This one’s for the moms – and the people who love them.
Friday night, the comedians with the “Moms Unhinged Standup Comedy Show” will take the stage at the Community Concert Hall at Fort Lewis College for an evening of laughing until your face hurts at the stories from moms in the trenches. The women (and sometimes a dad) will take on topics including potty training and sex talks, according to a news release, which added that Moms Unhinged was created by standup comic Andrea Marie “to fill a gaping hole in comedy. Nearly 90% of standup comics are men – leaving moms few opportunities to see their experiences reflected on stage.”
“This show is about connecting audiences with comics who get them and make them feel seen,” she said in the release.
Among those moms, and the evening’s headliner, is homegrown comedian Stephanie McHugh, who moved to Durango when she was in sixth grade and graduated from Durango High School. From there, she went to college at CSU, lived in Chicago and moved back to Colorado, where she lives in the Denver area.
Also taking the stage tonight will be Andrea Marie, Pam Moore and Merit Kahn.
If you go
WHAT: Andrea Marie Comedy presents Moms Unhinged Standup Comedy Show.
WHEN: 7 p.m. Friday.
WHERE: Community Concert Hall at Fort Lewis College, 1000 Rim Drive.
TICKETS: $19-$34.
MORE INFORMATION: Visit www.durangoconcerts.com.
McHugh said she learned fairly early in life that the use of comedy can help change the tone of a room – that the ability to make people laugh can diffuse negative situations. But it wasn’t until she was older that she considered becoming a professional, full-time comedian.
“When I got married, and we moved back to the Denver area, I thought, ‘Gosh, why am I not doing things that I love?’” she said. “So I took an improv class, and then someone said you should try comedy. I loved it, I just always loved comedy, so I started it when the girls were young. But one trip to the Las Vegas comedy festival less than a year in, and that helped shift it to just really join it more.”
The full-time aspect includes Moms Unhinged.
“It’s a great gig. I was on the cruise ships some before the pandemic and a little bit afterwards, but now I’m primarily focusing on Moms Unhinged shows,” McHugh said.
When it comes to mom-specific humor, she knows of which she speaks: She’s a mom of two now-grown daughters, and as an empty-nester, she said she’s been able to travel more now that her kids have moved out.
McHugh said Moms Unhinged is a great night out with the girls, something moms tend to not get a lot of. And the topics broached by the performers are pretty much universal in the world of parenthood.
“We kind of have all this shared experience as a mom, and it’s fun to honor that and laugh at some of the crazy, weird things,” she said. “Everybody gets it. We have all been there. So I just love the audiences. It’s a fun night out. I love it when someone comes up and says, ‘I just forgot how fun it was,’ and just have a really good laugh so that you can be reenergized and go do what you’re good at the next day and feel like you’re not alone, and celebrate all the wacky, weird stuff.”
katie@durangoherald.com
