Joe Recca's Biography

COMEDIAN JOE RECCA started doing comedy in 1987 at the Comedy Café in Washington, DC. A veteran comedian who started doing comedy with Dave Chappell. “Dave Chapelle and I would sit in the back of the club waiting to do our five minutes.”

Joe’s style of comedy can be described in three words: Funny, Funny, Funny. His real life comedy comes from life experiences. Observations of growing up in the south, racism, ex-wife, relationships; Joe’s comedy covers it all.

All ages, all races, everybody can relate to Joe’s comedy. Joe’s creativity comes from a love of making people laugh. Joe says, “No matter what race you are or what language you speak, we all laugh the same, everyone understands laughter.”

Joe was a probation counselor working in corrections, “People will listen to anything you have to say if you make it funny. There was an inmate who would find Jesus every time he got locked up. He’d say, ‘I’m back with Christ’. You wasn’t with Christ when you had those people lying face down in that liquor store. ‘Christ will set you free’. Christ better be on the parole board”.

I am a faithful follower of Jesus Christ. I’ve been a comedian for over 17 years, and I’ve been confronted with a lot of difficulties including the death of both my parents and recently my grandmother passing away. With all the ups and downs and trials that life has brought me since leaving my job as a probation counselor in 1990 and going into comedy full time the one common denominator has been God. God has always been my rock that I held on to at times when I didn’t have a stable place to live when I didn’t have money to buy food and wasn’t sure where the next dollar would come from, when I could feel the walls closing in on me, and then out nowhere a phone call would come in and work would come and I would be able to pay my bills. So, I know the power of faith and hard work.

A year or so ago I took a paint-less dent repair class so I could learn how to remove dents out of cars because I was tired of struggling as a comedian, but I was so bad at dent removal I wound up putting more dents in the cars than I took out. I got booked to do a comedy show in New York and got cancelled the day I was to tape the show.

So I prayed and asked God to help me in my career. You see I’m working hard just to put a little heat on me. A comedian called me and asked me to help him write some material because he was auditioning for a television show on BET called Coming to the Stage this was the second season of the show. It was the highest rated show on BET and made the first season winner Lil JJ famous. So I went to the audition of Coming to the Stage and waited and waited in this long line because there were over 80 people auditioning in Baltimore.

From Baltimore they selected me and 2 other comedians to go to Hollywood to tape Coming to the Stage along with 30 others they selected from around the country.

I just wanted to be seen on the show and get some exposure, but after my third week on the show I started to ask God to help me to win. And this is how I know what God has for you, he has for you. Because when I thought I was going to get voted off the show there I was still in the running. The show was a 13 week show and I was on the show for 7 weeks and in the finals the judges declared me the winner of Coming to the Stage…the Superstar of Funny. I received a $7,000 Ice-tech watch, a Disney cruise, a walk on appearance on the UPN sitcom Eve, and a BET special. The exposure gave my career the boost it needed to the next level and got my name out there. So I know the power of Faith, Prayer and Preparation!!