About Us – PNW Comedy

Updated: April 2024

PNW Comedy is a full-service producer/promoter specializing in producing small-scale comedy shows in unique spaces (ie. wineries, video stores, community theatres, etc.) and for niche groups (Comedy For Couples, Improv For Kids, etc). PNW Comedy hosts, manages, and books standard and specialized stand-up comedy shows, competitions, workshops, improv shows and classes, comedy open mics, and various other events including trivia nights at venues across Oregon.

PNW Comedy was started by Andrew Brunello as a matter of necessity. After a few years of grinding at open mics, getting booked on local shows, and self-producing comedy nights at bars, Andrew had been asked by a venue in the Willamette Valley, The Mac Club of McMinnville, and a comedy promoter in Central Oregon, Bend Comedy of Bend, to start hosting and booking his style of stand-up comedy shows at their venues in late 2015. Since Brunello lived in Southern Oregon at the time, he wanted to be able to cross-promote his monthly stand-up shows in Klamath Falls with his new shows in McMinnville and Bend. So, a unified brand that played off the geographic location was made so that it could be used to produce and promote shows no matter the place in the state… and beyond. That brand would be PNW Comedy.

PNW Comedy created the Western Oregon Comedy Competition in 2017 after deciding it was dumb that Helium Comedy Club in Portland didn’t reach out to the larger area. By 2019, it had been transformed into one of the largest comedy competitions in the state with hundreds of comics submitting applications from 11 states and three countries. COVID shut down the 2020 competition midway through its run in March of that year, but it was finally completed in late 2021. After taking 2022/3 off, the Western Oregon Comedy Competition will be back in 2024.

While COVID interrupted shows and closed venues across the nation, PNW Comedy took the opportunity in 2021 to partner with other local producers, creators, comedians, and various artists to expand what programming options it has to offer once things opened back up. And instead of working primarily in bars, PNW Comedy pivoted to focusing on running their shows from small theaters and unique spaces instead of the bar shows.

In 2021, PNW Comedy signed with Keizer Homegrown Theatre to produce a limited run of stand-up shows in the Salem/Keizer area. These shows could only seat 30 people due to the health regulations of the time, but these events were a way to ease back into the ‘new normal’ and adapt to the new-to-PNW Comedy theater setting. After a successful run of stand-up nights, and then later improv shows and classes, PNW Comedy was invited to continue producing in the space until 2024.

Also in 2021, PNW Comedy started producing stand-up shows and competitions at the Moonlight Theater, which is located inside 3rd Street Pizza Company in downtown McMinnville. After a successful run of shows, PNW Comedy was invited to continue producing as the sole comedy booker/promoter in the space. Tragically, a fire broke out in the theater and the entire facility burnt to the ground. Post3rd Street Pizza fire, PNW Comedy is planning on coming back and producing more shows and larger events in the space.

And in early 2024, PNW Comedy had been invited to produce stand-up comedy shows and other events on the campus of Linfield University. Gabriel Rutledge & Jenny Zigrino kicked off a successful run of shows in March of ’24 and more shows and improv events are scheduled at the beautiful campus, in the heart of McMinnville.

As of April 2024, PNW Comedy produces and manages shows and other events in McMinnville, Carlton, Astoria, and Amity, plus seasonal shows in Bend and Newport on the Oregon Coast.