{"id":475487,"date":"2026-09-25T16:48:16","date_gmt":"2026-09-25T16:48:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/475487\/"},"modified":"2026-09-25T16:48:16","modified_gmt":"2026-09-25T16:48:16","slug":"4-up-and-coming-comedians-to-watch-in-los-angeles-in-2026","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/475487\/","title":{"rendered":"4 up-and-coming comedians to watch in Los Angeles in 2026"},"content":{"rendered":"

There are probably about as many comedy clubs in Los Angeles as there are In-N-Out locations\u2014you\u2019re never more than a few-minute drive from one.\u00a0Whether you\u2019re after arena-caliber performers in a small comedy club<\/a> on the Sunset Strip<\/a> or genre-defying acts at an old playhouse near the L.A. River, there\u2019s a comedy scene for you somewhere in the city.<\/p>\n

So seeing top-tier comedy in L.A.\u00a0often becomes less a question of\u00a0where\u00a0and instead one of\u00a0who\u2014and we think you should beeline it to just about any show that has one of these\u00a0on-the-rise local comedians on its lineup. A mix of stand-ups, actors, writers and sketch performers, these are the\u00a0folks who can snap you out of\u00a0the doomscrolling doldrums or singlehandedly rescue a ho-hum evening. That\u2019s why these three solo\u00a0performers and one duo were inducted into the 2026 class of Time Out\u2019s Comedians to Watch in America<\/a>\u2014and while we\u2019re\u00a0enamored with the other eight picks on that nationwide list, we wanted to make sure to give the Angelenos in it some extra local love.<\/p>\n

Very special thanks to Joel Mandelkorn<\/a> and Mandee Johnson<\/a>, who curated and helped craft this list of L.A. comedians.<\/p>\n

\"Andrew
\nPhotograph: Courtesy Jim McCambridgeAndrew Orolfo <\/p>\n

Andrew Orolfo<\/p>\n

We all have those \u201ctruth is stranger than fiction\u201d moments, but we can\u2019t all craft those random encounters into a funny story quite like Andrew Orolfo. A fixture at the Comedy & Magic Club and on Don\u2019t Tell Comedy lineups, Orolfo lures in crowds with relaxed setups that give way to surprisingly outlandish punchlines, whether that\u2019s about tolerating a bit of casual racism when you\u2019re dating or sharing an edible with your mom. The L.A. by way of the Bay Area comedian\u2019s cleverly silly perspective extends to The Meter, a game show he first hatched on long car rides to find out which Hollywood actor has the highest of-the-moment STARmeter rating on IMDb in as niche of a category as possible\u2014say, the most famous person who\u2019s ever worn a cowboy in a film or actors who\u2019ve been really, really sweaty on camera.\u00a0<\/p>\n

What\u2019s the funniest thing about your life right now?<\/p>\n

My mom vapes, and sometimes it has a screen on it.<\/p>\n

The one joke that always lands:\u00a0Comics, we all just kind of dress similar for the most part. I always open with, \u201cDo y\u2019all like the lineup?\u201d And then the crowd is like, \u201cYeah!\u201d And I\u2019m like, \u201cYeah, me too. Everybody\u2019s been very funny, but am I tripping, or does this whole lineup look like we all work at the same thrift store? This is the most Buffalo Exchange\u2013looking lineup I\u2019ve ever been on.\u201d In other cities I\u2019ll just switch the thrift store, and find the local thrift store. It works most of the time\u2014if the wind conditions are right.<\/p>\n

You can stream The Meter<\/a> each week on YouTube or watch live at DSP Studios in L.A. Check out Andrew Orolfo\u2019s website<\/a> for his upcoming shows,\u00a0and follow along with him on Instagram<\/a> and TikTok<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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\"Curtis
\nPhotograph: Courtesy Lex Voight & @nocturneinbloomCurtis Cook <\/p>\n

Curtis Cook<\/p>\n

When Curtis Cook left Portland in 2016, he published a self-interview<\/a> in the city\u2019s alternative weekly about where he saw himself in five years: broke and broken in a world without comedy because his then-upcoming farewell PDX show was just unsurpassable. \u201cGuess I\u2019ve always been kind of a dreary guy,\u201d Cook tells me today, noting that while we\u2019re all doomed due to climate change and its survival-necessitated decline of \u201cthe arts,\u201d it has been a thrilling decade of opportunities since he moved to L.A. You might\u2019ve caught some of his TV writing credits on American Dad!, the criminally overlooked This Fool or recent hangout sitcom Adults. On-stage, Cook\u2019s stand-up presence is one-of-a-kind, at once care-free, provocative and insightful whether talking about telling his six-year-old daughter that her family identifies as goth or trying to join the military to feed an insatiable blood lust.\u00a0<\/p>\n

What\u2019s the funniest thing about your life right now?<\/p>\n

I\u2019m gonna die. Every day I live is a step closer to death, and through it all, I\u2019m like, \u201cPlease follow me on social media so I don\u2019t get kicked outta comedy.\u201d It\u2019s funny how much of this one, short, precious life I spend tryna get my numbers up online so I can keep doing what I love in person. That said, please follow me on social media so I don\u2019t get kicked outta comedy.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The one joke that always lands: I am, for better or worse, one of those stand-ups who revels in the knowledge that I could always lose the audience. It\u2019s fun to play with uncertain energy. That said, this joke<\/a> [about coercive interrogation\u2013inspired role play] tends to work more often than not.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Catch Curtis Cook on Wednesday nights at Zero Lounge in Hollywood, where he cohosts the weekly Zero Hour Comedy<\/a> with Brandie Posey, Rick Wood and John Michael Bond. You can follow him on Instagram<\/a> and TikTok<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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\"Felicia
\nPhotograph: Courtesy Van CoronaFelicia Folkes <\/p>\n

Felicia Folkes<\/p>\n

Don\u2019t try hitting on a bank teller when you have a negative balance\u2014because, as Felicia Folkes did in her former job, she\u2019ll literally see that you can\u2019t afford to take her anywhere. The Inglewood native brings charm and raw honesty to takes on relationship compromises and overly aggressive encouragement that\u2019ll still have you talking on the car ride home. Folkes first got into stand-up as an after-class diversion at Santa Monica College and then was the first Black woman to be a door guy\u2014and she really puts the emphasis on it being mostly guys\u2014at the famed Comedy Store, where she worked her way up to being a paid regular. A breast cancer survivor, when Folkes was first diagnosed, she was hesitant whether she could turn an experience that intense into something funny. But she certainly can, whether talking about accepting advances when you think you\u2019re on your deathbed or being irresistible to men even if you\u2019re radioactive. \u201cFor the first time, my comedy\u2019s doing that cheesy kind of thing where it\u2019s doing more than just making people laugh for the night,\u201d she says. \u201cIt\u2019s really making people laugh for a while, and it\u2019s healing them through their own journeys as well.\u201d<\/p>\n

What\u2019s the funniest thing about your life right now?<\/p>\n

I was just on that Netflix show [with Kevin Hart], and so now people recognize me. But like, I\u2019m still in L.A., I\u2019m still in Leimert Park, you know? So people now [in my go-to local shops], they\u2019ll be stopping me, like, \u201cOh, wait, are you from that show, can we get a picture?\u201d But I\u2019m like, I was here yesterday, and the day before, I\u2019ve been here for years, I see you all the time.<\/p>\n

The one joke that always lands: I have my own personal beef with Trader Joe\u2019s, and I feel like it looks like a kid built a grocery store, and the carts are too small, and they\u2019re drawing the prices on, and I want them to go in the back and print out the prices and put it on and stop playing these games with me. And the parking lots are all crazy. So that always works because people feel very personal about their grocery store. They start messaging me about Erewhon and what they think about that\u2014people in L.A. have a lot of opinions about grocery stores.<\/p>\n

You can see Felicia Folkes live<\/a> most Sundays at the Comedy Store, as well as at the New York Comedy Festival in November. Keep up with her on Instagram<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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\"Kim
\nPhotograph: Courtesy Steven MeidenbauerKim & Aliya <\/p>\n

Kim & Aliya<\/p>\n

A surreal short film about a dystopian marketing app, a satirical talk show, a card-based party game about gossip: No matter the form their comedy takes, you can expect something truly singular when Kim Seltzer and Aliya Kamalova are behind it. The improv and sketch collaborators, who go by Kim & Aliya for short, excel in authoring all sorts of offbeat, often exquisitely awkward bite-sized videos, whether that\u2019s slightly unnerving cooking demos, half-baked business pitches or, most recently, parodies of late-analog-era commercials. (Also, if you\u2019ve seen TikToks of messy-faced friends demanding to know who ate the last powdered doughnut, you can thank Kim & Aliya for starting that trend<\/a>.) But the L.A. performers\u2019 talents extend beyond phone-sized-screens: They\u2019re currently developing their debut feature, Pistols at 3:45, a mockumentary about two feuding local politicians trying to valiantly chicken out of an old-school gun duel.\u00a0<\/p>\n

What\u2019s the funniest thing about your life right now?<\/p>\n

We made a half-joke about how funny it would be if we launched a web arcade on our website because of how much we loved Flash game sites from the early 2000s. We took the joke too far and actually built an online game based on one mildly successful video series we have called \u201cKitchen Hacks.\u201d We taught ourselves pixel art and game development and created a game where you can play as Aliya in her demented kitchen hacks world. Then we became addicted to our own proprietary game. The highest score we\u2019ve gotten so far is 198,020, which is actually quite high for a score if you know anything about this game which most people don\u2019t.<\/p>\n

The one joke that always lands: Anytime we have a visual component while performing live, we try to always run the tech from stage via Aliya\u2019s laptop. Instead of seamlessly switching to the screen we want to share, we \u201caccidentally\u201d show Aliya\u2019s desktop which we fill with embarrassing open tabs like Google searches for \u201chow to get people to like you easy,\u201d \u201cwhen is too old for a first kiss?\u201d and \u201care Minions real life animals?\u201d Kim tries to vamp while Aliya struggles to navigate to the right screen. The audience always feels a split-second of horror until they realize it\u2019s a bit and then they laugh, laugh, laugh all the way home.<\/p>\n

You can keep up with Kim & Aliya\u2019s latest games and videos on their website<\/a>, and follow them on Instagram<\/a> and TikTok<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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