Scott Lindner has had more time over the last several months to take on gigs at the recording studio he co-owns in Long Island City.

Lindner and his business partner did keep their other joint venture up and running during the pandemic but New York Comedy Club was only operating at bare minimum. All venues have the option now of going to 100% capacity for fully vaccinated people.

  “We’ve been lucky enough to partner up with rooftops around the city. So, we’ve been operating on rooftops throughout most of the pandemic doing safe outdoor shows,” Lindner said.

So when New York State adopted CDC guidance last week which now allows  entertainment venues true option of returning to 100% capacity, if all guests are fully vaccinated, he quickly put together a plan to offer shows inside.  

They tried it out last weekend but Linder said they didn’t see a huge spike in interest for those indoor shows.

“I think there is a brand of people who are ready to go back inside and they are going guns blazing, they are fully vaccinated and just want to get back to normal and then there are people who are a little more weary, maybe they feel safer going to a rooftop,” said Lindner.

He told NY1 it may still be too early to tell what patrons really want and whether they even feel comfortable attending shows at 100% capacity, even if they’ve been fully vaccinated.

What he does know is that he had to take advantage of being allowed to return to 100% capacity.

Kambri Crews, the owner of QED Astoria, agreed and said that it’s a matter of being able to make a living.

“It’s imperative for our bottom line considering we’ve been closed for almost a year,” said Kambri Crews, which did keep its gift shop open several times a week over the last several months.

Q.E.D. is a live entertainment venue that hosts a variety of events but does often have comedy shows in its line-up.

While choosing to take advantage of offering events at 100% capacity, for fully vaccinated guests, Crews also wanted to ensure she wouldn’t be turning away any potential clients who happened to be unvaccinated.

In mid-June, when she will begin to offer shows at 100% capacity, she still plans to offer at least one show a night for unvaccinated guests.

“Our plan is to have 5p, 7p, 9p and 11 o’clock shows. The 5 o’clock will be mixed company, it will be reduced capacity...then the 7p and the 9 o’clock shows will be vaccinated only,” said Crews.

Crews and Lindner said that they hope by offering both vaccinated and unvaccinated shows , that they’ll see some kind of an increase in their cash flow.  

Both said, at this point, they are just trying to pay the mounting bills.

Currently, neither has received a dime from the much touted “Save Our Stages program” which got approval in December.

Both told NY1 that their applications for assistance have been in “pending” status for several weeks and they don’t know when they’ll find out whether they’ve been approved.
 
Bottom line, these NYC business owners just want to get back to making people laugh.