1:19:46Emilio Savone:It's no different than like a restaurant. I mean, I don't know. Like sometimes when I go to a restaurant and I see a menu that's five pages, it's too much. Oh, it's, you know, it's actually restaurants that have big menus have worse

1:20:01Luke Girgis:customer satisfaction than those that have lesser options.

1:20:03Emilio Savone:Yeah, dude. If you have too many options, sometimes you have no options. It's just too much.

1:20:07Luke Girgis:Yeah. You get FOMO, you get more FOMO. Whereas you've only got two things to choose from. You pick one, you're happy.

1:20:11Emilio Savone:yeah man like when i yeah like just you know i think a lot of times like i just don't i'd rather just have a simple menu like dude like like i went to uh reos a few weeks ago it was phenomenal there's no menu they just tell you what they got for the night like this is what we have pick two of them that's awesome it was phenomenal yeah that's that nice yeah their whole thing is you're coming here trust us yeah i like this is what you're going to get so i kind of look at like you know if you're running a club have that same mentality like i have people all the time i'm gonna come to your club who's there tonight i'm like don't worry about it you know it doesn't matter you're gonna have a great night yeah so end on this for

1:20:57Luke Girgis:us amelio what does success look like for the new york comedy club five years from now that we're

1:21:02Emilio Savone:still open, that we're still operating the way we're operating, that we have the staff still intact, that we are still consistent. And, you know, it's not if we have eight other clubs, we have everything that we need right now. We have more than what we need. Success to me looks like just keeping things as are. I mean, obviously we want to keep growing. We want to keep doing better. I don't want to just keep things as is per se in the sense of like, you know, just, you know, maintain. But like, but yeah, I mean, just, just remain consistent. Like, you know, I think, you know, it's all about longevity.

1:21:40Emilio Savone:You know, I want to be, I want to, I want the club to, I want, I want to, I want the clubs to be around until 90 or 80 or, yeah. And then even, you know, when, when, you know, when, when I do pass, you know, I, you know, Scott's got, you know, I don't have any kids, but Scott's got children, you know. I don't know. like I want this thing to keep going. So for me, success is, is maintaining, continuing with the consistency. And honestly, true success is the people that work for us are still with us. Or if you're not with us, you're doing something that, that has added to what you learned with us.

1:22:19Luke Girgis:I see.

1:22:20Emilio Savone:You know, like I would love nothing more. If you're going to leave my company or stop working for me and you want to open your own thing somewhere, dude, that's, that's amazing. That puts a smile on my face and who knows, maybe we can be involved in that too. You know, it's kind of like the Wu-Tang, you know, the whole Wu-Tang philosophy, you know, I saw their documentary and my favorite thing was, or like, we want, we want everyone to go out there and do their own thing. Cause it all comes back.

1:22:44Luke Girgis:Yeah.

1:22:44Emilio Savone:You know, so that's success for me, man. Success is, is creating consistency, but also building opportunity for other people. Success for me is these comics that we're working with, you know, like there's a comic, Rachel Williams, who's doing great. Katie Boyle, who we work on the management level. I want these comedians, five, six years and not to be selling at the garden. You know, for me, that's success. Hey, we created a platform and we created a stomping ground for these comics to really hone their skills. And that's why comedy clubs are a special place. That's why I don't get spooked by AI.

1:23:15Emilio Savone:You know, look, I'm aware of the challenges that are ahead with things like AI and all these other things that are happening. But, and I don't want to be one of these guys who's like, oh, this is never going to happen. And, you know, like I just saw Titanic recently and, you know, it's like even God himself cannot sink this ship. I mean, anything, any ship could get sunk, but I do believe that the comedy club is the purest, most, most purest place for art. And that's why when I see these pop-ups and I see these, you know, the, like, you know, these different companies, um, doing all these things, I don't feel any sort of threat because to me, like we are seven nights a week.

1:23:54Emilio Savone:We are 70 to a hundred shows a week. We are consistent every single night, you know, and that's just special. And when people come to my club or they go to a comedy club, they're there for the comedy. When you go to a barbershop show and this isn't a diss, I think it's great. They're there for a little bit more of like an experience of the events and mingling. It's a social thing. They're there to, you know, for the environment and comedy is just a piece of it.

1:24:21Luke Girgis:Yep.

1:24:22Emilio Savone:When you come to my club, you're not there for anything other than to see comedy.

1:24:26Luke Girgis:Yep.

1:24:26Emilio Savone:So success for me in five, 10 years is for us to still be doing that.

1:24:30Luke Girgis:Emilio, you're the first person to ever come on the Black Hoodie podcast. You're the first repeat guest. There it is. I've had a lot of fun. I'm very, very grateful. Thank you so much.

1:24:40Emilio Savone:You're the best, Luke. And yeah, keep doing it. I told Luke this earlier. You know, I got so many emails from doing this podcast from people just saying like how great it was for them to kind of like learn a lot of the stuff that they really don't hear a lot of club owners talk about. And that was why I was really excited to get back on this and do more of these with you because I really hope that I can kind of give information or help. Look, I just know there's people listening to this who probably have no idea how to break into this stuff. And I didn't have that when we were coming up. We had to learn on the fly.

1:25:10Emilio Savone:So if I can somehow offer any insight that can maybe help a young promoter out or a comic out or whatever out, again, I don't see it as a threat. I see it as someone who's been in a fortunate position to give insight. And I think that's a pay for type of thing. So, so you're doing good stuff, Luke. I appreciate it.

1:25:27Luke Girgis:I'll have you back on next time. I'm in New York. All right, my man. Thanks, man.

1:25:31Emilio Savone:Yes, sir.