London's Top Secret comedy club opens a New York outpost
It's a 'silly whim' says founder Mark Rothman
London's Top Secret has set up a new comedy club – in New York.
The 232-seater venue opened in the city's East Village last night, with US-based British comedy rapper Chris Turner on the bill.
Club founder Mark Rothman described his venture into Manhattan’s competitive comedy scene, as a 'silly whim' and 'absolutely mental’.
But he told Chortle he doesn't see the new club as a stepping stone for UK comedians attempting to break America, 'because I'm not that selfless to set up a bloody business in another country. I just thought it might work.’
However, 'if they've got their visa and we know that they're great from playing the club in London, then sure, why not?’
The space was previously home to improv institution the Upright Citizens Brigade between 2011 and 2019, and former street performer Rothman, below, signed a lease in August following a year of negotiations.
He has rejected the two-drink minimum and table service model favoured by most US clubs for theatre-style seating, with permission to expand the venue's capacity to 270. With no kitchen in the space, food is limited to frozen pizza and bar snacks.
'Immediately, you've got a more vibrant space without staff wandering through and hassling customers for their next order' Canadian-born Rothman said. 'That just seems like a bad formula to me.’
Rothman, who is also resident compere of the London clubs, started Top Secret as a club night in a room in the ‘semi derelict’ Africa Centre in Covent Garden, Central London, where street performers kept props such as unicycles, tightropes and juggling clubs. The ‘bar’ was stocked with booze bought from a nearby Tesco.
The club grew to running shows every night, until the Africa Centre trustees sold the venue. In 2013, they took over the lease on a venue in Drury Lane that has been their home ever since, often running several shows a night in both performance spaces there.
It has attracted top US-based acts such as Dave Chappelle, Amy Schumer, Trevor Noah and Louis CK. Rothman added that TJ Miller was at the London venue last night 'and he's really keen to help' in Manhattan.
Claire Grinis, who was venue manager and booker at the London club has moved to New York and will run the new club.
In a video on the club's Instagram page, Turner described himself as 'an Englishman in New York', declaring that 'when I tell you that the Top Secret Comedy Club in New York is going to be incredible you can trust me. Get on down there.’
Austrian-Slovenian comic Phillip Kostelecky, who previously worked on the London circuit but moved to New York last year, called Top Secret 'one of the best clubs in the world'.
He added: 'I hope that the one thing that they do bring from London, other than the amazing room structure, the great bar, the great staff, I hope they get those sticky floors when they come to New York. What's Top Secret without a sticky floor, you know what I mean?'
- by Jay Richardson
Published: 2 Dec 2025
