When Raices Brewing Co. approached Denver comedian Ricky Ramos two years ago about starting a Spanish-English open-mic night, Ramos was dubious.
“I didn’t really think it would work in a town where there’s, like, six of us right now,” Ramos said.
No joke. There were very few Latino comedians performing at comedy clubs at the time, and virtually no other opportunities to perform bilingual comedy in the city, despite Denver’s population being about 30 percent Latino according to 2022 census data.
Raices was unfazed by the challenge. That’s because the brewery, which opened in Denver’s Sun Valley in 2019, believes its beer is just the excuse to gather, often over cultural programs like salsa dancing and language exchanges, said bilingual program coordinator Paula Campos.
“Raices is a brewery, but it started as a project about roots, to bring everyone a little piece of home,” Campos said. “It works more as a cultural platform, which allows us to give space for these events to happen. The exchange of culture is the most important part.”
Comedy seemed to be an ideal addition to Raices’ lineup of programming. Raices’ owners saw a gap they could fill, and Ramos — who was making a name for himself on the circuit as a Denver local — was the person to make it a reality. In the summer of 2021, Raices Comedia was born, and as Latino comics came to Raices to tell their jokes in Spanish, English and anywhere in between, Ramos noticed their ranks were growing at a rate he didn’t previously think possible.
While comedy open-mic nights generally don’t prohibit comics from speaking Spanish, an intimidating performance is made even worse when a comedian is unsure if the audience will understand them. Ramos realized there were plenty of potential comedians in Denver who didn’t have a central place to get the laughs and instant feedback that most up-and-comers crave.
“(They told) me, ‘Hey, I never tried this because I never thought I would get a reaction; why am I going to do something if nobody’s going to understand me?’” Ramos said. “’So why even put myself through that as a comedian?’”
One of the up-and-comers is Israel Avila, who moved to Denver from Chihuahua, Mexico, seven years ago. He’s always been a fan of comedy, citing Mexican comic Franco Escamilla and American funnyman Gabriel “Fluffy” Iglesias as favorites, but didn’t have a place to practice his craft as he was learning and practicing English. As he started doing his sets in Spanish and eventually Spanglish and English, Avila said he saw Ramos as something of a mentor.
“I’m still learning from a lot of comics, including Ricky Ramos,” Avila said. “He opened the door for comics like me.”
For Ramos, opportunities to tell jokes on stage provided escape from adversity — it undoubtedly informs his exuberance for helping others find comfort in comedy.
Ramos was raised near West 38th Avenue and Federal Boulevard, in what is now known as Denver’s Highland neighborhood. During his senior year at North High School in 2004, his grandmother, the matriarch and homemaker of his family, died, setting off a period of his life in which he turned to drugs, alcohol and gang activity to fill his time.
“I stopped really caring about things,” Ramos said. “I wasn’t working a job, I was just selling drugs. I was running around getting drunk every day, just acting a fool.”
Ramos, who was a lifelong fan of stand-ups like George Carlin and Robin Williams, got onstage for the first time at an open mic in the Hotel Boulderado while he was working for a call center in Boulder County. He says the set was a disaster, but he took it as a challenge. Soon, he was hopping around the city to get on whatever open mics he could and taking daily hours-long public transit rides from Denver to Boulder to Longmont from work, to open mics, and back home again.
Eventually, his double lives as a comedian and gang member started to diverge — he was booking big shows in comedy, only to miss them because he was spending days in jail.
“I was supposed to do a show with Tommy Chong from Cheech & Chong,” Ramos said. “And, as the show was starting, I was literally in the day room at Boulder County Jail. I was like, ‘No, this isn’t where I want to be. This isn’t what I want to do. This isn’t where I want to end my story.’ ”
His final commitment to a life of comedy was when he met his wife, Brie Ruiz-Ramos. She was attending a show at the Speakeasy in Longmont, where Ramos was hosting, and started heckling him as he was onstage. He now says she didn’t know she wasn’t supposed to heckle; she only thought she was livening up a dull room on a slow night. From that moment on, he said, his life changed: he fell in love, dove into comedy for good, stopped doing hard drugs, and became a father figure to Ruiz’s three children.
“Since I’ve been in this stable situation, it’s skyrocketed even more because I’ve been able to focus on comedy,” Ramos said. “I’ve been able to put my heart into it.”
Now, Ramos is a youth-prison advocate in addition to hosting comedy shows up and down the Front Range. Stand-up comedy was the catalyst for a life of stability and joy for him. At Raices, he’s dedicated his time to making sure all Denver comedy hopefuls have the chance to find the same purpose he did on the stage.
“Eight years ago, I was sitting in a prison cell, not knowing if I was going home or not,” Ramos said. “So for me to be in this situation that I’m in now, you know … running seven rooms up and down the Front Range, a condo in Longmont with a patio and a yard and garage … I grew up in the projects in Denver, so success to me is — I’m successful now. So for these guys, I can only imagine what that looks like for them.”
Now, Ramos is making more plans for Raices Comedia. He hopes to start a program to help new comedians learn the sides of comedy that don’t happen onstage, like marketing and creating a social media presence.
Along with Raices Comedia, Ramos has started Vatos Locos Comedy Festival, coming September 27-30 at locations in Denver, Longmont and Greeley, which he proudly dubs as Colorado’s first bilingual comedy festival. It’s grown alongside Raices, starting out as a one-night bilingual comedy jam featuring Joey Medina, who made a name for himself on “The Original Latin Kings of Comedy” with George Lopez and Cheech Marin, into what Ramos hopes will be a weekend-long festival celebrating all that Denver bilingual comedy has to offer.
“We do officially have a bilingual scene now,” Ramos said. “Which is one of the greatest assets that we can have.”
