Looking for a Stand-up Comedy Open Mic that’s a supportive room and always a good time? Look no further than the Ya'll Mic. Whether you’re a seasoned comic, an improvisor who’s always wanted to try standup, or you just decided that today’s the day for your first open mic (kudos) – The Ya'll Mic is a great venue to workshop your bits. The show is every Tuesday from 5:30pm – 7:30pm. Signup is online and the signup sheet is posted on Facebook & IG on Mondays. The list is emailed out a few hours before the show. Comics get 4 minutes of stage time (and a lifetime of memories.) While all are welcome, the room prioritizes BIPOC, LGBTQ+, and Femme comics. Come laugh with us!

Hosted by members of Tuesday Musical Improv, this free weekly jam allows anyone to try out musical improv on the Annoyance Mainstage. Sign-ups begin at 6:45--no experience necessary!

A Random Memory is a close-up magic show about memories, connection, and bringing people together to experience magic. In this highly interactive hour of card tricks and mentalism your memories take center stage to make classics of magic more meaningful. So take a seat at the close-up table and together let’s make a magic show worth remembering.

The Annoyance's very own musical ensembles. Every Tuesday at 8pm, two groups improvise brand new musicals based on audience suggestions. Featuring Musical Director Lisa McQueen and starring the Annoyance Musical Ensembles. Follow us on instagram: @tuesdaymusicalimprov

Are you and your improv team looking for another place to get on stage? We've got a warm and supportive room ready to give you laughs and claps! Bring your own team to Annoyance on Tuesday nights to get a rep in and giggle. If you don't have a team to bring, no worries! There's a mashup team and we're happy to throw you on it! Signups are at 8:30PM and we'll hit the stage at 9:00PM. See you every Tuesday!

Open Stage is an opportunity for anyone to get on stage and try out whatever they're currently working on - standup, sketch, songs - you name it. At Open Stage anything can happen and it usually does!

There’s a spirit that haunts the Annoyance Theater….

Come with us on a journey where the fate is in your hands…every night the Petite Boy haunts a new member of our improv group, and we need your help to catch him!!! Inspired by the hit TV show Traitors, as well as Mafia (the fun childhood camp game, not the criminals) and the Jackbox game “Fakin’ It”, come join us for a fun night of improv, drama, accusations, deception, and spooky vibes!

Modern Butchood is an explosive, hilarious, new play about a big lesbian mess. This one woman show follows the misadventures of “Butch” the sardonic girlfriend of a semi-famous lesbian Tik-Toker. Dissatisfied in her relationship and seeking excitement, Butch begins sneaking out of her apartment at night, sparking a riotous descent into lust, chaos, and queer identity. Balancing sharp wit and biting examinations of queer life, Modern Butchood is a fresh theatrical experience you won’t want to miss!



Modern Butchood has played at the Hollywood Fringe Festival (2024) and Providence Fringe Festival (2025).


Written and Performed by Molly Gloeckner

Directed by Charlie Towle



This show runs 1 hour with no intermission.

BUTTERFACE is a two-person sketch show extravaganza exploring themes of compassion, love, empathy, and cringe. Written and performed through the vessels of Brady Barrow and Ollie Grishaber, these two will bring the beauty of HOPE back to comedy by doing the unspeakable: being two women with okay faces. Sure, the sketches are really good...but her face!
Run Time: 45 Minutes

You've been summoned...to laugh.

Jury Duty is a fully improvised courtroom comedy where the only thing on trial is sanity itself.

Each night, the cast creates a brand new legal disaster based on audience suggestion, questionable logic, and total chaos. Watch as the foreperson loses their mind, evidence makes things worse, and deliberations go off the rails.

No script, no rules, no justice. Just comedy

The trial is fake, the laughs are real

The Dim Sons are a two man Asian comedy duo whose chemistry and quick fire wit is the envy of all duos. This 55 minute show will highlight sketches, songs, and improvised segments filled with clever wordplay and unexpected heart. Join the Dim Son as they discover why they're as classic a combination as PB&J. Brian Park and Robert Kapaku formed the Dim Sons as a spin-off of the 2024 Victor Wong Fellowship at The Second City.

All the way from its one-year run in Los Angeles comes a brand new team built for Chicago! It's Asshole's Advocate, the court room show for situations that can't be taken to court. This improv show is based off the highly popular subreddit, Am I the Asshole. This long-standing online forum is where millions of people post their awkward social dilemmas or petty revenge and ask if they are the asshole in the situation. We take it a step further and bring in evidence and witnesses to prove that they are or are not the asshole.

A creature is stalking the streets of Wrigleyville in 1927 - this 70-minute comedy follows an investigative journalist and her ex-girlfriend, a private eye, as they look into a series of murders that have been afflicting this sports enthused neighborhood in Chicago. They'll chase rumors of a wolf the size of a man as they are faced with thrills, farces, a cavalcade of incompetent men, and of course - a big ol' moon! There's plenty to sink your teeth into here for a howling good time this October at The Annoyance Theatre.

Super Human is an improv team that tore into Chicago’s comedy scene in 2012 at The Upstairs Gallery (RIP). Since then, Super Human has become synonymous with bold, hilarious, fearless and fun comedy. Described as a “splash zone of women,” Super Human prides itself on the team’s diverse personalities and playing styles, with an unmistakable focus on creating inclusive learning and performance spaces. They are Super Human and SO ARE YOU!

A two act improv show. First, Annoyance students get a chance to enter their IDs into a fishbowl to be randomly selected to perform in an improv jam with veteran Annoyance teachers and performers. Then, the night closes with a set from Sight Unseen, an Annoyance house team who, for almost the past decade, has been known for its loose narrative form and vibrant (sometimes vicious) characters.

Start your weekends early with Cafe Lounge Underwater, Thursdays at The Annoyance!

Cafe Lounge Underwater is a sketch show that feels like a great house party. There’s dancing, music, drinks, and of course, laughs. Join Caroline Burke, Tom Phelan, and Maryrose Sheridan as they perform sketches from their monthly show run!

After two sold-out runs at Chicago’s Annoyance Theatre and features in the Chicago Sketchfest and Miami Improv Festival, Cafe Lounge Underwater brings a brand new show that will have you asking, “when can we all hang out next?”

Slay! elevates LGBT voices and challenges the community to laugh while they confront the hypocrisies and internalized homophobia that still lurks among us.The show incorporates a fundraising component for The Trevor Project, the leading suicide prevention and crisis intervention nonprofit organization for LGBTQ+ young people. Come out and enjoy the show as a dynamic ensemble of queer actors serve up campy scares and killer laughs in this equally dazzling and spooky spectacle.

Nationally headlining queer comedian and activist Dana Goldberg is bringing her new comedy tour - OUTrageous - to Chicago for one night only! Join Dana for a night of hilarious stand-up, heartfelt storytelling, and a chance to be in joyful community with each other. As the horrifying headlines continue, Dana is fired up and gayer than ever. Run Time: 75 min

Modern Butchood is an explosive, hilarious, new play about a big lesbian mess. This one woman show follows the misadventures of “Butch” the sardonic girlfriend of a semi-famous lesbian Tik-Toker. Dissatisfied in her relationship and seeking excitement, Butch begins sneaking out of her apartment at night, sparking a riotous descent into lust, chaos, and queer identity. Balancing sharp wit and biting examinations of queer life, Modern Butchood is a fresh theatrical experience you won’t want to miss!



Modern Butchood has played at the Hollywood Fringe Festival (2024) and Providence Fringe Festival (2025).


Written and Performed by Molly Gloeckner

Directed by Charlie Towle



This show runs 1 hour with no intermission.

Missed Call is a premiere Chicago comedy group that writes and performs an entirely new sketch show every Friday.

Hail and well met, traveler! Grab a drink, put up your cloak, and I’ll tell you a tale. Escapades is a completely improvised choose-your-own adventure. Sprinkled throughout each story are opportunities for the audience to vote on what happens next. Whether we’re riding jetpacks on Mars or a unicorn through a gumdrop forest, you’re guaranteed a night of gasps, laughs, twists, turns, and daring rescues. Excelsior!

A Chicago based improv comedy show and drinking game based on the works of Alfred Hitchcock. Based on an audience suggestion, the cast weave together an intricate Hitchcock-like drama, while holding true to the amount of drinking shown in his movies. You'll barely be able to stand the suspense, and the cast will barely be able to stand.

AHHHHH! What's that!! A monster? A ghost? A divorced dad with a guitar? No!? It's Double Booked Presents: Spooky! That Rocks!

Come to the Annoyance Theatre small stage to see Ghost Rats and Cat Bath share some of the scariest and rockiest bits the city has ever seen! There will be ghouls, vampires, and geological formations galore!

See a collage of character studies, scenes, songs and maybe even some audience interaction, all written in a week by some of Chicago’s most accomplished comedians. The “Holy Fuck Comedy Hour” is a curated hour of eclectic, comedic material written in a week with no rehearsals. Featuring a powerful collective representing a wide cross-section of the Chicago comedy community, the material varies every week.

Oh, we're keeping the yuletides GAY! Join us for a queer take on the classic A Christmas Carol as some of your favorite characters from the hit summer show "Steamworks the Musical" navigate the past, present, and future while trying to save the building from being destroyed by an evil Grinch!

Written by Connor James Hirsch, Noah Lanos, Nathan Wetter, and Ryan Brown , "A Very Steamworks Christmas" is coming back for its second year after a sold-out run in 2024.

Secret Family is a monthly sketch show featuring a cast that is exactly like a real family, only their drama and infighting is mostly pretend, and their love for each other is 100% conditional. To the best of their knowledge, they are not related. The family members are Brian Park, David Resnick, Evelyn Lawrence, Haley Gillman, Lola Selby, Nic Nightingale, Nichole Reed, and Thomas Toles. Follow them on instagram: @secretfamilysketch and you'll get a kiss on the cheek.

In the town of Mayfield, thirteen cliched horror movie characters find themselves at the murderous whims of a guy in a hockey mask.


Splatter Theater showcases the best performers from The Annoyance Theatre as cliche horror movie characters: Each murdered in wild, creative, bloody ways. With freshly painted white walls, the stage will be drenched in gallons of blood while both horrifying and delighting the audience along the way. Splatter Theater has been an annual tradition of Annoyance since its inception in 1987, and this production continues that hallowed tradition.

Annoyance founder Mick Napier created the Trigger Happy form out of a desire to make improv look as slick and beautifully put together as a scripted show. Through a language invisible to the audience, the fully improvised show magically comes to life. There is truly nothing else like it. An Annoyance Signature Improv show.

Review: https://www.newcitystage.com/2015/01/31/review-trigger-happythe-annoyance-theatre/

Super Scaries: The Next Chapter is back - and more terrifying than ever. Super Scaries presents a completely improvised horror musical that conjures an entirely new nightmare each night - never seen before, never to be seen again. The cast crafts a chilling tale from one audience suggestion of an ordinary object that turns out to be anything but. A cursed hairbrush that steals your best friend. A radio that won’t stop whispering your name. A key that unlocks something best left closed. Equal parts terror and hilarity, Super Scaries: The Next Chapter is a darkly funny dive into fear, fate, and the unexpected, before it's gone forever by the final note.

Enjoy an evening of off-the-cuff improv with some of the best emerging talent in the Chicago area. Fire & Beer is a fully improvised comedy show that explores the dark sides of life, relationships and human beings. The show features the Annoyance House Ensemble who excel at both long- and short-form improv. You can expect lots of laughs during this unpredictable improv show.

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WOAH! NEW EVERY MONTH. A raucous. raunchy, sometimes juvenile but always funny sketch show that will make your daddy give your mommy a pearl necklace... to clutch. Get tickets now, they're selling faster than a Stewie doll at Spencer's. DM: @Antivirginclub proof you bought tickets and we will draw you boobs.

An hour long comedy show featuring some of Annoyance Theatre’s best and funniest. Show Runner: Hails Reeves

They take edibles. Then they improvise. There's a 'too-high' button, for when it gets too crazy.

Chicago's talent and businesses SHOW UP! to support these fundraising shows to benefit Common Pantry. Each show features a different lineup...
TALENT INCLUDES:
Annoyance Teachers (Fishbowl)
Best of Annoyance Sketch
Claudia Wallace
Father Figures
JC Brooks
Missed Call
Napier & Estlin
Sean Flannery
Shake the Baby
Susan Messing & John Lehr
TJ Jagodowski
Tuesday Musical Improv

AUCTION ITEMS FROM:
Drew's On Halsted
Lakeview East Chamber of Commerce
Second City
Steppenwolf Theatre

Live amazing feats of Mentalism by the magic duo Napier & Estlin. Is it mind reading? Napier & Estlin seem to know things they couldn't possibly know - or figure out. How do they do it? Come find out!

In this 90-minute original Christmas musical, a high school drama teacher is tasked with writing an award-winning musical to restore the scandal-plagued school's reputation - and save his job. Along the way, he faces the challenges of directing a difficult cast of teenagers, dealing with a gym teacher determined to see him fail, an impossible-to-please principal, visits from the ghost of Charles Dickens, and the taunts of a pop star.

Oh, we're keeping the yuletides GAY! Join us for a queer take on the classic A Christmas Carol as some of your favorite characters from the hit summer show "Steamworks the Musical" navigate the past, present, and future while trying to save the building from being destroyed by an evil Grinch!

Written by Connor James Hirsch, Noah Lanos, Nathan Wetter, and Ryan Brown , "A Very Steamworks Christmas" is coming back for its second year after a sold-out run in 2024.

In this 90-minute original Christmas musical, a high school drama teacher is tasked with writing an award-winning musical to restore the scandal-plagued school's reputation - and save his job. Along the way, he faces the challenges of directing a difficult cast of teenagers, dealing with a gym teacher determined to see him fail, an impossible-to-please principal, visits from the ghost of Charles Dickens, and the taunts of a pop star.

Calling all 90s kids! This show is for you. Each week Chicago’s hottest comedians share PowerPoints on their favorite 90s obsessions, while the audience battles over trivia from Boy Bands to Beanie Babies. Hosted by Colette Gregory and Bren Tran, this show mixes comedy, crowdwork, and (your favorite 90s) crushes into a wild night that will make you forget you’re grown!

In a coven, where the witches don’t want to move and find new friends, where partners are passed around, and where warlocks go to sleeze. What is this? oh yeah it's THE COVEN. Join the warlocks and witches as they celebrate a wedding in Vegas!

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Think of your favorite musical but off-the-dome and underground... it’s The Great Human Machine! DePaul Comedy Arts’ improvisers mix long-form improv and their musical talents to create an on-the-spot and theatrical piece every Monday at 6:30.

A night for Annoyance students to JAM!

Wall Pasta is a show where Chicago comedians try out brand new sketch material and see what sticks! Hosted by Elizabeth Wilson and Claire Hyman, this bi-weekly showcase is an opportunity for the city's silliest to debut brand-spanking new material in front of a supportive, captive audience. To perform in or watch the show, follow @wall_pasta on Instagram for updates.