Prashanth Venkataramanujam

Prashanth Venkat, a 23-year-old college graduate from Chicago, won the top prize — $500, a trophy and a consultation with Eddie Brill, comedy talent coordinator for David Letterman.

Venkat cracked jokes about living at home with his parents (because he “has that kind of money”).

Venkat qualified for the competition here in Norfolk during preliminaries in March.
He knew a lot of other comedians from Chicago who have been to Norfolk’s festival, and he thought he’d give it a shot.

“By no means did I think I’d actually win the competition,” Venkat said.

Back in Chicago, Venkat is an IT consultant by day and a comedian by night. He recently graduated from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign with a degree in molecular and cellular biology.

Since graduating, he’s had a lot of free time. He’s been on stage 150 to 200 times this year, he said.

He’s been doing standup comedy since he was 17. His first performance took place in his basement in front of all his high school buddies.

“Growing up, I always wanted to do something in the performing arts, but I was too scared,” Venkat said. “My friends were the ones who pushed me to do standup.”

Venkat is trying to get involved with the college circuit of comedy — after all, a lot of college-age people could probably relate to living at home with quirky and sometimes annoying parents.
In the future, he hopes to break into acting in Los Angeles or New York City. Before college, he attended an acting school in New York City.

Venkat’s competition included Austin Anderson, Sam Cameron and Pat Neary of Omaha, as well as Leif Cedar, Frank Schuchat and Elliot Woolsey of Denver. Also traveling from Colorado to compete were Vinnie Montez of Boulder and Talon Saucerman of Aurora. Steven Poggi came all the way from St. Louis, and Venkat was the only one from Chicago.

For some, it was their first time at the comedy festival, and others were returnees.
Each gave a one-of-a-kind performance. Jokes about fanny packs to wives to Nebraska’s very own community of Lyons made the audience roar with laughter. Saucerman, who finished second in the competition, even donned a turban, re-creating Johnny Carson’s signature “Carnac the Magnificent” act.

After the winner was announced, there were no sore losers back stage. The contestants gathered for a group picture and congratulated Venkat on the win. - Great American Comedy Festival

A college student from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign will be performing stand-up for students on campus this weekend.

The KU South Asian Student Association, or SASA, has invited comedian Prashanth Venkataramanujam, or Venkat for short, to perform Saturday at Woodruff Auditorium.

Prashanth Venkataramanujam will perform his comedy routine at 8 p.m. Saturday in Woodruff Auditorium. Venkataramanujam was invited to campus by the KU South Asian Student Association, or SASA.

Seema Amin, Shawnee senior and SASA president, said the group first heard about Venkataramanujam after attending a 15-minute act at the University of Missouri last spring.

“What’s unique about him, first of all, is that he is Indian,” Amin said. “Not many comedians out there that are Indian are well known.”

Amin said that because Venkataramanujam performed his skits in English and made a few jokes about the Indian culture, he inspired SASA to invite the college student to perform at the University.

Venkataramanujam’s act on Saturday will be filmed and sent to Comedy Central. The comedian said he and members of his group called “The Brown Man Group,” were currently working on pieces to put together for a spot on Comedy Central.

Venkataramanujam is a senior majoring in neuroscience and said stand-up took a lot of hard work and effort and also took a lot of time away from his schoolwork.

“I didn’t really know what I wanted to do my first two years of college, at all,” he said. “Of course my parents wanted me to do medicine or dentist school.”

Venkataramanujam said the neuroscience major fell in his lap because of the credits he’d acquired toward the major, but ultimately, his passion was acting and stand-up.

One thing about Venkataramanujam’s comedy act that he emphasizes is that you don’t have to be Indian or Asian to enjoy it.

“I’m Indian, but I don’t think I’m an Indian comedian,” he said. “I’m just a comedian that happens to be Indian.”

Venkataranmaujam was raised in Chicago and his parents are originally from India. He said most of his act consisted of capitalizing on the differences between American and Indian culture, but also dealt with parents.

“Some of my jokes deal with the quirkiness of my parents’ personalities,” he said. “Parents are just weird sometimes.”

The college-aged comedian also finds it easier to perform for student audiences, considering he is still similar to them in age, workload and stress.

“Performing for college students, for me, is just like performing for your friends all the time,” Venkataramanujam said.

The comedian has been performing for the last five years, all while juggling classes, exams and papers.

The hardest thing for Venkataramanujam as a comedian and a college student isn’t the work load, he said, but the balance between the two and writing material at the same time. He said finding his own personality as a comedian was tough, and because he was just starting out he hadn’t found a topic that audiences were paying to see him for.

“Which is why the shows are free,” he laughed.

One other reason the show was free, he said, was because he’s a student and he understands finances with students.

“I don’t like to charge students partially because I’m a student and I don’t have money,” he said.

He gets paid for travel and a little more on top for food along the way, but for the most part, that was it. He said if he charged students it would be like charging his friends.

Sumeet Patel, Topeka senior and treasurer of SASA, said that before the performance on Saturday, SASA would pass around a donations can for the bombings in Mumbai, India.

“Some members of SASA could be affected,” he said. “Many of our group members have family there.”

After the event SASA will keep the donations can open for anyone in their office on the fourth floor of the Kansas Union. Venkataramanujam will perform at 8 p.m. Dec. 6 in Woodruff Auditorium on the fourth floor of the Union. - The Kansan

A college student from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign will be performing stand-up for students on campus this weekend.

The KU South Asian Student Association, or SASA, has invited comedian Prashanth Venkataramanujam, or Venkat for short, to perform Saturday at Woodruff Auditorium.

Prashanth Venkataramanujam will perform his comedy routine at 8 p.m. Saturday in Woodruff Auditorium. Venkataramanujam was invited to campus by the KU South Asian Student Association, or SASA.

Seema Amin, Shawnee senior and SASA president, said the group first heard about Venkataramanujam after attending a 15-minute act at the University of Missouri last spring.

“What’s unique about him, first of all, is that he is Indian,” Amin said. “Not many comedians out there that are Indian are well known.”

Amin said that because Venkataramanujam performed his skits in English and made a few jokes about the Indian culture, he inspired SASA to invite the college student to perform at the University.

Venkataramanujam’s act on Saturday will be filmed and sent to Comedy Central. The comedian said he and members of his group called “The Brown Man Group,” were currently working on pieces to put together for a spot on Comedy Central.

Venkataramanujam is a senior majoring in neuroscience and said stand-up took a lot of hard work and effort and also took a lot of time away from his schoolwork.

“I didn’t really know what I wanted to do my first two years of college, at all,” he said. “Of course my parents wanted me to do medicine or dentist school.”

Venkataramanujam said the neuroscience major fell in his lap because of the credits he’d acquired toward the major, but ultimately, his passion was acting and stand-up.

One thing about Venkataramanujam’s comedy act that he emphasizes is that you don’t have to be Indian or Asian to enjoy it.

“I’m Indian, but I don’t think I’m an Indian comedian,” he said. “I’m just a comedian that happens to be Indian.”

Venkataranmaujam was raised in Chicago and his parents are originally from India. He said most of his act consisted of capitalizing on the differences between American and Indian culture, but also dealt with parents.

“Some of my jokes deal with the quirkiness of my parents’ personalities,” he said. “Parents are just weird sometimes.”

The college-aged comedian also finds it easier to perform for student audiences, considering he is still similar to them in age, workload and stress.

“Performing for college students, for me, is just like performing for your friends all the time,” Venkataramanujam said.

The comedian has been performing for the last five years, all while juggling classes, exams and papers.

The hardest thing for Venkataramanujam as a comedian and a college student isn’t the work load, he said, but the balance between the two and writing material at the same time. He said finding his own personality as a comedian was tough, and because he was just starting out he hadn’t found a topic that audiences were paying to see him for.

“Which is why the shows are free,” he laughed.

One other reason the show was free, he said, was because he’s a student and he understands finances with students.

“I don’t like to charge students partially because I’m a student and I don’t have money,” he said.

He gets paid for travel and a little more on top for food along the way, but for the most part, that was it. He said if he charged students it would be like charging his friends.

Sumeet Patel, Topeka senior and treasurer of SASA, said that before the performance on Saturday, SASA would pass around a donations can for the bombings in Mumbai, India.

“Some members of SASA could be affected,” he said. “Many of our group members have family there.”

After the event SASA will keep the donations can open for anyone in their office on the fourth floor of the Kansas Union. Venkataramanujam will perform at 8 p.m. Dec. 6 in Woodruff Auditorium on the fourth floor of the Union. - The Kansan

It is 10 pm on Saturday night, three weeks into the school year at the University of Illinois, and almost 80 college students are packed together in a large, dimly lighted room, laughing, smiling, and chatting. In the next half an hour, hoards of more students pour through the door. By 10:30 pm, more than 150 students have crowded the room. But inside, there isn’t any music, dancing, drinking or any of the typical components for a college night out. Instead, the potpourri of students, varied in ages and backgrounds, are politely seated in anticipation for the twenty-year-old standup comedian Prashanth Venkataramanujam to step into the Courtyard Café stage spotlight.

Being on stage is a truly exhilarating feeling for Prashanth. “In a day and age where you can turn to so many external stimulations, like going to the movies and riding virtual reality roller coasters, it’s refreshing to think that a guy with a microphone can still entertain an entire audience with his words,” he reveals. On this particular night, Prashanth is sporting silver-rimmed glasses, dark jeans with a black t-shirt underneath a brown button-down collared shirt, and shoes with hues of brown and black melded together. While others might consider this color combination a supposed fashion faux pas, it’s obvious by his candid, take-it-or-leave humor that he’s unfazed by societal superficialities. It is this very nonchalance that embodies one of Prashanth’s greatest strengths as a performing artist.

Unlike many South Asian comedians, who attempt to reel in mass audiences with the familiar ethnic jokes about 7-11 convenient stores and Bollywood movies, Prashanth has a style of his own. He takes risks with his comedy by telling smart, witty, and slightly risque jokes that incorporate elements of both Indian and American cultures. He explores controversial topics such as intelligent design versus evolution, yet at the same time, also pokes fun at pop culture obsessions like Facebook and the High School Musical movies. “I’m Indian by descent, but I’ve been raised in an environment where I am an American,” he explains. “So if I tailor my jokes to be about conservative Indian parents and funny accents, I’m going to unnecessarily single out certain people who can’t relate.

And there’s just no need do that because there are so many things everybody can relate to.” Prashanth’s stand-up is refreshingly innovative, focused yet multi-faceted, and slightly self-deprecating—but not so much that you end up feeling sorry for him. Instead, you can relate to him— regardless of your ethnicity. Thus, while he’s performed at a plethora of graduation parties, cultural shows, dance competitions, and just about any South Asian cultural event out there, his universal appeal has earned him the reputation of an up-and-coming, distinguished young comedian amongst the Chicago-land comedy circuit.

On the laundry list of comedy venues that he’s performed at include Riddles Comedy Club, Barrel of Laughs, Zanies Comedy Club, Pressures Café and the new Improv, to name a few. Recently, in fact, The Improv offered him the prestige of opening for comedy legend Robert Schimmel, who is listed at 76 on Comedy Central’s 100 Greatest Stand Ups of all time. When asked about the most memorable feedback he’s received, Prashanth recalls a particular night he opened for a band on campus. “One of the band members said to the crowd, ‘did anyone see that Indian comedian who was up here? I honestly think his set was ten times better than half the guys’ sets on comedy central.’” But of course, he quickly adds, humbly, “I doubt that’s really all that true.” On stage, while breezing through his comedy sets with natural, fearless ease, Prashanth seems so comfortable with the microphone that it’s almost unfathomable that he only


“When I was in high school, I didn’t have the courage to do theater or speech or any performing stuff,” he admits. Thus, it seems fitting that the first “joke” he wrote was completely unintentionally. “Half way through the school year, my teacher was still pronouncing my name wrong. So I started writing this rant about how annoying it was, and I remember rereading it later and realizing that it was actually pretty funny.” “Still,” he adds, “I never touched that writing till a year later.” It was only when a few friends suggested that they all try their hands at stand-up comedy, for kicks and giggles, that Prashanth’s foray into the performing world began. Though he describes his initial stab at stand-up comedy as a terrible attempt that lacked substance, the boys’ comedic endeavors quickly gained attention throughout their high school. In a basement, with a spotlight set up, Prashanth and his friends performed self-written jokes to large gatherings of their classmates. “It was a big hit and by our second comedy night, over ninety people showed up and crammed together in this basement,” he remembers.

From that moment onwards, Prashanth started consci - Kahani Magazine

It is 10 pm on Saturday night, three weeks into the school year at the University of Illinois, and almost 80 college students are packed together in a large, dimly lighted room, laughing, smiling, and chatting. In the next half an hour, hoards of more students pour through the door. By 10:30 pm, more than 150 students have crowded the room. But inside, there isn’t any music, dancing, drinking or any of the typical components for a college night out. Instead, the potpourri of students, varied in ages and backgrounds, are politely seated in anticipation for the twenty-year-old standup comedian Prashanth Venkataramanujam to step into the Courtyard Café stage spotlight.

Being on stage is a truly exhilarating feeling for Prashanth. “In a day and age where you can turn to so many external stimulations, like going to the movies and riding virtual reality roller coasters, it’s refreshing to think that a guy with a microphone can still entertain an entire audience with his words,” he reveals. On this particular night, Prashanth is sporting silver-rimmed glasses, dark jeans with a black t-shirt underneath a brown button-down collared shirt, and shoes with hues of brown and black melded together. While others might consider this color combination a supposed fashion faux pas, it’s obvious by his candid, take-it-or-leave humor that he’s unfazed by societal superficialities. It is this very nonchalance that embodies one of Prashanth’s greatest strengths as a performing artist.

Unlike many South Asian comedians, who attempt to reel in mass audiences with the familiar ethnic jokes about 7-11 convenient stores and Bollywood movies, Prashanth has a style of his own. He takes risks with his comedy by telling smart, witty, and slightly risque jokes that incorporate elements of both Indian and American cultures. He explores controversial topics such as intelligent design versus evolution, yet at the same time, also pokes fun at pop culture obsessions like Facebook and the High School Musical movies. “I’m Indian by descent, but I’ve been raised in an environment where I am an American,” he explains. “So if I tailor my jokes to be about conservative Indian parents and funny accents, I’m going to unnecessarily single out certain people who can’t relate.

And there’s just no need do that because there are so many things everybody can relate to.” Prashanth’s stand-up is refreshingly innovative, focused yet multi-faceted, and slightly self-deprecating—but not so much that you end up feeling sorry for him. Instead, you can relate to him— regardless of your ethnicity. Thus, while he’s performed at a plethora of graduation parties, cultural shows, dance competitions, and just about any South Asian cultural event out there, his universal appeal has earned him the reputation of an up-and-coming, distinguished young comedian amongst the Chicago-land comedy circuit.

On the laundry list of comedy venues that he’s performed at include Riddles Comedy Club, Barrel of Laughs, Zanies Comedy Club, Pressures Café and the new Improv, to name a few. Recently, in fact, The Improv offered him the prestige of opening for comedy legend Robert Schimmel, who is listed at 76 on Comedy Central’s 100 Greatest Stand Ups of all time. When asked about the most memorable feedback he’s received, Prashanth recalls a particular night he opened for a band on campus. “One of the band members said to the crowd, ‘did anyone see that Indian comedian who was up here? I honestly think his set was ten times better than half the guys’ sets on comedy central.’” But of course, he quickly adds, humbly, “I doubt that’s really all that true.” On stage, while breezing through his comedy sets with natural, fearless ease, Prashanth seems so comfortable with the microphone that it’s almost unfathomable that he only


“When I was in high school, I didn’t have the courage to do theater or speech or any performing stuff,” he admits. Thus, it seems fitting that the first “joke” he wrote was completely unintentionally. “Half way through the school year, my teacher was still pronouncing my name wrong. So I started writing this rant about how annoying it was, and I remember rereading it later and realizing that it was actually pretty funny.” “Still,” he adds, “I never touched that writing till a year later.” It was only when a few friends suggested that they all try their hands at stand-up comedy, for kicks and giggles, that Prashanth’s foray into the performing world began. Though he describes his initial stab at stand-up comedy as a terrible attempt that lacked substance, the boys’ comedic endeavors quickly gained attention throughout their high school. In a basement, with a spotlight set up, Prashanth and his friends performed self-written jokes to large gatherings of their classmates. “It was a big hit and by our second comedy night, over ninety people showed up and crammed together in this basement,” he remembers.

From that moment onwards, Prashanth started consci - Kahani Magazine