Comedian Ben Wasserman to perform at Bloomington funeral home

Want a few laughs on Tuesday night? Allen Funeral Home has just the ticket.

Besides regular business, the mortuary is bringing a comedian to town. For one night only, Ben Wasserman, a stand-up comic from New York City, will be sharing laughs in a show titled “Live After Death.”

Billed as “The World’s Most Chaotic Comedy Show About Grief & Loss,” Wasserman will be performing Tuesday night in the chapel at the funeral home. Doors open at 7 p.m. and admission is $15.

According to David Shirley, owner of the mortuary at 4155 S. Old State Road 37, Wasserman will be stopping in Bloomington on his way back to New York after doing a show at a funeral home in the Denver area. But Wasserman has a family connection here, Shirley said.

“His sister is a rabbi — she was at Beth Shalom,” he said, referring to the temple on East Third Street. Rabbi Mira Beth Wasserman now serves on the faculty at Reconstructing Judaism, in Wyncote, a suburb of Philadelphia.Ben Wasserman, according to his website, began playing the funeral- home circuit after suffering a number of losses himself — within 3 years, he grieved the deaths of his dad, granddad, uncle, and four friends.His show, the website reports, “blends comedy, clowning, and crowd work as he leads the audience on a hilarious yet moving journey through grief, honoring and celebrating the ones we’ve lost along the way.”Wasserman has been the subject of articles in The New York Times, The Boston Globe, Chicago Reader, and NPR, among others.From a recent story in Paste Magazine:“What sets Wasserman’s hour apart is the combined chaos and magic of ample audience interaction. No two performances are alike; the alchemy of the particular audience drastically changes the end result.”Shirley said Wasserman called about two months ago to see if a show here sounded interesting. “I thought — why not?” Shirley said.He’d heard about Wasserman’s appearances at other funeral homes. “They just love him.”And how are advance ticket sales for the Bloomington show going?

“I think we’re up to about 60,” Shirley said.

This article originally appeared on The Herald-Times: Allen Funeral Home to host comedian Ben Wasserman