Having a broken leg is no laughing matter, but Jeff Polis hopes someday it will be.

Polis, who does stand-up comedy, has been laid up with a broken leg since March 3. That gives him plenty of free time to come up with jokes. And before the cast comes off his leg, jokes about it are definitely on the to-do list.

“Things happen for a reason,” Polis said.

He’s using the down time to learn lines for a supporting role he has in an upcoming short film and to write jokes.

Polis has been dabbling in comedy since 1994. When he first started, he’d drive three hours round trip to get three minutes on open-mic night at various comedy clubs in the metro area.

Polis got serious about comedy in 2003. That was the year he got runner-up honors at the Twin Cities Laugh Off. To get there, he beat out 59 other comics at a contest in Mankato.

After the Laugh Off, comedian Scott Hanson started using Polis in some of his shows.

After nine weeks in a row of heading up to the Twin Cities and standing behind a microphone, Polis decided it was time to start producing his own shows. Now, he’s almost as busy setting up shows as he is doing comedy.

He regularly schedules comedy shows in Albert Lea, Faribault, Northfield, Owatonna, Grand Meadow and Mason City, Iowa. It’s a family affair. His wife often sells tickets at the door with him and one of their three sons sets up the lighting and other equipment.

Often a show will lead to a corporate event, like a Christmas party, where Polis does a comedy routine for 45 minutes to an hour. A similar event got him in as the booking agent for the Monterey Ballroom south of Owatonna.

“I’ve probably done a dozen places like that in Albert Lea,” Polis said.

Polis said he has met a lot of other budding comedians along the way and has used a number of them in his own shows. And they often return the favor by asking him to be in their shows.

“By doing that, I’m able to travel a lot more,” he said.

He’s had the opportunity to open for Diane Ford and Louie Anderson, who have become big names in the business.

Polis admits that even though he’s been doing this a number of years, he still gets nervous when he steps up to the microphone.

“With comedy, you get immediate results,” he said. “You know right away if they like you.”

Comedy is something Polis admits he is able to do because he owns his business — two Quiznos stores and a business he started called Commercial Gaskets, which makes gaskets for restaurant lines as well as replacement curtains for walk-in refrigerators. He can work things like the film into his schedule.

He uses his own material. He’s learned that it’s best to write down something he thinks of right away, or it’s gone.

Any topic is fair game. Often his wife, Penny, will say something that leads to material he uses.

“I usually have a segment on her in my show, and if she’s in the audience, I can see people turn and look right at her,” he said.

But he stresses she takes it all in stride and knows it’s only a joke.

He said after a show, he gets together with his comic friends and they critique each other’s acts, pointing out what might work better.

Polis said he’d love to do more films and really anything in the entertainment business. He said Johnny Carson was an influence in his life early on. “I liked the skits he did and the whole venue of bringing comics out,” he said.

Someday, Polis said he’d like to would like to write a script and have a movie made about the 1950s Southern Minnesota Baseball League — in particular, the battles between Albert Lea and Austin and the large crowds and individuals that were recruited to make each team better.

But for now, there are those lines to read and the jokes to write.

“There’s always a reason for everything,” Polis said, pointing to the cast. “This is teaching me to eat right, work on comedy and learn my lines for the movie.”