Organizers of Latina Comedy Festival in Chicago gear up for largest event yet

The Latina Comedy Festival is kicking off its fourth year — and largest festival — on Thursday, more than doubling the acts from seven last year to 20 this year.

It’s also happening during Hispanic Heritage Month and at a time when comedians are trying to navigate censorship, threats to free speech and cancel culture. The festival is also thinking a lot about what it means to put on an event amid President Donald Trump’s campaign against immigration in the city.

The fest takes place throughout the weekend at Bucktown’s multi-theater venue, The Lincoln Lodge, 2040 N. Milwaukee Ave. The lineup features several well-known Latina comedians from Chicago, including actors Melissa DuPrey and Gwen La Roka, plus TV personality Patti Vasquez.

The festival’s founders, Janice Rodríguez and Jess Martínez, kicked off the first edition in the festival in 2022 at The Lincoln Lodge. It all started from conversations about how there weren’t many spaces for Latina comedians.

“We thought it would be cool if we got everybody together at one show,” Rodríguez said in a recent chat. “There’s tons of comedy festivals, but we didn’t feel like there was anything for us.”

This year’s programming includes three shows fully in Spanish, which were added based on attendee feedback, Rodríguez said.

“It was really important to add those this year,” she said. “Somebody always told me that if you can understand a joke in another language, that is how you know that language.”

While Chicago is well-represented this year, there will also be several performances from Latinas living in different parts of the country or in Latin America.

Natasha Samreny is a Florida-based comedian who’ll be in three different shows throughout the weekend.

Several years ago, Samreny landed at The Second City after moving to Chicago to hone her writing skills. She previously worked as a reporter.

“Falling into improv at Second City was one of those things that sort of sort of taught me that I don’t have to worry so much about trying to be perfect or making things right,” she said. “That was a big breakthrough for me and one of the reasons I fell in love with comedy.”

It’s her second time performing at the Latina Comedy. Samreny brings a unique experience to the stage: She navigates the world as the daughter of an Ecuadorian mother and Italian-Lebanese father.

She’s excited about reconnecting with her Chicago comedy friends, especially those who will share the stage with her at The Cabronas Show on Thursday.

“It gives us free space to just go for it, whatever our comedy styles are,” she said. “Some of these women I haven’t seen in a minute … so I’m just excited to come and perform with them and see what they’ve been working on.”

Rodríguez said the festival’s partnership with The Lincoln Lodge has been essential to their growth over the years.
“They have three theaters, and so we’ve been able to expand,” she said. “We want to give the comedians more time instead of having only seven shows and everyone’s doing a couple of minutes.”

‘It’s a very weird time for creative people’

With the Trump administration launching “Operation Midway Blitz” in the city last month, The Lincoln Lodge also told Rodríguez and the team that it’s prepared to handle any federal agents from Immigration and Customs Enforcement or the Department of Homeland Security.

Rodríguez said that the Latina Comedy Festival leadership has been having important conversations about the fears and threats their audiences face when attending a live show.

The venue told Rodríguez to let them handle things: “They said, ‘Let our permanent Lincoln Lodge staff handle it. You guys worry about the show,'” she said.

It’s a private, ticketed event, and though agents aren’t legally able to enter and detain anyone without warrants, fears still cast a shadow over immigrant communities.

“It’s a very weird time for creative people. It’s making me write differently,” Rodríguez said. She’ll find herself stopping or second-guessing her words at times.

After comedian Jimmy Kimmel’s show was temporarily suspended after he critiqued Donald Trump’s response to Charlie Kirk’s death, comedians like Rodríguez and Samreny began to worry even more about how artists might face punishment.

Samreny is coping in her own way. “You develop a weird wit or a sharp sense of humor. Some people may call it dark, and part of that’s a survival mechanism when it comes to … the idea of censorship,” she said.

DuPrey, an Afro Latina from Humboldt Park, said she’s also concerned about the unfolding of recent events.

“As the political climate goes in waves, it does affect where artists get to perform,” DuPrey continued.

DuPrey has been a part of the festival every year. She’ll host two shows this weekend.

“Chicago feels like it’s the ‘Midbest,'” DuPrey said. “It just feels real, and it feels connected and grounded, like you’re talking to a real person.”

She’s grateful for the stage, too.

“There are fewer and fewer spaces, especially for women of color, to be on stage,” DuPrey said. “It is the first and only [fest] of its kind that features nothing but Latina talent … I think that it being in the fourth year is a testament of how necessary it is to get to have a space.”

She’s worked in the industry for more than a decade, and is also known for starring in Fatimah Asghar and Sam Bailey’s web series “Brown Girls,” which is set in Pilsen, and the ABC medical drama “Grey’s Anatomy.”

The festival shows year after year that the Latina experience is a complete spectrum, she said.

“Just because we’re Latina comics doesn’t mean all of our content is specifically generated for Latinas and is about Latinidad,” DuPrey said. “You’re going to find a lot of different people … It’s for everyone.”