The Best Comedy Show You’ve Never Heard Of

Last month, Delucchi Plus held our annual meeting at the famous DC Improv. It was a fantastic day of laughs and sharing great ideas to better improve the company moving forward. I’m a huge fan of stand up comedy, and it was a thrill to be sitting up close to the stage where so many famous comics stood before. During one of the breaks, I began to wonder: What’s the best comedy venue that no one has ever heard of?

A few weeks later, I found my answer. Every Wednesday night, it happens in an unlikely place: the dim, unfinished back room of a comic book shop on Sunset Boulevard. Just a few blocks east of Los Angeles’ biggest comedy clubs, the NerdMelt Showroom in the back of Meltdown Comics and Collectibles is home to one of the most welcoming and well-respected stages in the city. Over the past four years the theater’s flagship show, The Meltdown, has hosted hundreds of incredible lineups while cultivating a uniquely inclusive atmosphere, making it as much a clubhouse for comedy nerds as it is a coveted credit for comics.

The hosts are renowned comedians Jonah Ray and Kumail Nanjiani, bring infectious energy each week, peppering recurring bits, unplanned tangents, and conversations with the crowd in between The Meltdown’s billed acts and frequent unannounced guests, from local LA comedians to the stars of Comedy Central’s top shows. Fans know they’re just as likely to see a drop-in from Louis CK (or Daniel Tosh, Sarah Silverman, etc.) as they’re likely to be surprised by pies from the producers around Thanksgiving.

“I wanted to start a show anyways,” says Emily Gordon, Kumail’s wife and co-producer of The Meltdown with Jonah and Kumail, “but then I was like, I want to start a show that feels like New York shows do, where people just hang out and it’s a fun atmosphere.” The success of The Meltdown paved the way for more programming aimed towards the show’s savvy fans. The fact that the show’s producers were able to turn a cavernous room filled with floor-to-ceiling beams and the incessant (often hilariously timed) chirping of crickets into a cozy enclave established the space as a viable home base for the community growing around it. For regular attendees, the show is often more than just a night out. Groups who met in line now hang each week, and have their own Meltdown-related rituals; couples have met and gotten engaged at the show.

They were named the #1 comedy show in Los Angeles by LA Weekly in 2012, crowned the best comedy show in LA by Splitsider, and named one of the top live shows in LA by Serial Optimist! In May 2013, Hollywood Reporter named them one of the hottest places to see comedy in LA. “I’ve always been fascinated with the moment people go from being a just a group in a room to one unit. For me, that’s the most interesting thing on the planet,” Emily says, “Movies do that, and church does that, and comedy shows do that, and I always wanted to make an environment where that happens.”