ONEIDA — Comedian Nick Marra recalled his funny stories about his restaurant clientele in the late 1980s prompted some fans of those tales to sign him up for his first comedy show appearance.

Now, the Syracuse-based Marra will headline Comedy Night Live at 8 p.m. Friday, March 3 at the Kallet Civic Center, 159 Main St.

Marra recalled he would visit the local bank daily and tell the folks there about his day ... specifically some of the silly goings-on with the customers. Someone there said he should become a comedian because his stories were so funny. Marra brushed it off, until he found out that he was signed up for a spot in an amateur comedian show in 1989 at Wise Guys comedy club in Syracuse.

“It was frightening,” Marra admitted. “I was always just telling stories about my day and really had no ‘act.’”

But after that, he continued with the open mic comedy shows every Tuesday. It was kind of like a bowling league, he said, where everyone gets to know everyone and they make connections.

Since then, he has appeared on television and traveled across the country and into Canada with his comedy, including a performance for the audience at the ESPY Awards in 2017 in Los Angeles. There he got to meet sports stars like Peyton Manning and attend the award show and the after show party, he said.

Marra said his comedy is a throwback to the comedians of another time and place, calling back to the glory days of stand up comedy.

“I could be raunchy or dirty but that’s not my act,” he intimated.

He also stays away from politics, admitting he knows that nothing he says on stage is really going to change anyone else’s political persuasions.

Audiences in their 40s and 50s are “right in my wheelhouse,” he said, because they will likely relate best to his jokes. Not that they are strictly for them, of course, as his shows appeal to all ages.

He does enjoy mocking the younger generation because he just doesn’t really understand it nor their technology, he said. Marra also likes to mock himself because he can’t relate.

Much of his material comes from observations of his own children, he admitted. Marra’s youngest is 17 and he also has a 91-year-old father so he has comedy fodder that spans multiple generations.

“They don’t even know that they are funny,” he said. “I just get up in the morning and take notes. My act is just my life in general. This is all stupid stuff I do from morning until night.”

Comedy Night Live also features the comedy of Dee Watson, who has performed throughout the northeast at venues like the Funny Bone comedy clubs, the Comedy Works, Baltimore Comedy Festival, D.C. Comedy Festival, Proctor’s Theater and the North Carolina Comedy Festival in Greensboro. The event is hosted by Gomez Adams, a comic and on-air personality for years at the Bridgeport-based TK99 radio station.

Marra definitely thinks laughter is the best medicine.

“Don’t take life too seriously because if you do you will be in a lot of trouble,” he said. “I wish people would all go through life with a bit more laughter.”