Jayson Cross was originally working toward being an accountant, but that career path didn’t add up for the Chicago-based stand-up comedian.
Cross has a love for southern Wisconsin venues, but he will be bringing laughter and fun up north when he performs two shows Oct. 24 at Ignacio’s Puebla Street Food, 230 E. Green Bay St., Shawano. The visit is part of his “Moral Dilemma” tour.
Cross has done stand-up comedy for two decades, but he didn’t originally plan on extruding laughter from the public on a regular basis. He was attending the University of Illinois and majoring in accounting, following in the footsteps of his father, a tax accountant, when he met a modeling agent at a mall who commented on his high cheek-bones and broad shoulders.
“Initially, I thought he was hitting on me,” Cross said. “Then he gave me his card, and I showed it to my parents, and they said, ‘Hey, give it a call. It couldn’t hurt.’”
After discovering the agent was for real, Cross crossed the Wisconsin border to West Bend for his first photo shoot for Kohl’s department stores. He considered that a pretty good payday for a 21-year-old, and he decided to move to New York to pursue modeling as a career.
However, Cross’s first year in New York found him struggling to make ends meet with print media modeling, so his agent suggested he try getting into commercials. The agent suggested he try to do stand-up comedy to get noticed by commercial casting directors.
“I wound up falling in love with comedy,” Cross said. “I think it’s the greatest, the best art in the world. It’s instant gratification. You know if the joke works then and there or not. If it’s fine, they laugh, and you instantly know. If it’s not, they don’t laugh, and you instantly know.”
The same philosophy applies with live theater, Cross said, but with film actors and models, it takes time before discovering if their work is a brilliant success or a flop.
Oftentimes, comics are also the writers and marketers of their shows, which allows Cross to be involved in every aspect, not just having the expectation of making people laugh. He said it’s good to be involved from beginning to end with his work.
Cross noted he has an outline of what he wants to say, but it’s 50/50 between scripted routines and crowd work, where comedians get audience participation to map out where the laughter goes next.
The “Moral Dilemma” tour comes in the aftermath of a hate crime in which Cross intervened. The victim was being attacked by a brick, and although the matter was scary, Cross has turned the incident into a story that people can laugh at.
“I have the bullet points of it, and I just let it come out emotionally but in a funny way,” Cross said. “I go through it and work it loosely because I want to be in the moment. I want to go back so I can paint a picture for the audience of how intense the situation was, as well as the crazy thoughts in my mind, which drives the humor.”
Even with finding the humor, Cross said he was traumatized by what happened. The attacker was sentenced two years later to 14 years behind bars, and Cross decided it was time to move back to Chicago.
“I thought, Lord knows what he’s plotting in there, so I moved back to Chicago,” he said. “Now, you know you are very scared when you move to Chicago for safety. When Chicago is the safe alternative, you are shaking in your boots.”
Cross believes everything has some thin thread of humor in it. It’s the delivery, he said, that determines whether comedians get a laugh or booed off the stage.
“I think everything has a humorous lining,” Cross said. “It’s just how the situation is framed. Real emotion, like admitting fear, can be funny, depending on how it’s conveyed.”
Comedy proved to be a catharsis for Cross, who said he’d experienced panic attacks following the hate crime incident. He said it took three years before he tried to work it into his routine.
“Now, people are rolling in the aisles about it,” Cross said. “Go figure.”
Besides doing stand-up comedy, he also works as a reading interventionist for the Chicago Catholic Diocese. As a result, jokes about education and occasionally faith work their way into routines.
“Education is the gift that keeps on giving,” Cross said. “I feel like every teacher is a part-time comic anyway, because you need it to keep your sanity. Dealing with the students, the bureaucracy, the parents — there is a lot of humor there.”
Cross also talks about the constant and relentless teasing when he was a child, especially being enrolled in a Chicago language academy. He noted that someone jokingly called him a Nazi, which he refers to as “the other N-word.”
“It’s kind of hard being the only Black man on the south side of Chicago speaking German,” Cross said. “It drew a lot of attention. That’s for sure.”
However, learning German is a benefit for Cross when he performs in Wisconsin, as many families in the state have German roots.
“That’s why you have all the great breweries in Milwaukee or the southern Wisconsin area,” he said, noting that when he visits, he stops at The Brat Stop in Kenosha to get brats and German potato salad. “I consider myself a Germanophile.”
AT A GLANCE
WHAT: Jayson Cross stand-up comedy
WHEN: 6 p.m. and 8 p.m. Oct. 24
WHERE: Ignacio’s Puebla Street Foods, 230 E. Green Bay St., Shawano
TICKETS: $45, available at Ignacio’s
Comedy serves as a catharsis for Jayson Cross, a former model who intervened once in a hate crime and suffered panic attacks for years a result. Now, he’s found a way to turn that incident into something people can laugh about. (Contributed)
