No Kidding, the Plano Comedy Festival Is Now the Biggest Comedy Festival in North Texas

Comedian Wes Corwin doesn't take any credit for the Plano Comedy Festival becoming the largest comedy festival in all of North Texas. Though he's one of the festival's founding members, when it comes to strategy, Corwin says most of the credit should go to his fellow founders, comedians Britainy Goss and Tom Smith.

"I would love to take credit like a chess master," he says from behind the wheel of his car while on the road for a gig. "Britainy and Tom are very smart. There's not a world where I earned any of this where it's happening. I wake up. I post on social media. I do the work, but I feel like there's a high level of competence and ability for what they do and I just don't have that. I'm not in a position where it gets to my head at all."

Regardless of how much credit he or the rest of the team is willing to take, they have all considerably grown a festival that will start its fifth year on Thursday, Oct. 13, with four days of performances from more than 130 local and national comedians, sketch groups and improv troupes.

It's even more impressive when you realize that one of those festivals had to be held in virtual spaces because of the pandemic.

"The virtual festival was really good for us," Goss says. "We bonded with a lot of comedians from all over the U.S., and now we're funded in part by the city of Plano."

This year's lineup has some impressive names for any comedy festival, such as comedian and podcast host Jackie Kashian, actor and comedian Matthew Broussard, Dallas native Paul Varghese and America's Got Talent finalist Mike E. Winfield, who performed at the very first Plano Comedy Festival in 2018.

"We booked him just based on a video," Corwin says of Winfield. "He's hysterical. We had no idea this would happen."

The festival's shows will be held at the Plano House of Comedy located in the Shops at Legacy and in four of the theater spaces at the North Texas Performing Arts theater in The Shops at Willow Bend.

The audience sales have also grown with the comedy rosters. Seats are filling up for the headlining shows featuring Winfield and Broussard and also for local headliners Varghese, Linda Stogner — who recently scored her first special on Dry Bar Comedy — and Ralph Barbosa, who started in Dallas and has gone on to appear in the HBO Max special The Ha Festival: The Art of Comedy. "There's lot of great talent this year," Goss says.

The festival will close with its annual Roast Battle, in which comedians compete to out-insult each other at the festival's climax.

"I'll probably get in trouble with the other board members for saying this, but if you come to one event, come to the Roast Battle at the end," Corwin says. "They would probably prefer to say to come to all of the shows but if you're only allowed by a court of law to come to one show, please come to the Roast Battle tournament. People are just so mean. Imagine a summer camp and everyone's singing 'Kumbaya' and remembering the friendships they have. We're the opposite. It's the opposite of catharsis. It's a beautiful thing."

Having the support of the city of Plano with grants that partially fund this year's festival has also boosted the annual comedy event's expansion.

"They want us here," Goss says. "They say that we make Plano look cool and Plano is the happiest city in America. Just being there making people laugh is great, and Plano is a big arts city."

One of the most satisfying achievements is seeing some of the comics who came to the very first festival go on to great success.

"Seeing them continue to flourish and get better and better every year," Corwin says, "it's great."