Bringing a Much Needed Laugh To Bar Harbor's Winter Season
Three comedians set to play Ivy Manor Saturday
BAR HARBOR—Everybody needs a few laughs, especially in the middle of a Maine winter. So this Saturday, March 2, the Ivy Manor Inn presents a triple-headliner in back-to-back shows.
“We’re very excited about it,” said Brian Goff, Bar Manager for Henry Hotels. “Once the season ended at the end of October, we just thought of some cool events we could do in the offseason. We brainstormed.”
They came up with comedy. The idea was a hit with the management of Henry Hotels, and then it was all about the planning.
“I had a pretty good idea of the comic scene in Maine. I lived in Portland once upon a time. That’s the comedy center in Maine,” Goff said.
He knew he wanted Tuck Tuckerson if he could get him. Brendan Williams had a connection with the community because his mother, Lynn Williams, is a state representative.
“I’d heard of Johnny. I’d never seen him perform before. I certainly knew who he was,” Goff said.
The rest was history. A second show has been added because the first received a lot of interest.
THE COMEDIANS
Williams’ love of comedy began early on. Imagine one of those kids telling you jokes, making puns, quipping. That was Brendan Williams.
“I’ve always loved telling jokes even when I was a small child,” he said. “One of my earliest memories involving comedy was when I was growing up in San Francisco and my mom and I ran into Robin Williams who was with his own daughter at the local playground, and he would go into comedian mode around the other children. I started doing stand-up comedy at age eight when I attended Camp Winnarainbow (a circus and performing arts camp run by Wavy Gravy) in Northern California. Besides Robin Williams, my other favorite comedian is Joan Rivers.”
Williams graduated MDI High School and lives in Portland now. For him, comedy is necessary and needed, especially in times of trouble.
“I think comedy gives people permission to blow off steam and laugh at the irony of life around them. Comedians on TV have also become more trustworthy than the journalist or tv reporters that we see on TV. Look at Jon Stewart, John Oliver, or Bill Maher. These comedians know how to break down complex issues into simple terms while doing it with respect and humor,” he said.
Williams started off as a little kid telling jokes to his mom and friends. Now, he has a observational style and does story-based comedy, a bit like a cross between Jerry Seinfeld and Wanda Sykes, he said. His favorite type of comedy is old-school stand-up from the 1970s and 1980s. But, he’s also a big fan of the story where real life experiences becomes stories shared on stage.
“I love using my comedy to raise awareness about being hard of hearing, but also telling stories about my childhood growing up in San Francisco or throughout various towns in Maine,” Williams said. “Maine is definitely a good state to find a treasure trove of stand-up material. The business side of stand-up comedy like trying to get gigs and organize a comedy show can be hard work and not the most fun.”
Maine comedian Johnny Ater proudly waves his ‘uncool’ flag high, which might make him secretly pretty cool.
“I’ve embraced it !! Thank you for thinking I’m cool though!!! That makes me feel cool!!!” Ater said in an interview.
Ask many people and they’ll tell you that there’s nothing cooler than embracing your authenticity and that’s something Ater does in bit after bit during his stand-up. Ater brilliantly blends his “uncool” personality into someone likable, someone you root for on stage. In a world where meanness gets a lot of press, retweets and discussion, there’s something immensely kind underlying Ater’s act.
“I think when someone sees a comic they usually can tell they like them after a few jokes. I do like to consider myself a kind person. I appreciate you seeing that and voicing it to me, thank you!” Ater said, remembering to be courteous even in an interview.
Kind can still be funny—very funny, and Ater’s been working the stage and the jokes for 21 years, perfecting his rubber face expressions and “eminent nerdiness.” He’s worked with both Brendan Williams and Tuck Tucker, the two other comics that will be at the Ivy Manor Saturday.
Being the middle child of six kids, Ater says that he was a bit starved for attention.
“That obviously has not changed!” he said, “There has been times when I use my humor to avoid feeling for sure. But I’m a true believer that laughter is the best medicine.”
“My family of origin were great laughers. Especially at me!” he joked. “My immediate family are terrific laughers! My daughter Annmarie and son Max are both really funny people.”
Family helped sculpt Williams’ humor, too.
“My grandfather was very funny. He was a businessman on Wall Street and was also blind, but he was a very humorous person and often told jokes and funny stories around the dinner table during Christmas and Thanksgiving dinner,” Williams said.
Ater said that his choice and work thirty-six years ago to be sober has only refined and expanded his humor. Now, he’s a Maine stand-up pro who describes himself as what you’d get if Captain Kangaroo and Benny Hill had a baby. There’s a comfortableness about Ater and his act that has that vibe of down home, Maine, and maybe a bit of Bean-o. It’s been like this for him for a while.
“During my drinking and drugging days, I didn’t have much to be humorous about. Since then I’ve tried to find humor in everyday situations,” he said.
Williams thinks everyone can find that humor superpower to help them through.
“I think everyone has a sense of humor and anyone can be a stand-up comedian if they know how to be observant and structure a joke,” Williams said. “People these days tend to be worried about making jokes or laughing at a certain topic because of the pushback we will receive.”
How bad you are at magic? It can be funny.
Wicked uncomfortable underwear? It can be funny.
The sound of a man imitating a corduroy thong when someone is running? It can be hysterical.
“I would say being able to laugh at yourself is a good place to start. I heard someone say that ‘life’s too serious to take serious.’ I like that! I’ve found myself getting depressed at points in my life but humor really does bring me out of it,” Ater said. “I have met people who lacked the humor gene, but I know somewhere in there is a clown waiting to burst!”
Prepare to burst Saturday as Ater’s, Williams’, and Tucker’s humor genes burst out.
“The thing I love most about it is when someone comes up to me after a show and says, ‘I really needed that you be hilarious.’” Ater said. “That somehow the fact that I made them laugh helped them. That brings joy to my spirit for sure.”
Not so much fun is the occasional intoxicated people who go to shows.
“But it goes with job. Thankfully, that doesn’t happen very much,” Ater said.
The Bar Harbor shows are special to him because his niece Jessica DesVeux and her husband Kevin live in Bar Harbor and own West St. Cafe.
“They’re both awesome people. I actually married them up there!”
Tuck Tuckerson didn’t go to MDI High School or marry anyone here, but he’s a Southern Maine comic whose been gracing the stages in Maine and across the nation for more than 15 years. He’s a big part of the stand-up improv group Running with Scissors and has the improv-based comedy show, ComedySportz Maine.
LINKS TO LEARN MORE
https://www.johnnyatercomedy.com/