After living in New York City and performing comedy there for 15 years, I believe that most of what makes a great comedian is their wanting to be a great comedian. I want to be a great comedian. There, I said it. Did it happen? Am I hilarious? Do I have millions of fans? Hmm, I’ll give it a day… maybe it’s one of those things that has to sit out for a while before it’s ready.

In New York, I saw my friends’ performances go from mediocre to extraordinary after they became the most annoying people in the room. They just kept talking about being a successful comedian, and then in a few months or a few years, we would all see them doing a standup set on a late-night talk show. Of course, they worked really hard, but a lot of people do. They chose to say it out loud and work until it was an accurate description of their life.

When I moved to Montana, I saw the same characteristic in skiers, hikers, and climbers. People are talking at the bottom of the mountain about going to the top, and about surrounding themselves with people who have structured their entire day/week/month around being at the top. They say they’re ready; they work really hard to be ready, then before they know it, they’ve been up and down the mountain so much that they’re bored by it.

All of that made sense to me; people move to New York City to test their comedic talent in the most difficult environment available. If they get laughs, then they’re as good as they hoped. People move to Montana to test their physical talent in the most difficult and incredible environment available. If they get to the top and back down again, then they’re as good as they hoped.

What I didn’t expect was to go to an open mic in Bozeman, Montana, and see the same types of comics I would see in New York. The charmers, the weirdos, the brainiacs. And, just like in New York, people were annoying and talking about comedy. They surrounded themselves with people better than they were, and as I came back to open mic after open mic, I would see them get better. They were climbing their mountain, taking notes from those who went before them, and pushing the art forward. It was inspiring to see the same qualities in the comedians in Montana that I saw in New York, but with no promise of a career, just love for the art form and wanting to make a room full of people laugh.

I have produced quite a few comedy shows. I had great shows, and I had shows that left me embarrassed to pass the audience on their way out the door. The great shows always felt like they had an innate magic to them, but looking back, I can see that the only real difference was that, in the great shows, the performers really wanted to have a great show. Usually, that desire stemmed from admiring someone else on the show and wanting to do their very best in front of them.

So now I’m in Montana, lucky to continue to be surrounded by incredible comedic talent, with the knowledge that we can give a Montana audience a show that rivals New York shows. What else was there to do but set it up? Why can’t Bozeman be the next great destination for comedy? Let’s all start climbing together. On August 26th at 7pm, come see The Summit at Last Best Comedy in Bozeman. It’s a variety show that highlights the very best of comedy and music. We have James III coming in from Los Angeles (you may know him from the Netflix sketch comedy show Astronomy Club, or the successful podcast, Black Men Can’t Jump In Hollywood), improv from Sam Chronowski & Jasper Stone and their team “Cowards” (Last Best Comedy), Stand-up from John “The Engineer” Nelson (Bone Dry Comedy), music from Shay Zanna (Lucy Was Right), and hosted by me, Max Brand (Comedy Central, HBO, TruTV). Tickets are $15, but the view from the top is priceless.