“The more s— you give us, the stronger we get. And every good comic will take any kind of adversity and turn it into comic gold,” he says.
Ammiano will lead by example when he takes the stage for “Pride Is a Laugh Riot” on June 25 at the SF Eagle Bar. He’ll be joined by comedians Binya Kóatz, Nebulous Niang, Julia Jackson and Wonder Dave and special guest Race Bannon.
The show is part of the Safe Words Queer Comedy Showcase, a monthly series that gives a platform to LGBTQ+ comics and offers an inclusive space for performers and audience members. The upcoming event also includes an after party with a DJ set by Andy Iwancio and a free Queer Pride Art Mart.
“Pride Is a Laugh Riot” is a nod to a pivotal moment in LGBTQ+ history — the Stonewall uprising in June 1969 in New York — and its connection to Pride.
“As we approached this Pride season, we were acutely aware of the current political unrest and the rising threats against queer and trans people … [W]e looked to both history and action: Stonewall was a riot. Pride is a riot. And this year, we wanted to explicitly honor that spirit with our Pride programming,” say Jonah Price and Wonder Dave, producers of “Safe Words.”
Ammiano is a key figure in LGBTQ+ history. In the 1970s, he and activists Hank Wilson and Harvey Milk successfully campaigned against a California ballot measure, the Briggs Initiative, that sought to ban gay people from teaching in the state. As a California Assemblymember, he introduced the School Success and Opportunity Act, which extends discrimination protection to transgender K-12 students in public schools.
He started doing standup in the 1980s, he says, when “it was OK for comics to make fag jokes, but it wasn’t OK for a fag to make jokes.”
Audience members shouted homophobic slurs, and the bars and clubs were hostile environments.
“In the old days, you couldn’t get a gig in a straight club. If you did, you literally put your life in your hands,” Ammiano recalls.
Anticipating the need for a quick exit from a venue, Ammiano and fellow gay comics would keep the key in their car’s ignition. “Sometimes we did need to run out,” he says.
Those experiences, coupled with wanting a place for queer comics like himself to further their craft, prompted his proposal of a Gay Comedy Night at Valencia Rose in San Francisco. With gay owners Hank Wilson and Ron Lanza, it became a weekly fixture in the 1980s, bringing in an array of comedians and a supportive crowd.
“AIDS happened right around the time we started the club, and we thought, ‘Well, this could be a very big challenge for comics.’ But you know what? People wanted it. The audience just got bigger. And I think you’re getting that today, too,” says Ammiano.
As a comic, he’s learned to turn homophobia on its head, using it as material for his standup routines.
“I think that’s the gift of comedy, and I think queer people have the benefit of that gift and [can] take advantage of it,” he says. “You can be funny and really make a good political point. Just being gay and getting up there in that sense is political.”
“Even within the queer community, we’re not monolithic … but whenever we are attacked in such a way, we become more cohesive. And what better way than through laughing—laughing at the enemy, laughing at yourself,” he adds.
At 83, San Francisco’s “Mother of Gay Comedy” is ready to perform with LGBTQ+ people of various ages at “Pride Is a Laugh Riot.”
“Having older people too, that’s part of inclusion, and sometimes it gets neglected. In this case, that’s not happening, so that makes [the show] even more special,” Ammiano says.
He’s also aware that being of an esteemed age equates to people seeking him out for life advice.
His?
“Moisturize.”
“Pride Is a Laugh Riot” is at 7 p.m. June 25 at SF Eagle, 398 12th St., San Francisco. Tickets are “pay what you can” with suggested $15-$25; visit teamwonderdave.com.
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