Don Garrett Sees Success Locally and on the Stand-Up Comedy Circuit

Countless stand-up comics have origin stories similar to that of Don Garrett — folks who were always the funny ones in their respective friend groups until the people around them convinced them that they should get onstage and try comedy in front of a crowd. 

For Garrett, however, he remembers the exact day. He recalls that he was goofing off in the kitchen with friends on Memorial Day 2015 when they told him he needed to try comedy. That only planted the seed until two years later, when Garrett was working as a claims adjuster at Liberty Mutual and his coworkers suggested the same thing. 

He thought, “Maybe I should give this thing a shot.”

Rather than wing it at the first open mic he could find, Garrett approached stand-up as a student of the art, enrolling in a six-week course at the local Comedy Zone to learn the basics of comedy. 

He and his classmates marked their graduation with a performance on June 26, 2017, giving new meaning to “walking the stage.” He found the feeling of garnering laughs from strangers infectious. 

“[I thought,] maybe I have a future in this … I felt it and I wanted to feel that forever,” he recalls.

Fast forward eight years and Garrett hasn’t slowed down. He is now participating in more than 100 paid shows a year, running from a couple hundred bucks for a performance to $1,750 for 50 minutes of stage time (his highest-paid gig thus far, in Arizona). 

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Having taken the advice of those close to him, Garrett has gone on to accomplish something that’s rare in Charlotte’s stand-up scene by establishing himself as a touring comic.

He still performs locally a good bit, having recent hit venues ranging from Mooresville and Cornelius to Rock Hill, regularly returning to The Comedy Zone where it all started. 

His next performances will take place on Sept. 20 at That’s Novel Books in Camp North End, with time slots scheduled for 7:30 and 9:30 p.m. 

Turning laughs into dollars

Garrett’s first paid gig came at Empire Pizza & Grill in Rock Hill in 2018. He didn’t think he was at a point in his career where he could ask for money, but the show’s producer, Chris Corrado, surprised him with the cash. 

“He dapped me up like it was an illegal transaction,” recalls Garrett. “He doesn’t know what that did for me. It was just 25 bucks and I’m telling you, the proudest $25 I’ve ever made.” 

The experience helped him realize he could build up his presence and potentially provide a living for himself through comedy. He still regularly performs Corrado Comedy shows, having headlined the most recent one at 742 North in Rock Hill on Sept. 6.

Garrett hasn’t quit his day job just yet — he currently does HR for a local nonprofit — but his end goal is to make his life revolve around his comedy. He hopes to some day host a late-night television show.  

“I go to work during the day to pay my bills,” he says. “I always say I’ll sell my soul for a paycheck, and then on stage at night I get it back.” 

When he’s not working his 9 to 5, he spends his free time working on his material, which includes practicing facial expressions in the mirror.

“I’m always working on my craft,” Garrett said. 

He likes to analyze his most recent sets; if stuff didn’t get laughs, he tries to diagnose why that might be, then strategizes a different way to approach the joke and keeps testing it until it works.

Along with Corrado, he credits local comic Tara Brown, whom he describes as his big sister, and Cee-Jay Jones, who’s currently on the cruise ship circuit. He thinks of both as mentors who have helped shape his style and work ethic. 

Grinding it out in comedy

Garrett emphasizes that, while he’s no household name just yet, even the success he has seen has been extremely hard to come by. According to him, a life in comedy is not for the weak; one has to battle to survive or they won’t be in it long. 

Garrett says he finds opportunities to perform by scanning social media, likening the practice to fishing as he casts his net and tries to hook an opening. He’s not just the talent, he’s his own agent, manager and hospitality coordinator. 

He describes his comedy style as observational and witty, like a joke he does about Charlotte street names.

“There is this street called Sugar Creek, and ironically, there is nothing sweet over there,” he says. “Don’t go on that side of town if you’re not familiar with it.”

The joke works not only as a pun but as a promo; he wants the audience to think of his joke and chuckle to themselves when they pass that common thoroughfare as well as the others he mentions as part of the bit. 

Garrett describes himself as a “mostly clean comic.” Many of his shows are billed as “family-friendly” and he doesn’t do political comedy, preferring to bring people together through comedy rather than divide.

He insists that his best material came out of his attempts to lose weight. He would bare his soul about the experience on stage and believes crowds especially appreciated the authenticity and emotional transparency — a lesson he’s taken with him in furthering his writing style. 

Of course, bombing is bound to happen to even the best comics and Garrett still clearly remembers the exact date when he went through his most harrowing performance without landing any laughs. It was March 7, 2018, during Laugh It Up Thursday at Morehead Tavern. 

He has repeatedly analyzed that night’s performance, as he’s wont to do, and says it all came about because he went on stage without a game plan, then second-guessed himself once he was there. He got into it with a heckler, who got on stage and turned the performance into a roast battle.

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This sort of situation might usually provide the comic a chance to do what they do best and possibly even turn the night around, but instead, the heckler got the best of Garrett.  

“He’s killing me dude!” he says as he relives the experience. 

The knockout blow came when the heckler told him he should have stayed in school and not become a comedian. Ironically, Garrett had earned his master’s degree just three days before.

Most comics can expect to bomb here and there, especially in their early years, though not many will have to deal with the embarrassment of having a member of the crowd come on stage and outshine them. 

It was a humbling experience, but all part of the learning process — something no course at The Comedy Zone can prepare you for.

Garrett is now planning his own six-week comedy course in which he’ll teach the basics on how to put together a set. He hopes to launch the class in October, charging around $300 for six weeks of instruction that will end with a graduation set.

As for what advice he has for up-and-coming comics, Garrett says, “Keep hitting the stage, stay dedicated to your craft, and when your number is called, be ready for that opportunity.” 

Keep up with Don Garrett on Instagram at @dongarrettcomedy or on his Facebook page.