Cincinnati has nationally ranked restaurants, an expansive music scene, a thriving club culture and its share of renowned art galleries and museums; it only makes sense that the comedy scene would be on the rise, too.
CityBeat’s Best Local Comedian 2025 winner Kelly Collette and co-founder of the city’s newest comedy venue, Nathan Kroeger of Commonwealth Sanctuary, weigh in on Cincinnati comedy and how an old church turned comedy club across the river in Dayton, Kentucky, is helping build that community.
Established local anchors like Go Bananas and national chain The Funny Bone have been favorite comedy venues for comedy fans and up-and-comers for years, but non-traditional comedy venues like MOTR Pub and The Comet started hosting comedy regularly in recent years, adding opportunities for comedians and audiences alike.
Cincinnati-based comedian Collette, fresh off winning CityBeat’s Best Local Comedian 2025, was taping a special in Chicago at the time of our interview. Collette seems grateful and excited for the win and current climate in Cincinnati comedy. “I was like, ‘Oh, my gosh, this seems real,’” she says with a laugh on winning the vote. “I think the people who won it the last couple years were like Katt Williams and Gary Owen and it’s like, ‘You don’t even go to this school,’ you know what I mean?” she says jokingly, “It’s nice that someone who is actively performing comedy in Cincinnati got it, that’s very sweet.”
Collette, who now tours nationally as a full-time comedian in addition to teaching a course on stand-up for local all-female comedy organization Alphas Comedy, performed her first open mic in 2009 at Go Bananas. She was just out of college before she went all in and quit her full-time job in 2019. Collette says comedy is more available than ever.
“I think it’s really grown a lot,” she said. “I think there’s so much more stage time here than there used to be, especially with everybody putting together their independent shows at MOTR or coffee shops or things like that. Pick a night of the week and we have a show.”
Northern Kentucky got its first dedicated club and added to the current comedy landscape when the Commonwealth Sanctuary opened in 2023.
The club opened after couple and co-founders Kroeger (artistic director) and Jacoba Wells (programming director), both former employees of public libraries, moved from Bloomington, Indiana, in 2019 and bought the building in 2020 to renovate it for a to-be-determined project. The couple, both comedy fans, met local comedian and event organizer Shawn Braley, now Commonwealth’s creative director, after attending events he hosted at Dayton, Kentucky, venue The Garage. When The Garage became unavailable, the three decided on a use for the former church.
“Commonwealth Sanctuary is a refuge from the daily grind,” Kroeger says. “We built a comedy club in a former church building and named it a ‘sanctuary.’ So, we want people to think of us when they need to feel lighter and be around people who are feeling the same way.”
He tells CityBeat they had three goals in mind when opening Commonwealth Sanctuary: to bring well-known comics to an unconventional and unexpected space, benefit the local community in Dayton by bringing people to bars and restaurants before or after shows and helping local comics.
They’ve already hosted several sellout shows with noteworthy comedians featured on major platforms like Comedy Central, HBO and NBC’s Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon with others coming up, like Rory Scovel, who’s had specials on HBO Max and Netflix. Former Saturday Night Live cast member Punkie Johnson and Michael Ian Black of cult-favorite movies like Wet Hot American Summer and MTV sketch show Stella, will help celebrate the club’s two-year anniversary this July.
They also host a weekly open mic on Monday nights for locals called The Workshop. “Comedians need stage time. And we wanted to create a show for the working comics, young and veteran alike, to get in their reps because that is the only way they get better as performers. As they improve as performers, we hire them to work our weekend shows, opening for the headliners we bring through each week,” Kroeger tells CityBeat.
The club makes good with the goal of an unconventional space, too. The former church, built in 1914, sits high above street level. After you climb the stairs leading in, you’re met with a few more to enter the main room that features all the hallmarks of a historic church: high ceilings, exposed beams and some dramatic touches. There’s also a portion of the stage with an organ and drums that are often used to play people on and off stage.
The performance space, while feeling open, isn’t huge. Collette describes the experience of performing at the venue. “I like an intimate show. I like when I can see the audience members, I can feel their energy, I can tell what kind of material they’re starting to like and what they’re not so I can adjust and be playful, whereas I’ve done theater shows and you hear the laugh but you don’t see the people and you’re just like, ‘I’m talking to the darkness right now.’ I like a small venue, they’re fun.” She continues, “It feels like we’re all in a really cool experience together, feels very special.”
Collette feels people have accepted the new venue because they’re very focused on comedy and comedians, not drink specials and food sales. She says, “I think what’s great about Commonwealth is it’s run by a couple that are just big comedy fans that are really good people and they just wanna bring really great acts to Cincinnati.”
Kroeger says they’ve felt welcomed by the comedy community with the help of locals like Collette. “Kelly’s one of the top headliners that’s based in Cincinnati and she’s touring all over — she’s a true professional working comic and she’s headlined here. We love Kelly’s comedy, so any time we get to see Kelly, we’re really happy and that’s what’s great about this scene, generally, is all of these comics have been very supportive of us starting up a new venue in a town that has had, kind of, a historical scene. You know, Go Bananas has been there since the ‘90s and Wayne Memmott is running the Bombs Away! Comedy at The Comet in Northside. He’s been doing that for 11 years and has built up a huge, very cool following there and he brings in some very cool people.”
Memmott and Commonwealth have since joined together for the Crosstown Comedy Festival that will take place from July 10-Aug. 30.
Collette says the comedy scene in Cincinnati has improved in other ways, as well. “When I first started, it wasn’t super inclusive. I remember someone being like, ‘Hey, I’m not gonna bother to learn your name until you’ve been to at least six months of open mics because you’ll probably just quit one day,’ and I was like, ‘Oh, harsh reality.’ Now we’re all like, ‘Come sit next to me,’ you know? Everybody’s so much nicer now.”
For more information about the Commonwealth Sanctuary, visit commonwealthsanctuary.com. For more information about Kelly Collette, visit kellycollettecomedy.com.
This story is featured in CityBeat’s April 30 print edition.
This article appears in Apr 30 – May 13, 2025.