Comedy is only the beginning
The second annual Miramontes Music and Arts Festival began with laughter.
Comedian Kira Soltanovich entertained students and community members in the Aspen Rooms of the UMC on Saturday night. The show was the first event of many in the Miramontes Music and Arts Festival.
Soltanovich has been featured on shows such as “Girls Behaving Badly” on The CW. She has won and been a finalist in many comedy competitions and festivals, such as Comedy Central’s Laugh Riots, California’s Funniest Female and Seattle International Comedy Festival.
Before Soltanovich performed, two CU students took the stage and received a good amount of laughs from the audience. Then Soltanovich began, and her comedic tone was prevalent from beginning to end.
Her set was complete with jokes of all kinds, from inappropriate to simply funny. She had the crowd laughing at least every two minutes. When a photographer began taking pictures, Soltanovich turned to him and said, “As a Jew, I don’t appreciate you taking pictures of my profile.”
She made multiple jokes about her Jewish heritage throughout the night. Her other jokes varied from storytelling with as much animation as possible to straight improvisation in which she conversed with her audience.
Soltanovich repeatedly called some male audience members names like “sweet nuts” and spoke to multiple people in the crowd. She even asked what CU’s mascot was, and after hearing “Buffs!” and “Buffalo!” shouted out multiple times she said, “Ah, buffalo. Makes great jerky!”
At the end of her set, there was a period for question and answers from the audience. Soltanovich gave advice that any aspiring comedian should take to heart.
“You can’t be too sensitive in this business,” Soltanovich said. “I started out poorly doing open mic nights, and worked my way up.”
The audience seemed very pleased after an hour of Soltanovich’s hysterical comedic performance.
“I thought it was really good,” said Rachel Newson, a junior geology major. “I’m a foreign exchange student and I was feeling very homesick. She put me in a much better mood!”
Another audience member had only more good things to say about Soltanovich.
“She was really funny. I’ve never been to a comedy show before, but she was great,” said Jasmine Clayton, a senior linguistics major.
The Miramontes Festival continues throughout the week with many other events. They are all free and open to the public unless otherwise noted.
Click here to see the other festival events occurring this week.
Contact Campus Press Staff Writer Emma Dessau at Emma.Dessau@colorado.edu.
