Comedian Tim Cavanagh loves Cedar Rapids audiences

Whenever Tim Cavanagh returns to Cedar Rapids, he always thinks of Penguins Comedy Club. It was the comic-musician’s favorite gig.

“I loved Penguins,” Cavanagh said while calling from his Chicago home. “I worked there for 25 years. I enjoyed everything about it. The audience was always great and the guy who ran it, Jeff Johnson, is one of the most honest and straightforward guys in the business.”

Penguins — housed in a variety of locations after the 2008 flood — ended when the pandemic altered life in March of 2020. Johnson, however, has been putting together comedy shows at the Olympic South Side Theater, where Cavanaugh will perform Saturday night, March 2, 2024.

“I look forward to the show there, since the Olympic is a 300-seat theater, which is intimate enough for comedy,” Cavanagh said. “I look forward to the show since Iowa crowds are always nice and educated. They know comedy in Cedar Rapids.”

Expect to experience a number of amusing tunes.

“I love playing funny songs,” he said. “I have a new one about neutering pets. It’s written from the dog’s perspective.”

It’s also difficult having a gig like Cavanagh’s brother, who works in human resources and handles drug testing.

“He literally has to go into the bathroom with guys to make sure the person urinates in a cup,” Cavanagh said. “Everybody at work must hate him.”

But the song spinning out of that task a crowd pleaser, according to Cavanagh.

“I like wordplay and so does the audience,” he said.

However, wordplay, set up and punchlines are taking a back seat to storytelling. Many standups are spinning yarns in lieu of delivering jokes.

“It’s true,” Cavanagh said. “I love a good punch line. But so many comics just go up there and tell stories. There’s an art to that. I don’t disparage young comics who tell stories, but I love comics that hit with jokes.”

Set up and punchlines like Cavanagh renders keeps the laughs per minute high.

“I love that,” he said. “That’s the reason to come to a comedy show. Sometimes a story, as well as it can be told, takes four minutes to get a laugh. The shame is that it’s now the norm for younger audiences. My shows are a little different. I hope there’s a quite a few laughs a minute.”

There were no laughs for Cavanagh in 2021, when the comic was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer.

“I was very lucky and unlucky,” he said. “I lost the entire year battling cancer. But I got very lucky that I’m fine now.”

Cavanagh visited the ER after being sick for two weeks. A stage two malignant mass was found on his pancreas.

“They contained it with chemo and radiation, and then I had surgery,” he said.

The doctors declared Cavanagh cancer free in 2022.

“It was really frightening, but I came out on the other side of it,” he said. “I’m so happy to be able to perform again, since comedy is such a pleasure.”

Cavanagh delivers some bits inspired by his ordeal.

“But my comedy isn’t about reality,” he said. “I try to keep it light. People need it that way, since with the way the world is going, people need to laugh now more than ever."