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A KickAss Time Multi-faceted artist Coral Thede knows how to keep spirits (and tits) up. BY LILY DETAEYE
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oral Thede’s house is as bright and welcoming as she is. The walls of her office space are a galaxy of pink, gold and blue. They provide a gentle background for the instruments, costumes and books strewn about in the signature chaos of a creative person. Her kitchen, familiar to those who tune into her Instagram livestreams, is punctuated with brightly colored odds and ends that come together to paint a vivid picture of Thede. It’s here that we sit, and she tells me that before her blockbuster show, Tits Up!, which runs at Teehee’s Comedy Club, she didn’t really consider herself a stand-up comedian. “I’ve always kinda been funny and kinda been musical and was just kinda in those realms, but not fully in them. And then when Teehee’s opened, I was like ‘Oh, now I actually have a stage and a space to do this thing.’” Thede started going to open mics when the club opened its doors in 2019. Previously, she had traveled the world—made country music in Nashville, performed theater in Wyoming—and she found herself in Des Moines with a new job and a new house just months before the COVID-19 pandemic turned everything on its head. But despite her extensive entertainment background, Thede didn’t jump right into stand-up. “Teehee’s opened and I was there opening weekend,” she said. “And then the first Monday night show, I chickened out. I chickened out for two months. Like, I would sit in the back and wouldn’t sign up. I was just so nervous. It’s one thing to be a funny person, it’s a different thing to just actually get up there and do stand-up.”
Gabriel Greco / Little Village
Once Thede finally did get onstage, the comedy bug bit her and she decided to sign up for Teehee’s’ first stand-up comedy class. Unfortunately, the showcase for the class was postponed due to the pandemic. It’s no secret that independent venues struggled, and are still struggling,
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during the pandemic. According to a study conducted by the National Independent Venue Association (NIVA), independent venues in America lost billions of dollars in revenue by being closed during most of 2020. This doesn’t include food and beverage revenue lost, and it doesn’t include the financial impact
Tits Up! Teehee’s Comedy Club, Des Moines, Saturday, April 30 at 7 p.m., $25-130
of the years following 2020. And while the struggle was real for Teehee’s, as it was for other Des
