It may be pretty well known, especially in the Philadelphia area, that hotshot comic and podcaster Shane Gillis became a Guinness World Records holder twice over on July 17, when his Lincoln Financial Field show pulled in 73,946 attendees and sold 77,047 tickets. This earned him two titles.
What may not be well known is who exactly he took the title from, and which other comics around the world and from decades past have come close to matching this feat.
Gillis, the fired Saturday Night Live cast member who threw off the shame of that early-career rejection to become one of the most popular podcasters in the nation, is the new title-holder for largest audience for a comedian, and also for most tickets sold for a comedy show by a solo comedian. The second title represents a brand-new category Guinness created specifically around this event, with 54,000 set as the bar to clear.
For 18 years, up until Friday night, the Guinness World Records attendance record belonged to German comedian Mario Barth. The comic, also known as the “Tattoo Artist to the Stars” for having inked Sylvester Stallone, Tommy Lee, and Lenny Kravitz, was known for his rapid-fire observational humor. The Austria-born German comic performed for 67,733 people at Berlin’s Olympiastadion on July 12, 2008.
