Hailing from the mean streets of “The City That Reads,” comedian, actor, and writer Stavros Halkias has spent the past decade and a half blazing his own trail to comedy greatness. Known for his razor-sharp wit and impeccable comedic timing, he has consistently left audiences in stitches. Far from being an overnight sensation, Stavros has remained laser-focused, pushing himself creatively both on the mic and behind the scenes while navigating the complexities of internet fame. The results speak for themselves; his recent accomplishments read like a greatest hits list. So, if you’re unfamiliar with Stavv and his unique brand of comedy, let us run it back for you!
After honing his craft at open mics across the DMV (D.C., Maryland, Virginia), Stavros became a driving force behind the wildly popular podcast “Cum Town,” which ran from 2016 to 2022. His debut comedy special, “Live at the Lodge Room,” garnered a million views in just four days and currently sits at over 6.8 million views. In late 2022, his evolution continued with the launch of his hilarious, advice-driven podcast “Stavvy’s World,” which debuted at number three on the iTunes comedy charts and attracted hundreds of thousands of subscribers in its first year. The following year, he was named to Vulture’s list of “Comedians You Should and Will Know” and identified by GQ as “at the front of a new wave of comedians.” Riding that wave, his sophomore comedy special, “Fat Rascal,” debuted on Netflix in December 2023, becoming an instant hit and bringing even more attention to his unique body of work.
It’s important to note that he isn’t afraid to throw you a curveball. For example, Stavros is an accomplished model, having walked in Kid Super’s Paris Fashion Week show in 2023, where he was described by Vogue as “the plus-est of plus-size models.” (I guess it never hurts to have a backup plan!) While stand-up comedy will always be his true passion, he also shines as a comedic actor, as demonstrated by his role in Netflix’s comedy series “Tires,” where he stars alongside series creator and comedian Shane Gillis. As you can see, it’s been a wild ride for Stavvy, and thankfully, he’s just getting warmed up.
In his most impressive feat to date, Stavros is making the jump to the silver screen with “Let’s Start A Cult,” an uproarious throwback comedy that he co-wrote and stars in. What’s it all about, you ask? Having missed out on his cult’s long-awaited ritual suicide, an obnoxious loser named Chip Harper teams up with his bogus ex-messiah to rebuild their doomsday commune. Traveling together through middle America, this constantly bickering duo inducts a military wannabe, a mentally unstable mom, and a mysterious foreign hitchhiker into their cult. But will this family of outcasts fulfill their transcendent destiny, or will they decide this life might be worth living after all? Touted as one of the funniest comedies of 2024, the film is finally headed to theaters this October via Dark Sky Films.
Jason Price of Icon Vs. Icon recently caught up with Stavros Halkias to get the inside scoop on his origin story, creative evolution, and the making of “Let’s Start A Cult,” his first feature film. Along the way, he offers glimpses into his future and shares his thoughts on where the road ahead might lead him.
You’ve made quite a name for yourself in comedy over the past several years, but let’s start at the beginning. Everyone has a unique story, so I wanted to know how comedy first made an appearance in your life.
I grew up right around the Adam Sandler and Chris Farley years of ‘Saturday Night Live.’ My mom was a waitress at a Greek restaurant, and I would literally watch SNL as I waited for her to bring home leftover calamari. So it’s like my two great loves of comedy and fried food kind of melded together at an early age! From there, it was comedy movies first. It’s really not that different from “Let’s Start A Cult.” It was comedian-centered movies where you have one really dumb, confident guy in the middle, and then a bunch of really hilarious characters kind of orbiting them.
We got cable kind of late, like in my teen years. We got DISH Network because they had Greek channels. Initially, we weren’t allowed cable, but as soon as my Dad found out you could get Greek TV on it, that’s when we got it! That’s when we got Comedy Central. At the time, Comedy Central pretty much just replayed Comedy Central half-hour specials and classic Saturday Night Live. That was kind of what did it for me and I became really obsessed with it. I watched an incredible amount of stand-up. When I was a little kid, I had always been a performer. I would be in school plays and stuff like that. I always wanted attention! Even as a baby, I would sing songs, put on my little plays, and make my family watch. My parents bought me a little tape recorder. It was a little Speak and Spell-type thing. Bizarrely, I would spend hours talking into it. It’s funny to think back on now, but I was essentially recording a podcast, which is insane. So, I guess even as little kids, we know what we’re destined for, but that’s really what it was. I’ve been doing stand-up since my freshman year in college when I did an open mic in the basement of my dorm. So, I pretty much have been doing stand-up since I was 19. It wasn’t really thought out. It was just one of those things where I was like, “Okay, you do that when you’re young. It’s easy. Easy. I’ll just keep going with that.” Then, you wake up one day only to realize you’re just a 35-year-old man with no other abilities, so you have to try and pivot to movies and turn to acting to flesh out your career! But yeah, it’s as simple as I loved it growing up, and when I had the chance to do it, I did it. There was not a lot of thinking other than that, other than I knew I was the kind of guy who wanted a regular job. I just couldn’t. I had a lot of anxiety, and I had a lot of I felt really bad. I was good at school, but I hated it. I hated having assignments and being told what to do. I just needed a very stupid job and wouldn’t even call it a job. Honestly, I didn’t look at it as a job at all, and I was prepared to fail when I started doing open mics. It was something I just wanted to do for myself. So, yeah, dude, I just kind of got lucky. That’s the origin story, and it’s not anything crazy. I didn’t want a job when I was 19, and I just did stand-up instead. [laughs]
At the root of it all, you’re a storyteller. What drew you that, and how have you evolved in that role?
That’s an interesting question, and I keep coming back to it, especially since I co-wrote the film, which is the most direct storytelling I’ve ever been involved in. Before this film, I thought of myself more as just a performer. Much of what I do is entertain, and I really enjoy spontaneous moments—whether on podcasts, giving advice on my show without preparation, or getting on stage with my unique style, there’s a good amount that’s unscripted. I think I’m learning that at the core of all entertainment, you have to tell a story and craft a narrative. I really enjoyed that aspect of writing a movie because as much as I love stand-up, I think it can be a little limiting. Sometimes, you kind of have to get a laugh, no matter what, every 15 seconds. So, it’s kind of hard to set up larger themes. Listen, this movie is not “The Godfather.” [laughs’] This movie is a simple, stupid, fun movie with a lot of jokes, but you get to be more creative in how those jokes are delivered. You get to put them in the context of a greater story. So, I really am enjoying that aspect of movie-making. This is something that I definitely want to do again. It’s cool to really go after that story, because I think that’s where we all start, right? Movies and TV shows are what hooked me as a kid and then I went a separate way with it. And, listen, I’ll never stop doing stand-up, but making a movie has been cool. You just have to craft a story to justify making a movie, and I had always looked at it as an afterthought. I was like, “It’s all about the jokes. Who gives a fuck about the story?” And then I kind of ended up loving putting it together. Even for a stupid, zany movie, I’m proud of how it has a fun beginning, middle, and end. Everything is earned a little bit, in a way that I think people wouldn’t expect from an over-the-top vulgar comedy.
Pursuing a career in comedy is not an easy road. What stands out to you as the biggest obstacles you’ve overcome?
I mean, nobody deserves or should have a comedy career. [laughs] That’s the thing; it’s the ultimate luxury. The biggest obstacle is that statistically, everyone who tries this fails. Like I said, I didn’t care what my life was like when I was 19. I was broke. We didn’t grow up with a ton of money, and I was broke until I was 27. It was a decade of having no money and destroying personal relationships. [laughs] You have to have a specific type of mental illness to be like, “This is worth it! Wasting my youth in shitty bars, telling bad dick jokes is totally worth it, because maybe 15 years from now, I’ll be able to tell better versions of these dick jokes in theaters.” That doesn’t happen, right? So, I just got lucky. The biggest obstacles were just material realities and being able to override the human desire for survival. [laughs] I was ignoring every sign that I should go get a real job, have a real family and a regular life. Luckily it worked out because if I woke up, if I was this age, and I had nothing to show for it, boy, oh boy, would that be a much shittier reality. Luckily, we got a couple stand-up specials, a movie, and some TV stuff, so I’m pumped, man!
What lessons might you have learned early in those years that continue to resonate? With so many irons in the fire, has it been difficult for you to find a creative balance?
Yeah! Ya know, I joke about it in the last answer, but I really was the happiest in those early years. I say that because it is purely about getting good at an art form, not to sound high falutin or like I’m taking things too seriously. Like I said, I really love stand-up, and it was so rewarding, even though I had no money. I was so broke that one of my go-to meals was taking a sheet of aluminum foil, and I would bake beans and eggs because they were the cheapest things you could eat, and it was the easiest cleanup. I would eat them directly off the aluminum foil , ball it up, and throw it away. No dishes, no nothing! [laughs] I worked a shitty job, and I would commute an hour and a half sometimes to go do one open mic for five minutes. As shitty as that was, I loved it because that’s what I was learning about the craft and getting good at it, and I felt myself improving. It really wasn’t about your career. It wasn’t a job at that point. It was like an artistic pursuit. In a lot of ways, the lesson for me has been to try to channel that.
It’s easy to start worrying about everything other than what you created. Along the way, it’s easy to forget about getting better. You could rest on your laurels for a few years and be pretty good, which does happen to people. You get so used to having a fan base. You can get so used to people that you can walk out on a fucking theater and, when the people cheer, for a second, you’re like, “Maybe I’m the smartest man on the planet, and maybe people should listen to me about everything I say.” That’s bad! You have to tap into what it was like to learn new things and not be an expert or a guy with fans. I think a big lesson for me was always to keep that, and that’s also why I like doing different things. That’s why the movie was really important, because I don’t know what I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing. It’s crazy that they let me star in a movie, right? [laughs]
I’d never written a script. I didn’t know what that was like. Both of those were such rewarding experiences, and they made me feel that fire and hunger of being a 23-year-old who just had to get good at this, or be poor for the rest of his life. It was that same thing with “Let’s Start A Cult.” This is a big risk, and this production company has paid a ton of money to make the movie. So, I knew, “This is a big opportunity, and I can’t fuck it up.” That’s the lesson. Try to tap into what it was like when you weren’t successful, and don’t rest on those laurels because it’s easy to do that.
I have to say I find that inspiring because I know we all have days when we have doubts about what we might be doing creatively. Then I see a guy like yourself who keeps the ball moving down the field, and I get a little reassurance that the hard work will eventually pay off.
Yes! Absolutely, and there’s no secret to it. It’s just doing it, and that’s the hardest part.
Let’s talk about your new film, “Let’s Start A Cult.” Tell us about the genesis of this whole project and the creative team behind it.
It started with a short film, “Exit Statement.” Ben Kitnick, our director, had the germ of the idea. The premise was, “What if a guy was so annoying that the rest of his cult killed themselves without him?” We just thought that the log line was worth building a world around. The short was fun because it was kind of what we were just talking about; it was about creating and trying something different. At the time, I didn’t know Ben or many of the other actors. It was all improvised. We just went into a house for a weekend and just did whatever we could.
From there, it was like, “That was a cool experience, but probably nothing will come of it.” Then, Queensbury Pictures and Dark Sky approached Ben about movie ideas. He said, “Hey, we always thought about making this a movie…” It was just a simple thing, and it comes back to that ethos of “Let’s just do it.” It was a fun idea! We think cults are funny, but ultimately, what we loved more than the idea was being able to make a movie. We got the opportunity. Since we had such a great time with the short, we thought, “Let’s flesh this out. Let’s take this as a challenge!” The way this works is that you get a lot of opportunities that never happen, but this was just a rare thing where, at every step of the way, they were satisfied, and we got to make it!
We just had to write a really tight script and tried to get as many funny people involved as possible. A big strength of the movie is the cast. The cast is stacked! Some people have one line in this film that could easily star in their own movie. That was it, man! It was just a challenge: “Can we do this? We’ve never done anything like it?” I’m an executive producer on the film, so I was involved in pretty much every aspect of it. I went from not knowing anything about movies to having to figure out pretty much every aspect of it. That was, again, a challenge, but it was the kind of challenge that keeps engaged. There was no autopilot. There was only trying to desperately to understand something and then trying to come up with a solution and not fucking it up! [laughs] That was kind of difficult, and sometimes you do fuck it up, but you just make the best movie you can. It was great, man. It was so cool to get the opportunity to write and star in a movie. I mean, if nothing else happens in my career, that’s a bucket list thing for sure.
You’re an indie with a small budget and a tight schedule. You’ve already overcome a ton of obstacles. Tell us about the experience of hitting the set and starting to shoot.
It was fucking nuts! We did it in three weeks. We had many locations and a lot of different people in the cast, so there was no getting comfortable because everything was constantly changing. We did 12-hour days, but because we were also executive producing it, my co-writers and co-stars spent a lot of time kind of going over the next day and going over shot lists. Our days were pretty much “Wake up. Go to work. Work. Get Taco Bell. Work two more hours. Get high. Go to bed.” [laughs] We were working 18-hour days, so it was a little frustrating.
I say that because I had imagined making a movie as this fun, creative, artistic process. We cast all these talented people, and I wanted to fuck around and improvise. I really loved all those Will Ferrell movies or Judd Apatow movies where you could tell they were just coming up with shit on the spot. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to do as much of that as we wanted. I wanted it to be like an Adam McKay movie where you’re just shooting a ton of stuff and using the best stuff. In reality, it was like, “Get this shit done because we have two hours in this location!” or “Get that done because we’re supposed to be here for four hours, but the sun is setting, and you just have until the sun goes down to get this line.” So, it was a challenge, man, but it was so much fun! I think we got lucky that we wrote a really tight script, and even though we didn’t get to improvise as much as we wanted to, it was still very funny. We wanted to keep it tight, so we ended up cutting a lot of stuff too. I don’t know what we would have put in there because our big goal was to get it under 90 minutes.
You mentioned the stacked cast in this film, and I couldn’t agree more. What were some of the highlights there?
When we were writing the script, we wrote with a lot of people in mind. That was the understanding that we could get a lot of our friends here. But even still, we just had such talented people. For example, Eric Rahill plays our army guy, Tyler. He was the one guy who could sneak in a little improv, and the little moments were just so fucking funny. We also had Zuri Salahuddin. It just so happened that I had been watching the show ‘South Side,’ which was so funny! That was one of the few characters that we really didn’t have a strong vision for. We were just like, “Oh, this could go a couple of different ways. We could see a couple different people in this.” She just did such a great job in that scene with Joe Perra. We were lucky to have these weird energies people brought into it.
We wanted to be specific with our casting. For example, we had a certain role written for a teenage ice cream employee. Still, we found this incredible older for the role. He was talking about how he got his SAG card in 1972 or whatever. [laughs] He was just a cool presence and a great person to work with. It was simple, really. We just tried to get talented people involved, and we tried to tee them up, and they always surprised us! When we couldn’t do that with people we knew, we tried to get interesting people. And I think we got very lucky with that too. Jeanne Sparrow, who plays Georgeanne Jennings, was incredible. She plays a newscaster, and she started in news casting for real. She was so great, and this was her first feature. We just got really lucky up and down with this movie!
“Let’s Start A Cult” also has a little something for the ladies. You have a passionate lovemaking session in the film. What was that experience like for you?
That’s the thing, man. A lot of this movie, when I was miserable on set, not that I was miserable that day, but it’s like, you have no one to blame but yourself. There’s another scene where I’m submerged in water. When it came time to shoot, we could only find this disgusting, shitty lake where they were literally picking glass out of it. They’re like, “Hey, we have a little patch with no trash. I think you should go face down here.” I also spent a day in clown makeup, and you just couldn’t touch your face even though it was itching. But, you know, I have no one to blame for the love scene but myself, because I was also adamant that we had to have it! So, I was fine, but I feel bad for our intimacy coordinator. This poor woman had to tape a weird little plastic sheet around my dick and balls, and that lady didn’t deserve that, man! [laughs] I was just trying to get through a day of work, so she’s the true hero.
You’ve got a ton of irons in the fire at any given moment. What do you look for in the material and projects you take on today? What speaks to you?
I really just lead with, “Is this fun?” From my standpoint, it’s purely, “Is this funny? How can I get what I’m good at? How can I find a context for what I’m good at and what my skills are?” Dude, that’s pretty much it. I’m kind of at the point where I’m very lucky to be working on “Tires” also, which was not my baby. I get to just come in and be funny on that show, and that’s been really refreshing. For the next thing, it’s all about the stuff that I’m passionate about.
“Let’s Start A Cult” was a fun movie because Ben, our director, this was kind of his idea. It was cool to feel almost like not a hired gun because we came up with it altogether, but it was kind of freeing to not have it feel like this precious idea. It made me feel like I should do more of this, man, and the idea doesn’t have to be what I’m the most passionate about. I just need to find stuff that’s a good context for what I do. I love the genre of these movies. We made this one kind of adventure/road trip movie. For the next thing, I’m interested in focusing on how I can be funny and pay homage to the things I love; I know and really understand. I want to work on more of these comedies. I think it’s as simple as that. I want short and punchy because I don’t think we’re really making like these comedies anymore. And if I can do that, the 90-minute over-the-top comedy with a ton of jokes, that’s it! Hopefully, with the next one, we will have a little bit more money and a little bit more time, and maybe we can have a couple more gags in it. So that’s it, man! I just need to be funny and do it in a ton of different ways! Whether that’s through stand-up, television, or movies, that’s it! That’s it right now!
Some special homecoming shows are happening this November at The Lyric in Baltimore. What can you tell us about what’s in store?
Yeah, I’m really excited about that! I was at the Lyric last year and had a blast. A little scoop for you here — I want to try and make this an annual thing! I want to do something around the holidays! It’s a lot of fun to prepare for it. I want to get a couple of Baltimore-specific things in the mix and I’m also trying to get surprise guests to come on the holiday weekend. I’m trying to see if I can bribe some of my friends from New York to take the train down and just do a surprise set! I want it to have a little bit more of a party atmosphere than a regular comedy show. I want it to feel like you’re celebrating with friends, So we’ll see! I’ll be honest, I was thinking I’d be way more prepared for it, but we’ve got to people to see this fucking movie. But, yeah, I’ve been writing and getting ready for it. Like I said, I just want to make it feel a little more special than a regular comedy show. It’ll have a couple different things and elements for everybody, so it’s the kind of thing you’ll want to come to year after year.
You took some time off from touring, but I’m sure you’re about to come roaring back. What’s the outlook for 2025?
Yeah, man! I have a huge tour coming up in ’25. I’ll officially announce it in a couple of weeks, but I’m definitely getting back out there. I’ve missed doing stand-up. I’ve started again and have the outline of a new hour ready to go. I’m really excited because I do genuinely miss touring. It was good. I needed to miss it if you know what I mean. I needed it because I was tired of it. So, it’s now fun again because I’m tired of promoting a movie! [laughs] So, now I’ll do now I’ll do stand up until I’m tired of that, and then I’ll hopefully do some more acting. [laugh] I would like to settle into this and then have a nice break in between. This is not a bad schedule to be on. I’m a very lucky man! Hopefully, I can bounce between a stand-up special, a tour, a movie, and a movie promotional run with a four-month vacation in between for the rest of my life. If I can do that, I’m golden, dude!
For this last question, I’m going to tip the hat to another Baltimore comedy legend with a little riff on a page from Ryan Sickler’s playbook.
Yeah! Hell yeah!
You’ve already touched on it a bit. What advice would you give your younger self if you had to do it all over again?
Yeah, man. I don’t know. Honestly, I’ve thought about this a lot! I don’t think I would tell I think I would say anything. I would just look at him and not say anything because I got so lucky that if I changed it one way or another, I don’t think I’m here, bro! I think I got insanely lucky, so I’m not going to tell him to do anything different. Well, except to maybe get a little less up fucked up. [laughs] Maybe get a little less fucked up! Maybe just work out a little bit, brother! Take care of these knees, you only get one pair. That’s all I would do. Actually, you know what I would do for real? I would get him insoles for his plantar fasciitis before his plantar fasci tore! [laughs] That’s my only advice, I would go and take him to the podiatrist!
Thanks for your time today, Staavy. Keep the good stuff coming!
Thank you, my friend! I appreciate you talking to me, and I’ll see you next, brother!
One of the most unabashedly funny films in 2024, ‘Let’s Start A Cult’ hits theaters on October 25th, 2024, via Queensbury Pictures and Dark Sky Films — Tickets are on sale now! For everything Stavros Halikas, visit his official website at www.stavvy.biz.
