This BSCC award-winning platform was the first of its kind to pioneer English speaking stand up comedy for multilingual international audiences. Establishing comedy club culture in Switzerland and laundering tons & tons of comedy gold into the Swiss joke bank from 2006 onwards, in 2022/23 International Comedy Club aka Funny Laundry embarked on its final year of Funny Laundering.
Guy Stevens, son of well-known British comedy & character actor Ronnie Stevens, arrived in Switzerland jobless. Despite having decades of experience in show business he found no interest in his skill sets locally and during a bout of home-sickness decided to create regular, touring comedy club nights as a means to making a living for his new family, whilst sharing top quality English language laughs around the country at the same time. Founding a regular programme of authentic comedy club culture in Switzerland brought something brand new to the entertainment landscape and filled the (yawning!) gap that existed for professional English language entertainment in general, catering to both long and short term international residents and local anglophiles alike.
From the first night in Zurich in May 2006 – and totalling 676 shows until the last in 2023 – the club grew into a landmark stage for top English‑speaking comedians. Audiences packed in to see standout acts including Eddie Izzard, Michael McIntyre, Trevor Noah, Dylan Moran, Simon Amstell, Alan Davies, Sarah Millican, Jim Jefferies, Russell Brand, Dara O’Briain, Arthur Smith, Paul Merton’s Impro Chums, Frankie Boyle, Richard Herring, Ari Shaffir, Ed Byrne, Russell Howard, Jimmy Carr, Matt Kirshen, Nina Conti, Kevin Bridges, Omid Djalili, Tom Rhodes, Ross Noble, Ardal O’Hanlon, Guy Pratt, Tommy Tiernan, Lucy Porter, Rich Hall, Josh Widdecombe, Daniel Sloss and the legendary punk poet John Cooper Clarke, to name just a few.
A consistent, dedicated spotlight was always given to notable up-and-coming talent in the English speaking stand up comedy world, especially the new wave of non-native English speaking comics, such as Magnus Betner, Christian Shulte-Loh, Dag Soras, Henning Wehn, Francesco de Carlo, Luca Cupani, Sofie Hagen and others, who were championed as part of regular line-ups as early as 2008. With Swiss comics Thomas Wiesel, Noman Hosni, Nathanaël Rochat and Javier Garcia amongst them.
From the outset an open spot was made available at club shows and for many years this gave the very few that were interested in trying stand up an in-at-the-deep-end experience, sharing the stage with the professionals. Funny Laundry/International Comedy Club offered advice, time and expertise to anyone that wished to learn more about comedy stage craft and potentially take the next steps towards a full-time comedy career. But there were none that ever expressed that desire in Switzerland. Those that did decide to ‘have a go’ usually did so just for fun and so fun, and quite a few laughs, was what they and the very supportive audiences generally had whenever people bravely stepped-up onto the stage.
However, after over a decade of striving to maintain all the shows and develop the platform beyond Swiss borders, seeking collaborations with local entertainment and media companies and trying to find Swiss sponsorship support that never materialised, in 2017 a group of overly enthusiastic would-be ‘comedians’ appeared out of nowhere. Jostling themselves individually and en masse onto club stage open mics at exactly the same time as a Swiss Re sponsored ‘British Comedy Night’ was being mounted at an established Zurich klein kunst venue, fronted by a Swiss journalist.
Before long, several paid entry open mics and hobby comic-focused ‘comedy nights’ emerged, with accompanying media coverage – some of which directly contradicted its previous reporting. It became evident that the self-proclaimed ‘comedians’ behind these efforts, and those either pulling their strings from afar, or im Schatten (in the shadows) locally, were not genuine in their comedic pursuits or in any claimed intention to support the platform’s growth.
Disrupting the established club shows, dividing the increasingly developed and integrated audiences and saturating the limited niche market in stand up comedy karaoke was the order of the day. With numerous ‘brands’ proliferating pointlessly throughout the Covid pandemic too, despite there being no public demand for them.
Maintaining the highest standards built International Comedy Club’s reputation. Keeping those standards high is what set it apart, made it a respected entity amongst professional UK, US and international comedians and a unique and influential entity in the social and cultural landscape of Switzerland and Europe as a whole.
But one person working alone for well over a decade, am langen arm verhungern lassen (hung out to dry) by passive-aggressive, oligopolist entertainment and media industries, mobbed by a ‘comedy scene’ put-up job with a small army of clown puppets and puppeteers, can only take so much, so seriously. Especially, having only just enough in pocket from his turnover to survive for all those years. In one of the richest, most expensive and unfriendly countries to live in, in the world.
The last International Comedy Club show in Switzerland was on May 26 2023 at Mascotte in Zurich.
By early 2024 Guy Stevens was packing his suitcases and after twenty-one years as a permanent Swiss resident he left the country, having keine Wohnung to live in oder Geld left to live on.
Funny Laundry & International Comedy Club are on hiatus.
International Comedy Festival is weighing-up its options.
Guy Stevens is slowly writing a book – email: funnylaunderer[at]pm[dot]me
Updated September 2025
“Seymour” + Red Hot Chili Peppers – Foxy Lady [One Hour with Jonathan Ross – UK C4 – 16th March 1990]