BYU NewsNet - Laugh Out Loud Says Goodbye to Founding Member With Show

Kenny McNett has always loved to make people laugh: on stage, in class, in the theater and even in church.

"I was always the guy in the back of class cracking jokes and trying to make people laugh," said McNett, a senior from Federal Way, Wash., majoring in advertising. In one BYU class, he and a buddy kept score of how often they made the other students laugh. Extra points were earned by getting the professor to laugh, too.

When McNett came to BYU, he looked for a way to get involved in comedy. He joined an off-campus improv group called 23-skidoo, and that experience eventually led to the formation of Laugh Out Loud as a BYUSA club.

Four years after Laugh Out Loud was officially organized early in 2003, the group is saying goodbye to one of its last remaining founding members.

Laugh Out Loud's "The Goodbye Kenny Show" will be tonight at 8. Doors open at 7:30. Tickets are available at the WSC info desk for $2, or for $3 at the door.

While Laugh Out Loud shows normally have only five "players," this show will have several more, said David Hutchison, 24, a senior from New Zealand majoring in physics. "Everybody wants to be in this one, so it's going to be a huge show."

"I'm excited that it's going to be such a huge cast," said Laugh Out Loud president Allan Mount, 24, a senior majoring in economics. "The on-stage chemistry is going to be nice."

One of McNett's roles has been to teach new improv games to the players, Mount said. McNett understands what will and won't work on stage, but remains open to ideas.

"He's fun to be around, but he's very professional," Mount said. "He takes his comedy seriously."

McNett's experience with Laugh Out Loud has opened doors for him to emcee numerous on-campus events. He also appreciates the opportunity Laugh Out Loud has given him to make friends with fun people.

"I'll tell anyone to join a club or start their own," McNett said. "Laugh Out Loud is great for me, but there are so many clubs on campus and so many ways to get involved that I feel so bad for people who don't get involved and let that slip by."

Now that graduation is here, McNett plans to take the lessons he's learned through starting Laugh Out Loud and another group, Decaf Comedy Jam, to his new home in California.

"It's kind of hard to find a clean comedy group that I can join, especially outside of Utah," McNett said. "So maybe I'll start my own group in California and keep representing the clean comedy out there."