American Eagle Outfitters, Inc. announced the winner of its search for the funniest college student in America. Hundreds of thousands of AE customers cast their votes on AE.com using March Madness(R)-style brackets to select Billy Horrigan of the University of Rhode Island.
AE Campus Comedy Challenge host and professional standup comedian Jasper Redd said, “Billy seemed like a natural, he was so poised and confident for someone who didn’t have much experience on stage. The competition was tough at Rhode Island as all four performers were funny. It’s a great accomplishment for Billy and I hope this experience helps him to continue pursuing a career in standup comedy.”
American Eagle Outfitters flew Billy Horrigan to Cancun, along with runner-up Ross Parsons, to perform in front of an audience of thousands of spring-breakers on March 21.
The AE Campus Comedy Challenge was developed and produced in partnership with Generate, the first production and talent management company established by media leaders to create content across multiple platforms. The search began Friday, February 9, at University of Minnesota and ended March 15 at Virginia Tech & State University, with stops in Wisconsin, Virginia, Ohio, Washington, Florida, Michigan, New Jersey and Maryland along the way. Professional comedians including Bryan Callen, Sheng Wang, Baron Vaughn and Bobby Miyamoto were featured on the tour.
Each of the twelve participating schools held individual competitions prior to the AE Campus Comedy Challenge events to select the three finalists to perform and compete on stage, with AE’s touring comics, to a packed house of fellow students. Winners were chosen by in-venue text voting and announced at the end of each performance. Footage of each of winners’ standup performance was displayed on AE’s bracketing system on ae.com.
Horrigan is from Holliston, Massachusetts and majors in Philosophy at the University of Rhode Island. Horrigan was convinced by his 24 year-old sister to enter the contest and now plans to use this opportunity from American Eagle towards a career in comedy.
