As one of Chicago’s most prolific comedy acts, fans and aspiring comedians might wonder how Cook County Social Club got to be so damn funny. The answer is simple: They hate each other.
“We don’t find each other funny in the least,” says Greg Hess. “In fact, internally, we are a back-biting, hate-fueled comedy machine. So the method used here is pure deceit. If we ever did laugh at each other, I am sure that would be the end of Cook County.”
The end of Cook County? That would be a tragic thing indeed. Besides being a favorite at various comedy festivals, they’ve got a pretty significant fanbase in the Windy City. Since their last visit during the Charleston Comedy Festival in January (an event which saw a dramatic interpretation of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and member Brendan Jennings portraying a shirtless, dancing infant), they’ve made some major strides in their careers.
“We started our own training wing at iO Theatre, Brendan and Tim [Robinson] were hired to be members of the Second City resident companies, Mark [Raterman] and I are writing a pilot that will shoot this summer, we got asked to do the TBS Just For Laughs Fest, and we still do a weekly improv show,” Hess says. “Counseling works.”
Most of them are also settling into the grown-up life, with wives, babies, and all that other stuff. But they’re not letting it get in the way of their comedy.
“Being married and having kids only affects our comedy when one of our members can’t make a show because a member of his family needs tender, loving care,” Raterman says. “But we’ve been pretending we’re married on stage for years, so thankfully that hasn’t changed.”
This familial yet hate-based chemistry results in some random scenes. Raterman recalls a personal favorite:
“One of our best scenes was when Brendan landed his spaceship in a field and thought the rest of us were aliens. Turns out we were high school kids, and he’d landed in a field about 100 yards from his house. Hilarity!”
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