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Brick Wall Comedy
Cover image credit: Thumbnail: YouTube · 800 Pound Gorilla Media

Them

Big Jay Oakerson

YouTube · 2025 · 59 min

An unscripted hour of dirty crowd work in Denver.

Watch it free on YouTube (opens in a new tab)

Big Jay Oakerson sits on a stool, peers into the dimly lit tables of the front rows, and does what he does better than almost anyone else: talks to strangers until they reveal their weirdest secrets. The set operates without the safety net of written material. It is a full hour of pure, unscripted crowd work, where Oakerson transforms casual club chatter into highly specific, often filthy running gags.

Filmed at Comedy Works in Denver and released on YouTube in February 2025 by 800 Pound Gorilla Media, Them serves as the first half of Oakerson’s two-part crowd work project, Them/They. After streaming networks passed on the hour, the veteran club comic put it out independently. It went on to win the 2025 Audience Choice Award for Independent Comedy Special of the Year on his tour platform, proving that his core audience of podcasters and club-goers was more than ready for his signature, off-the-cuff style.

The Denver crowd provides plenty of strange fodder, but the peak of the show arrives when Oakerson zeroes in on a one-armed former biker. The man explains that he lost his limb after being hit by a car, which happened to strike his needle arm back when he was using speedballs. Oakerson instantly turns the grim confession into a bizarrely endearing exchange, riffing on the driver’s odd luck and wondering if the man can scratch records like a DJ. Other encounters include a woman with forearm tattoos who is married to a man named Lauren, a couple too high on weed brownies to follow along, and a table of biker women who get pulled into the crossfire.

The set list

4 bits

  1. Interrogating an interracial aerospace couple in the crowd

    Riffs on expecting them to be carnival weight-guessers before learning they met in aviation mechanic school, transitioning into jokes about their children.

  2. Spotting two female hairstylists who ride motorcycles

    Probes into their salon clients in Denver and jokes about the physiological effect of motorcycle seat vibrations desensitizing their anatomy.

  3. A lone Black male patron and Denver's racial demographics

    Expresses excitement at finding a full Black attendee in an overwhelmingly white mountain city, riffing on cuckold porn and local dating odds.

  4. Mistaking a Mexican man with a headband for Native American and talking to an Indian-American woman with a white husband

    Jokes about Jim Morrison hallucinations, cultural stereotypes, and strict parents giving spelling quizzes over holiday dinners.

How it plays

Tone
Dirty, edgy, crude, and observational.
On stage
An easy-charming, unapologetic, sit-down delivery style that balances filthy, intrusive questions with a disarmingly palatable bedside manner.
Pace
Relaxed and conversational, working the room and pulling stories from audience members without breaking a sweat.
About
crowd interrogation, interracial dating and relationships, Denver demographics and race, unusual occupations, sex and porn

What the critics said

Hailed by peers and supporters as masterclass, unfiltered crowd work from a veteran of the form, though criticized by some reviewers for relying heavily on low-hanging racial and sexual humor rather than structured written material.

In the room: Eager, vocal, and fully primed to be interrogated and roasted on the spot.

Summed up from reviews, articles and listings. Sources: imdb.com, bigjaycomedy.com, justwatch.com, decider.com, letterboxd.com, weownthelaughs.com, en.wikipedia.org.

Backstory

Part 1 of a two-part, hour-long crowd work special ('Them/They') filmed at Comedy Works Denver, consisting entirely of unscripted, improvised crowd interactions without any prepared stand-up material.

Details

Released
Taped
Comedy Works, Denver
Runtime
59 min
Where
YouTube
Director
Matthew Salacuse
Honors
2025 Audience Choice Winner — Independent Comedy Special of the Year (The Interrobang)
Topics
Before
Dog Belly (2023)

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