Las Vegas Sun

March 29, 2024

Columnist Lisa Ferguson: Nailz hammers away at structure of big business

Insider-trading scandals. Shady accounting practices. Disappearing pension funds. Looming layoffs. Is it any wonder why American workers aren't smiling much these days?

Russ Stolnack understands their frustration. His job: Do whatever it takes to make burned-out laborers laugh again.

That's not such a tall order for the funny man to fill. A professional comic for nearly two decades, he uses his catchy nickname, Russ T. Nailz, when performing at comedy clubs in Las Vegas, Lake Tahoe and Atlantic City. That's how he's been billed this week while playing a nearly weeklong gig that wraps tonight through Sunday at The Improv at Harrah's.

He stumbled into a comedy career by way of his former career as a radio personality in San Diego, where he also worked in television news and won six regional Emmy Awards. All the while he's used the Nailz nickname -- Russ is his actual first name; T is his middle initial -- bestowed on him as a child by his late father.

"I've always been able to make people laugh," Nailz said recently from his San Diego home, "either with the faces that I make ... or character voices that I developed on the radio."

In his stand-up act, the 46-year-old father of three "breaks the ice by talking about myself," along with current events and personal observations. "There are some old, standard bits of humor that have lasted me over the years, and if the audience is new, so is the material. I don't go out to reinvent the wheel every night."

It's by using his birth name, Russ Stolnack, that he butters his bread, working as an emcee at various events, an auctioneer and a professional speaker. He appears at meetings and conventions performing his shtick (a sort of stand-up act for the corporate set) for employees of some of the biggest companies in the world. The catch: Audiences don't know he's kidding -- at least, not at first.

Stolnack isn't some big-business bigwig; he just plays one behind the podium as "The Executive Impostor."

Armed with a mock job title, "I come in as a serious speaker, and then make it obvious there's no chance I know what I'm talking about," he explains.

To prepare for his quasi- lectures he reads tons of literature about the companies that hire him to speak, studying technical terms, marketing strategies and such. "My pre-production work is expensive," he says.

His scripted bits generally last about 10 minutes. "The first five are real serious, with legitimate jargon that they would hear from the person I'm supposed to be."

Stolnack recalls the time he served as the featured speaker during a company meeting for Anheuser-Busch, where he had audience members "convinced that beer is liquid bread," and that its brew should share shelf space with Wonder Bread at supermarkets. "When they hear that, dollar signs are floating around in their heads and they're like, 'Yes, you're right,' and are gung-ho."

He's even had attentive audience members go so far as to take notes on his presentations. To play the part convincingly, he creates full-blown power-point presentations and uses a laptop computer as a prop.

Stolnack even tackles questions from eager employees. After mastering his improvisational skills over the years, deflecting bombs lobbed by hecklers, he says, "This is nothing, to answer a guy in a three-piece suit."

The second half of his speeches are when "I start going out even further on the limb, until I just completely fall off."

Last month he spoke to a crowd of Mercedes Benz conventioneers in San Francisco. The company is focused on luring young, hip consumers into its high-end, luxury-vehicle-filled showrooms. Stolnack ran with the information, telling employees the auto maker would soon begin referring to its cars as "Mizzle Bizzle" and using street-gang-like hand signals to describe its models:

" 'M-Class is three fingers down; E-Class is straight to the side. Let's all try that.' I had about half the crowd giving me the M-Class sign," he recalls.

When meeting-goers finally figure out Stolnack is a phony, "They just crack up," and he wraps up with a sampling from his comedy-club act.

As funny as the end results can be, Stolnack says he's learned some sad truths about Corporate America.

"There are a lot of people that are afraid to say what is really happening. There's one guy steering the ship, and the rest of the people are looking at him like, 'OK, we're on board with you, Chief' ... Someone needs to stand up and tell this guy he's so wrong, and I think he would appreciate it, actually."

While he's never had to burn the midnight oil behind a cubicle to make ends meet, he says he can sympathize with those who do. "I understand how important it is, if I were in that spot, to do what they're counting on me to do, because that's part of the cog that makes the big wheel turn."

Still, you won't catch him trading his microphone for some company name badge anytime soon. Whether as Russ T. Nailz or Russ Stolnack, "The best spot I can find myself is on a stage in front of a crowd that's expecting comedy."

Out for laughs

For a second time, Santa Fe Station's Green Room Comedy Club has shut its doors. The club opened during the summer and featured a rotating lineup of comics before closing in August without a specific reason offered by Station Casinos reps. The laughs returned in early September, but were silenced again following last weekend's performances by Vince Morris and Rob Brackenridge. Still no word on why the club was shuttered or whether it will return to the property in the future.

The "Joker's Wild Comedy Tour" pulls into the Aladdin Theatre on Nov. 28. The funny men and woman fit the bill: A.J. Johnson, who had a recurring role in the '90s sitcom "Martin"; Rudy Ray Moore (aka Dolemite); "The African King" Michael Blackson; Damon Williams, who served as the opening act on the "Original Kings of Comedy Tour"; and Simply Marvelous, a performer on "HBO's Def Comedy Jam." "Joker's Wild" tickets are $26.35, $36.85 and $47.35 and can be purchased by calling the hotel-casino's box office, 785-5000.

There's no reason not to catch local comic Mike Saccone's act, given that he performs it several times in the coming weeks: Monday through Thursday and Nov. 16, he headlines Excalibur's Catch a Rising Star, then shifts the opening spot there -- warming up crowds for comic/former talk-show hostess Caroline Rhea -- Nov. 14 and Nov. 15. Saccone moves to Palace Station's Laugh Trax for shows Nov. 25 through Nov. 29 before returning to Catch a Rising Star Dec. 14 through Dec. 21.

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