“First reaction was: ‘Here we go again,’ second reaction was, ‘Nobody’s safe,’” says Curtis Shaw Flagg, president of The Laugh Factory Chicago, who had previously seen an uptick of unruly customer behavior during the pandemic (and even had some stage charge attempts at his club). “We are leaving comedians completely exposed. We’re allowing them to exercise their creative speech on stage, but we aren’t taking the requisite steps to make sure that they’re protected. The security team are to blame for not taking adequate measures to make sure [attackers] didn’t even get to [the comics]. That’s their one job and it seems like there’s been a complete failure to do that.”

The Comedy Cellar owner Noam Dworman didn’t think the Oscars incident would inspire additional stage attacks on comedians, but now he’s not so sure.

“What happened to Dave is actually much more worrisome [than Smith striking Rock], and extends beyond comedy,” Dworman says via text. “This wasn’t a spontaneous reaction to a perceived slight — as bad as that was. It was premeditated and dangerous, and it seems part of a general violent trend creeping up in many segments of American life. I’m very, very happy he’s OK. At the Cellar, we always have security, but, of course, we’ll be on the lookout.”