Treehouse Comedy
464 Boston Post Road
Orange, CT
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The Treehouse Comedy Club is Connecticut‘s original and first full time comedy showcase. Making it the oldest and most experienced comedy company in the state. The Treehouse opened its first location in Westport in the summer of 1983. A number of factors come into play for the successful run of the Treehouse Comedy Clubs.
Being first at anything is always a good start. The Treehouse features great talent, in an intimate comedy setting, coordinating great press and promotion opportunities, while providing good guest service. The company has never veered from that focus or attention to detail.
The original Treehouse Comedy Club featured such unknown, up and coming young cut-ups as Rosie O’Donnell, Boston’s Denis Leary, LA’s Tim Allen, Brooklyn’s Andrew Dice Clay, Rita Rudner,and Jon Stewart. Henny Youngman was the very first national act to grace the Treehouse stage, proving he was truly, the “King of the One Liner”. It was in this location the Treehouse started featuring such celebrity comedy artists as Jerry Seinfeld, Jay Leno, Robert Klein, Pat Paulson, and Richard Belzer. Rodney Dangerfield helped put the Treehouse on the map by doing stage time to work out material for his upcoming Tonight Show appearances. The Treehouse sold its lease back to its landlord six years later and relocated its club to a Connecticut Avenue location in Norwalk. This club featured a larger venue with a seating capacity of 450. The Treehouse no longer had to provide breakfast, lunch, and dinner for hotel guests. It focused solely on what separated it from the other hundred or so other clubs that tried to stage comedy and failed, and that, was doing comedy right.
It was in this venue that the Treehouse featured comedies biggest and brightest young comics. Stars like Chris Rock, Sam Kinison, Bill Maher, Gilbert Gottfried, Sandra Bernhard, Kevin Nealon,and Paula Poundstone. When Rosie started catching some heat with her hosting spot on VH-1’S Stand-up Spotlight she returned to her Treehouse roots. Jerry Seinfeld headlined his last comedy club appearance, at the Treehouse, on New Years Eve of 1990. Only one month before his show “Seinfeld” became a mid-season replacement. The Treehouse tradition of bringing Connecticut the best in homegrown comedy talent also continued, staging its weekly Open Mic Night. The Treehouse helped launch the comedy careers of Johnny Rizzo, Billy Winn, Tom Hertz, Jim Gaffigan, Lisa Lampenelli, Andres Fernandez, Chip Chinnery, and Andrew Kennedy. The Treehouse gave all these, and, numerous other stand-ups a vehicle to work out new material. Connecticut’s Comedy Gym, sort of speak. It was in the spring of 1990 that the Treehouse started its expansion. Opening satellite clubs in Danbury and Mystic Connecticut. It was in these venues that Dave Chappelle, Ray Romano, Joe Rogan, Colin Quinn, Darrell Hammond, and Jeff Foxworthy started gracing the Treehouse stages.
It was not unusual to have a week of Treehouse shows with Paula Poundstone in Westport, Robert Wuhl in Mystic, and Shirley “What’s Happening” Hemphill in Danbury, all of these comedy artists working for the Treehouse in the same week. The company has provided more than 10,000 comedy shows non-stop throughout Connecticut and West Chester County, New York for over 25 years.