Many comics argue in favor of stand-up being an art form; both Patton Oswalt and Kyle Kinane have said as much on their comedy albums. And there is a real case to be made on their behalf. Most long stand-up sets are arranged much like a symphony or a Broadway musical: a strong opening riff to draw you in, an extended middle section where little motifs and beats spark and dazzle along the way, and a big closer to send you out into the night beaming.

It was great, then, to see comedy given a big showcase as part of an arts festival like TBA, and to see the stand-ups invited to be part of the night by host Jason Traeger (he takes the pictures on the Portland Stand-Up Comedy Photo Album blog when he's not doing comedy himself) bring so many different variations of the form to The Works.

The biggest surprise of the evening was an appearance by former Portlander Ron Funches. The jocular co-star of the NBC sitcom Undateable was apparently in town, in part, to finalize his divorce, a situation that he was quick to make light of in his signature lackadaisical style: "At least I know who is to blame for this situation...[long pause]...my son. Have to put the blame squarely on his little shoulders." (I'm paraphrasing this so forgive me if I didn't get it exactly right.) It was obvious the situation wasn't getting him down, or he's just been enjoying some local weed, as he seemed downright giddy up there, snickering at his own punchlines and not seeming phased when the stairs leading off the stage collapsed underneath him (he didn't get hurt, by the way).

Otherwise, we got an array of familiar, and mostly male, faces. And if there was a theme to be teased out of the night, it was an emphasis on some absurdist voices. Tim Ledwith ceded most of his time to a hilarious PowerPoint presentation that had AppleTalk reading a long suicide note he supposedly wrote when he was 12, accompanied by a slideshow of childhood pictures. Christian Ricketts, on the other hand, presented a long bit that involved a mute ventriloquist's dummy named Lou that warned of the dangers of tobacco products before apparently ranting about a Zionist conspiracy. It was one of those set pieces that goes from really funny to not funny at all back to being funny again, if only by dint of the sheer ridiculousness of watching a grown man wrestle a felt puppet onstage.

The comic that seemed to wake the late night crowd up the most was Amy Miller. As you may know, her style has a more traditional stand-up bent, but that seemed to spark something in the 300+ strong audience. Having seen her set a number of times now, I can safely say that the X Factor was the confidence with which she delivered the material. Her riffs on dating younger men and growing up in a trashy family were familiar to me, but I still found myself guffawing away at them anew. If anything came out of last night's fine comedy showcase, it's that my money is on Miller becoming the city's next breakout star.