Daniel Tosh, performing at Mirage, jumps from Comedy Central to Vegas headliner

A new generation seems to have found its comedic voice. And one cable network helped discover it.

Every Super Bowl weekend seems to come with one red-hot show ticket, and this year it's the very sold-out Daniel Tosh at The Mirage. Tosh's 18- to 34-year-old male demographic does overlap with the big game, but Comedy Central's "Tosh.0" doesn't really need to piggyback onto the Super Bowl. It's the network's highest-rated show and the most watched on Tuesdays by men of that age.

But the 36-year-old Tosh is just the most popular of a new wave of comedians who have taken root on the Strip. Kevin Hart, Gabriel Iglesias, Jo Koi, Henry Cho and Amy Schumer, who debuts at the Riviera on March 2, are among those who can thank Comedy Central for a major role in helping make the jump to headliner.

"There seems to be a new renaissance in stand-up and a younger guard," says Jonas Larsen, Comedy Central's senior vice president for talent and specials.

"Stand-up is a form of truth telling; it isn't just jokes," Larsen adds. "We're going through some interesting times, very uncertain times. People have something to say, and it's a great platform to be heard if you do it right."

Stand-up runs in boom-to-bust cycles, and these days the network has much to choose from. "There are more people out there doing stand-up. A lot more competition for the slots that are available," Larsen says.

Comedy Central is the invisible hand behind a lot of new Las Vegas headliners who fill a large comedic gulf that used to exist on the Strip.

On one end is the comedy club, where most tickets are sold on blind faith in the format, and patrons often aren't familiar with the comedians they are going to see.

At the other end are big-name headliners such as Tim Allen, who plays The Venetian today and Saturday, returning to stand-up as a star after making it big in TV and movies.

Younger stand-ups now fill the room in the middle, solo-billed on the Strip without any help from scripted TV. Josh Wolf headlines the South Point this weekend, via one of the new paths to instant recognition: a seat on the panel of Chelsea Handler's E! talk show. His Facebook page is even called "Josh Wolf (best known from Chelsea Lately)."

But no one late-night host holds all the power, as Johnny Carson did in Allen's teeth-cutting years. And no one network owns all the stand-up. But the one with "Comedy" in its name still uses stand-up to account for about 20 percent of all programming.

"Going back to our roots as a channel, stand-up has always been our backbone," Larsen says. What has changed is the network developing its own "curriculum," as Larsen calls it, for developing new talent gradually.

It was no random accident that Schumer knocked it out of the park on the network's roast of Charlie Sheen, or that Tosh was the perfect match for a forum to riff on Internet videos.

"We try to develop the stand-ups we feel are the right types of voices," Larsen says. The network has its own scouts in clubs, but agents and managers also organize showcase performances.

Those with potential begin with five- or 10-minute sets on programs such as "John Oliver's New York Stand-up Show." Coming off as well on TV as in a live club can lead the way to one of the 12 to 16 half-hour showcases Comedy Central produces each year, then a full-hour special, "which is really like the gold standard," Larsen says.

"Once you get a half-hour, certainly we've got our eye on them as someone we're looking to develop with." And, he adds, "It's not about the first one; it's about developing. Sometimes it takes a little time for a stand-up to mature."

Tosh had a network presence since his first half-hour special in 2002. Three years later, the network released his comedy album "True Stories I Made Up" through its own niche label.

"He was obviously a stand-up we had our eye on, someone we felt was immensely talented, someone we wanted to develop. We spent some time developing various pilots with him (to find) the thing that felt right for his voice.

"The most exciting thing about this job," Larsen says, "is to see somebody come into their own, like Amy."

So when he says to keep an eye on newcomer Hannibal Buress, another "bright light that's shining out there, coming into his own," you'd best believe it's a name you might see on a Las Vegas marquee some day.

Contact reporter Mike Weatherford at mweatherford@ reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0288.