Tracy Morgan reached another milestone Monday night.
The comedian who nearly died last year in a horrific car crash that killed a friend and left him in a coma performed two stand-up gigs in Manhattan ahead of his return to “Saturday Night Live” as host this week.
“My first time on stage in 16 Months at the #Comedy Cellar! Picking up the pieces!” Morgan tweeted to his 3 million followers.
The 46-year-old funnyman included a photo of himself standing onstage and holding a microphone.
He wasn’t listed on the Comedy Cellar’s official bill, and a staffer deferred questions about the set to Morgan’s camp when reached by the Daily News.
“T Money is back!!!!!!!! So great to see @RealTracyMorgan back on stage tonight @NYCComedy Cellar,” comedian Judah Friedlander tweeted, with a photo of him and Morgan celebrating the triumph Monday night.
Both comedians appeared on NBC’s “30 Rock” together, but Friedlander, who was part of the club’s official Monday night lineup, was in the dark about Morgan’s top-secret gig until he arrived, according to Refinery29.com.
MIKE BLAKE/REUTERSMorgan made jokes about his speech therapy and then said a brief, onstage coughing fit was either “because of the accident” or because he smoked too much marijuana, the website reported.
The comedian also did a Monday night set at The Stand, with the club tweeting a photo of him appearing to sit against a wall during his set.
“What an honor having @RealTracyMorgan back on our stage tonight,” read a statement on The Stand’s Twitter feed.
Morgan, three other comedians and some entourage members were riding in a Mercedes Sprinter on the New Jersey Turnpike when a Walmart truck slammed into them from behind in June 2014.
The high-speed freeway crash killed Morgan’s close friend James McNair, 62, a fellow comedian. Morgan suffered several broken ribs, a broken leg and head trauma. He returned to the spotlight last month when he made a surprise appearance at the Emmy Awards.
“I’m here, standing on my own two feet,” he said from the Emmy stage after receiving a standing ovation.
“It’s been a long road back. I suffered a traumatic brain injury that put me in a coma for eight days. When I finally regained consciousness, I was just ecstatic to learn that I wasn’t the one who messed up,” he said to laughter.
“Only recently I’ve started to feel like myself again, so, which means, a whole lot of y’all women are gonna get pregnant at the after-party,” he joked.
A criminal complaint said the Walmart truck’s driver, Kevin Roper, had not slept in more than 24 hours and was barreling down the road 20 miles over the speed limit at the time of the tragic crash.
Morgan and McNair’s family later reached settlements with Walmart.
Source: The Daily News
