https://www.cnn.com/2018/04/11/entertai ... index.html




Mitzi Shore, Comedy Store owner, dead at 87
Brian Lowry
By Brian Lowry, CNN

Updated 4:20 PM ET, Wed April 11, 2018
Mitzi Shore
Mitzi Shore
(CNN)Mitzi Shore, who could make and break careers as the owner of the Comedy Store, has died after battling Parkinson's disease. She was 87.

A who's who of legendary comedians passed through the Sunset Strip club, with David Letterman once describing Shore as a "den mother" to the eccentric assortment of personalities that jockeyed for stage time.
The 1970s and '80s were an especially fertile and defining period for standup, and Shore was a key gatekeeper, showcasing performers like Letterman, Jay Leno, Robin Williams, Jerry Seinfeld, Richard Pryor, Garry Shandling, and Roseanne Barr. The holy grail for comics was parlaying that into an appearance on "The Tonight Show" with Johnny Carson.
Related: 'I'm Dying Up Here' shines spotlight on '70s stand-up scene
Those years have been dramatized in the Showtime series "I'm Dying Up Here," which stars Melissa Leo as a Shore-like figure. Jim Carrey, another Comedy Store graduate, is among the producers of the show, which begins its second season in May.
"No words can express the gratitude I have for her," Carrey tweeted about Shore, amid an outpouring from comics citing her role in their careers. "We met in 1979. She opened the door to my dreams! If she loved you, you did well. If she didn't, you did something else."
Shore took over the club in the mid-1970s, after her divorce from comic Sammy Shore, who co-founded it. (Shore famously took the club in exchange for a reduction in alimony payments.)
Her four children included actor/comic Pauly Shore.

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favrefan said:"Chris Coghlan isn't gonna pay your rent, Jimmy."

Roseanne was just talking about her when she was on Howard a few weeks back. she was really important to standup through its best years.

I have two Mitzi Shore stories:

In 1985,my wife and I took a vacation in Palm Springs. We were young in our 20's. We went to a Comedy Club out there and had a nice evening. I remember looking around the Club thinking we were the oldest couple there. It was spring break or something. It was towards the end of the show when this lady came up to us and started talking. She was really friendly and told us she was the manager. I'm almost positive it was Mitzi but not sure. I don't think there were too many female managers of Comedy Clubs back then.

My second story had to do with seeing her son,Pauly at the Schaumburg Improv....HE SUCKED!

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favrefan said:"Chris Coghlan isn't gonna pay your rent, Jimmy."

How was his standup?

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"Play until it hurts, then play until it hurts to not play."
http://soundcloud.com/darkside124 HOF 2013, MM Champion 2014

Rather that Mitzi Shore should live and I'm Dying Up Here should die.

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