“I'm so sorry,” says Curtis Cook. We’ve just met up at a coffee shop in Southeast Portland to discuss his impending move to LA, and he’s reacting the way many stand-ups do when they realize that, as a critic, I’ve seen their sets many times over.
It’s a liability for anyone who covers comedy, but not when it comes to Cook, whose sets reliably include sharp-edged tangents that are often even funnier than his tested material—material that covers race and politics without apology or hand-holding. On Wednesday night, Cook will perform at Helium with his co-hosts from the comedy showcase Earthquake Hurricane—Alex Falcone, Bri Pruett, and Anthony Lopez. It’ll be Cook’s last comedy show as a Portlander.
His reasons for leaving are pragmatic: He doesn’t hate it here, it’s been a happy medium between his future home LA and Ohio, where he grew up and went to college at Oberlin. But for Cook, who recalls early days in Portland comedy when he was often intimidated by fellow comics he performed with, the city’s utility as a training ground is waning. “Nothing really makes me nervous here anymore,” he says. “I kind of miss it.”