It’s true. The ladies love Nick Thune.

The comedy scene in Vegas could best be described as, well, let’s say “amorphous.” Sure, you’ve got your share of practitioners and devotees, and a few outlets like Palace Station’s L.A. Comedy Club and The Bunkhouse’s Monday night open mics, but as far as bringing the Patton Oswalts, the Brian Posehns and the Paul. F. Tompkinses (Tompki?) of the world to town, it’s been a harder sell.

In an effort to create a mid-level venue for local up-and-comers who are beyond open mic and under-the-radar national talent, co-founders Bryan Bruner and Julie Seabaugh have organized Fear and Laughing in Las Vegas — although we suspect there’ll be at least 60 percent less ether usage than its gonzo namesake.

The show is tomorrow night at the Four Queens Casino’s Canyon Club at 9 p.m. for $15. Bruner will host and Brandon Muller is featured. Headlining is Nick Thune, who is a veteran of The Tonight Show, Comedy Central Presents and Los Angeles showcase Comedy Death Ray. We caught up with Thune to find out about building a comedy scene, what comics think of Vegas, and whether he and Dmitri Martin are going to join forces in an acoustic guitar-slinging comedy showdown.

How did you get involved with this event? I think they came to me, actually. As far as I know, I just got a phone call that said hey do you want to do a show in Vegas? And before they got to the “s” in Vegas, I said yes.

What do you have to do to build a comedy scene from the ground up? It’s interesting. It just depends on the rooms. I’m from Seattle, and I’ve been going back up to Seattle more and more recently and doing some shows up there. The non-club scene has started up there. It’s been really neat. It really just took three guys who were passionate to start something that wasn’t going to be in a club, and work on getting local people. It’s taken a couple of years, but it’s become a really popular show up there. I think it’s that, it’s finding the right venue, and finding a few guys who want to do it and are going to be there every week doing new things.

We don’t get a lot of the alternative comedy crowd coming here … does it have a reputation in the community as being a place comics don’t want to come? Comedians want to go to Vegas. It’s so close to LA, you’ve got a place to stay for the night. Why not do a show? It kind of has a reputation of being old. For instance, the HBO stuff on Don Rickles, people are recognizing him again as being a classic. That’s the scene that feels like is happening in Vegas. When you’re at that level, you go to Vegas, and then people who have money travel to see you there. I don’t think people realize there’s a town there.

If the show’s a hit are you going to come back with Demetri Martin and do an all-acoustic comedy set? Yeah, me and Demetri want to go out on a tour together so bad right now.

Seriously? No. I’m fine with not doing that. But if he came together and wanted to do a Bee-Gees sort of a thing, I couldn’t say no to that.

By Jason Scavone

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