Patton Oswalt, Michelle Wolf Call on Sebastian Maniscalco to Reverse SiriusXM Channel Takeover

The world of stand-up comedy is in another round of internal strife. But this time, instead of turning on each other over Saudi paydays, the focus has turned toward A-list comic Sebastian Maniscalco, who has so far shown little concern over pleas from some famous comics to restore the lucrative programming that once filled the SiriusXM channel now bearing his name.

In April, Maniscalco’s Comedy Radio replaced Channel 99, formerly Raw Comedy/Raw Dog channel. According to Patton Oswalt, Michelle Wolf and other comics, Raw Comedy/Raw Dog was a small corner of the satellite radio giant where up-and-coming comedians could not only launch their careers but make a few bucks doing it. The channel is now “curated and headlined by Maniscalco.”

In an Instagram post addressed to Maniscalco, Oswalt said young comics must be allowed to thrive if the comedy world is to stay dynamic and diverse.

“Listen, there’s a lot of up-and-coming comedians who are depending on the money and the checks that they get from Sirius, and the fact that you and I still get to tour and still get to work, and still get to be as funny as we are, is because comedy right now is so dynamic and has so many new young voices that are coming up,” Oswalt said.

“But 500 of them have been booted off of Sirius,” he continued. “You bought that channel. I know you didn’t mean to do anything bad by doing it. You can easily reverse this decision. Get those young comedians back on the SiriusXM channel. Let them get those checks. Let them keep working. Let them keep coming up. It keeps us working. It keeps the profession that we’re in dynamic and fun.”

Wolf also addressed Maniscalco directly on her Instagram account.

“SiriusXM Radio on their Raw Dog channel used to play like 800 comics — you could turn that on and find a comic that would be your absolute favorite, who you’ve never heard of before,” she said. “Since then, Sebastian has acquired the channel, and it went from about 800 working comics to around 300 comics — all of which you already know. These are famous people. These are influencers.”

Wolf told Maniscalco that “everyone can see that comics, we’re together on this,” and that he should want to change the station back to one that supports comics who have worked local clubs for decades.

“I guarantee you, your favorite comic used to play on that channel,” she said.

According to Stand Up for Standup, a comedy industry advocacy group, comics earned $15 in royalties per “spin” of their set on the channel, money the group says “aids in supporting their comedy career in the form of passive royalty earnings.” The group said the channel no longer draws from the wider pool of 800-plus comedians and instead rotates a narrower roster of comics each month, with more than 75 percent of plays going to the top 50 artists and bigger celebrity acts.

Maniscalco is certainly counted among that elite group. In September 2024, he set four records during a run of five sold-out shows at Madison Square Garden as part of his “It Ain’t Right” tour, including the highest gross for a single tour stop at $10.7 million.

The Hollywood Reporter reached out to Maniscalco’s team for comment but did not immediately hear back on Tuesday. A spokesperson for SiriusXM detailed the pivot to Maniscalco’s channel and said that many of the comics heard on Raw Comedy/Raw Dog will be heard on their many other comedy channel offerings.

“SiriusXM works together with our creative partners to program the best possible experience for our listeners,” a SiriusXM spokesperson wrote in a statement sent to THR on Tuesday. “The launch of Sebastian Maniscalco‘s Comedy Radio introduced a new creative direction and a regularly evolving programming mix for the channel, and SiriusXM continues to invest in comedians more than any other audio platform to deliver a wide range of comedy offerings across our channels.”