Don't applaud. Either laugh or don't. (At the Comedy Cellar)

This is a book about three things-
1. A room called the Comedy Cellar.
2. Who gets to speak in that room.
3. What they get to say.

AMY SCHUMER. LOUIS CK. JERRY SEINFELD. CHRIS ROCK. They all worked the Comedy Cellar in Greenwich Village, honing their acts, experimenting, taking risks. It was a safe space, thanks to the principles of its first owner, Manny Dworman, then his son Noam. The only threat to freedom of expression was a lack of laughs.

But how did a New York taxi driver, born in Tel Aviv, create comedy's most important stage? How did he influence some of the biggest names in stand-up? What are the limits of a joke? Who decides? And why does the comedians' table matter so much?

Andrew Hankinson speaks to the Cellar's owner, comedians, and audience members, using interviews, emails, podcasts, letters, text messages, and previously private documents to create a conversation about the perils, pride, and prejudice of modern comedy. Moving backwards in time from Louis CK's downfall to when Manny used to host folk singers including Bob Dylan, this is about a comedy club, but it's also about the widening chasm in contemporary culture.


'The smartest (and funniest) book yet on the culture/free speech wars. Andrew Hankinson does it again with another incredible work of nonfiction.'
-Will Storr, author of Selfie- how the West became self-obsessed

'Credit to Hankinson for tackling these broad, important ideas - what speech is acceptable, what's forbidden - and trying to understand them through the prism of a specific environment.'
-NJ McGarrigle, The Irish Times

'This oral history is dominated by discussion of freedom of speech and what should be acceptable within the confines of a comedy club ... it captures the intensely combative, competitive, hierarchical and often petty atmosphere of an iconic comedy venue.'
-Alastair Mabbott, The Herald