Twenty Comedians will Fit Right At Home

He traveled to Boston, Chicago, Minneapolis, Austin and Atlanta.

He made trips to Washington, D.C., Raleigh, N.C., Indianapolis, Seattle, Denver, Los Angeles and San Francisco.

He conducted auditions in New York City, too.

After all was said and done, Eddie Brill found the 20 stand-up comedians he wanted to bring to Norfolk this summer.

“We’re very excited about the 20 comics who are coming to our fifth anniversary of the festival,” said Brill, who serves as the executive producer of the Viaero Great American Comedy Festival, as well as serving as the warm-up comic for “The Late Show with David Letterman.”

The 20 comedians invited to attend are “men and women from all over the U.S., in the top 1 percentile of comics who bring one-of-a-kind, creative, smart and silly material that would fit right at home on ‘The Tonight Show’ when Johnny Carson was hosting,” Brill added.

Ten of the 20 stand-up comedians will take to the Johnny Carson Theatre stage on Thursday, June 14, at 7 p.m., and the other 10 on Friday, June 15. Each night, four will be selected by a panel of judges to advance to the finals of the stand-up competition on Saturday, June 16.

The judges who will be on hand for the festival are:

— Bert Haas, executive vice president of Zanies Comedy Clubs in Chicago.

— Richard Barrett, entertainment director for the Comedy and Magic Club in Los Angeles.

— Rene Harte of the Improv comedy club in Fort Lauderdale, Fla.

The professional comedians invited to participate in the festival are:

Pete Lee of New York City, Harry Terjanian of New York City, Brian Hocker of Denver, Amber Tozer of New York City, Andrew Orvedahl of Denver,

Ryan Dalton of Cleveland, Dave Waite of Ludlow, Ky., Tom Keller of Raleigh, N.C., Reese Waters of Brooklyn, N.Y., Andrew Sleighter of Los Angeles,

Amber Preston of Minneapolis, Kevin McCaffrey of New York City, Gary Petersen of Boston, Denise Ramsden of Chicago, Johnny Beehner of Waukesha, Wisc., but originally from Omaha,

Janine Brito of San Francisco, Sasheer Zamata of New York City, Owen Smith of New York City, Ben Bizuneh of Bloomington, Ind., and Stephanie McHugh of Denver.