WCIU, the channel best known for airing daytime court television and reruns of The King of Queens, is kicking off the New Year with something a little different. Instead of relying on a 2 Broke Girls marathon to bring in viewers before midnight, the local station will air Chicago’s One Night Stand-Up, a showcase of local comics hosted by one of the city’s most visible stand-ups, Rebecca O’Neal.
“I’m really happy that the lineup for the pilot episode was good, so that people can see what the Chicago comedy scene has to offer,” O’Neal says. “And they were really reflective of the entirety of the city too. It’s not just a north-side comedy show or a south-side comedy show.”While each performer is used to going onstage in front of a live audience every night, things run a little differently when taping for television. O’Neal acted as her own warm-up comic, greeting the audience barefoot to give herself a break from her show heels. Audience members had to keep their energy up for four hours straight, allowing for breaks between comics when cameras needed to reset. And sets were stopped and restarted to account for audio and visual interference in the theater. Still, O’Neal says that the comics killed, and the small hiccups were a minor inconvenience.
