Teacher Show brings rotating comics to La Grande this Friday

A former Portland-area history teacher who turned a joke at his father’s funeral into a comedy career will bring The Teacher Show to La Grande, giving Union County residents a night shaped by classroom stress, grief and the kind of humor that comes from everyday school life. Four comics from the rotating lineup are set for McKenzie Theater at Eastern Oregon University, a campus stop that puts the show close to home for educators, parents and staff.

The performance is scheduled for Friday, June 26, 2026, at 6:30 p.m. in McKenzie Theater, which is located in Loso Hall at Eastern Oregon University, One University Boulevard, La Grande, OR 97850-2807. The venue seats up to 435 people and serves as home to EOU’s theater and music programs, making the comedy stop feel more like a campus community event than a large commercial tour date.

Don Gavitte, identified in prior coverage as the creator of The Teacher Show, has said the comedy project began in 2018 during his father’s funeral, when he made a joke while delivering the eulogy. Gavitte’s father worked at John F. Kennedy Airport in New York until age 77 and died at 80, and that moment of humor in a deeply personal setting became the starting point for a performance path that has since traveled through Oregon and Washington.

The show itself has featured about a dozen comics on a rotating basis, according to Go Eastern Oregon, which means the La Grande stop will not be a single-voice set but a sampler of different perspectives tied together by the same classroom-centered theme. Gavitte has also been identified as a Portland-area high school history teacher who has taught in the Portland area for more than 30 years, a background that gives the material a built-in connection to the pressures and routines of school life.

That mix of teaching, grief and comedy may resonate strongly in Union County, where school staff and families know how much energy it takes to keep classrooms steady through long school years. The Teacher Show arrives as a social, off-campus event that brings people into downtown La Grande’s university setting and adds another summer arts option to the local calendar, with a venue sized for a more intimate audience and a performance built around real-life experience rather than polished distance.