LUST FOR LAUGHS
The secret to scoring babes isn’t looks or money — it’s a good stand-up routine
ALTHOUGH Harrison Greenbaum graduated at the top of his Harvard class in 2008, the preppy bachelor didn’t score when it came to dates.
A self-professed goody-two-shoes high school valedictorian, he never made time for love, never mind a girlfriend.
“My dating life was nonexistent,” Greenbaum tells The Post.
But that changed once he became a professional comedian. He moved to the city after college, working his way up to doing stand-up full-time, and he now has more than 700 gigs a year.
His dating prospects skyrocketed alongside his career, and Greenbaum goes on one or two dates a week, mostly with women he meets at comedy clubs.
“Being a comedian is an interesting job [in New York],” says Greenbaum, 30, who regularly performs at Stand Up NY on the Upper West Side.
“Most [women] go on dates with lawyers, accountants or finance types, and comedians are interesting to them. They don’t want to talk to someone about spreadsheets. My job is exotic to them. I professionally make people laugh. That’s a fun thing.”
His observations about women loving funny men are spot on, according to a paper published in April in the British journal Royal Society Open Science.
In the study conducted by Scotland’s Abertay University, men and women
were shown portraits of members of the opposite sex, followed by fictional short stories that varied in humor and wit. Turns out, men with average faces were more attractive to the fairer sex if their short stories were funny and clever.
The study could help explain why more New York women are flocking to comedy clubs to meet bachelors instead of bars.
“I’ve definitely seen women out and about going to [comedy clubs] and even taking improv classes to find single men,” says Devyn Simone, a matchmaker at Three Day Rule, who’s seen this trend grow over the past two years.
“Humor is important to women because in 20 years, when he’s still leaving the toilet seat up, the only thing that’s going to get you through it is laughing at him or with him.”
After Greenbaum has a successful gig, women approach him and ask to hang out. Most are in their 30s, educated and hold white-collar jobs.
“If you have a really good [comedy] set, you’re a superhero,” says Greenbaum, who says that his act doubles as an icebreaker.
“You’re a magnified version of yourself,” he says. “You really do get that little extra boost to start talking to a girl . . . or a stranger approaching you. [Comedy] is a turn-on for [women].”
In December, he exchanged numbers with a woman after a gig. On their first date, he decided that they should book a whirlwind vacation to St. Lucia for the weekend — and they’ve been involved ever since.
Fellow comic Billy Procida, host of the “Manwhore Podcast,” says his brash sense of humor has made him a babe magnet who gets “five hookup appointments” weekly.
“She’ll justify [a hookup] to her friends” based on the funny factor, says Procida, 27, of Bushwick.
“That’s the effect comedy has on women. It’s like what alcohol has on some men.”
Gabrielle Puglia says she’d rather admire funny men at clubs such as Midtown’s Shake Rattle & Roll Dueling Pianos than try to meet dudes in tradi- tional bars.
“When you go to a bar, there’s little interaction and it’s so loud,” Puglia, a 29-year-old executive assistant based in Bay Ridge, tells The Post. She says she’s met prospective dates while going to comedy bars.
Carolyn, a 40-year-old educational researcher on the Upper West Side, also targets comedy clubs in the hopes of finding Mr. Right — whether it’s the comedian or an audience member with a sense of humor.
“It’s nice to be in a fun, funny environment to escape reality,” says Carolyn, who declined to give her last name for professional reasons.
She and her girlfriends have yet to meet their matches, though.
Interestingly, while men can up their attractiveness quotient through humor, the reverse isn’t true, according to the study published in Royal Society Open Science.
Dating expert Simone says that’s because men care more about beauty than personality.
“Men are just not as evolved,” Simone says. “Of course, women have a certain idea of what they want their partner to look like, but they value personality and stability at the end of the day . . . Men care about a woman’s looks because it’s a status symbol for them.”
And while Greenbaum admits that the men he knows don’t place a premium on finding a woman who’s drop-dead hilarious, he says they still want women who’ll be able to laugh at their jokes.
“If she doesn’t find you funny, it’s not gonna work out,” he says. “I definitely want some- one who has a sense of humor, but I don’t need someone to be professionally funny. I can carry that weight in the relationship.”
But there’s a dark side to dating a professional funnyman.
Carolyn Busa, a 31-year-old comic based in Prospect-Lefferts Gardens, always harbored crushes on famous comedians such as Conan O’Brien. She even considered herself a comedy groupie. But after casually dating a few of her colleagues, she decided that they’re not marriage material.
“I don’t think they make the best boyfriends long-term,” Busa says. “It’s great to see them onstage . . . But I also think they’re kinda secluded people and need their time to be by themselves . . . That can be frustrating.”
And, since humor can come from a very dark place, there’s usually a huge difference between the routine and the person behind it.
“Sure, onstage they’re appealing to the masses and trying to come across as approachable, but if you’re getting into a relationship with this person, he’s not gonna deal with [his emotions] in a bright and funny way,” Busa says. “It could be hard to deal with.”
“The effect comedy has on women [is] like what alcohol has on some men.” — comedian Billy Procida