Comedian looks to joke about own experiences

Comedy is all about crafting stories, and for Chris Distefano, his own stories make for the best material.

Distefano, a New York-based comedian, will be performing May 5 and 6 at the Vermont Comedy Club.

In the past Comedy Central named him a “Comic to Watch” as part of the 2012 New York Comedy festival, and Distefano has headlined at the famous Gotham Comedy Club.

Distefano’s style involves observation, but the core is storytelling, rather than traditional jokes, he said.

“I’ve always been the type of comedian who prefers to be autobiographical,” Distefano said.

A key theme of his standup is family, especially his experiences caring for his daughter.

A lot of Distefano’s comedy comes from these interactions – how he was with my dad, how he is as a dad. Distefano regularly includes bits about his wife and mother as well.

“I think it relates to everybody,” he said.

In addition to his standup, Distefano regularly appears on MTV2’s “Guy Code,” a reality show that serves as “the ultimate guy’s guide to the laws of manhood,” according to the MTV website.

Right now, he is working on the pilot for “Distefano,” a sitcom based on the comedian’s own experiences.

The show is being produced by Carter Bays and Craig Thomas, creators of the show “How I Met Your Mother,” and has been picked up by CBS.

“Distefano” centers on two 20-somethings raising their newborn daughter and merging their loud families, according to Deadline, an entertainment news website.

The show will focus on the Italian and Puerto Rican background of the couple, which is based off of him and his wife, Distefano said.

The sitcom could potentially mean fulfilling a dream of Distefano’s.

“My goals have always been to do a lot of standup about my family and get a network sitcom,” he said.

Looking to the future, Distefano doesn’t think the sitcom will have too much of an effect on his act, at least not immediately.

“If my show gets on the air and it’s successful, maybe my standup will change a little bit,” he said. “But for now, I’m still just focused on that goal of talking about my family and things that happen to me.”