Golf is inherently funny.
For ages, golfers have gleefully told off-color jokes at their local clubs; movies like “Caddyshack” and “Happy Gilmore” have tickled audiences with their irreverence; authors like Rick Reilly have written books espousing the virtues of self-deprecating golf humor, and announcers like David Feherty have launched playful barbs at professional golfers stuck in a spot of bother.
But as of just a few years ago, golf had rarely seen humor in the form of Saturday Night Live-esque sketch comedy—available in short-form videos on Instagram, TikTok, YouTube and beyond—performed and produced by professional comedians.
That void was filled in the fall of 2022 by the Atlanta-based comedy group of St. André. In just over two years, the group has quickly amassed more than 440,000 Instagram and 330,000 TikTok followers. Dozens of their skits have gone viral on multiple platforms including 25 different YouTube shorts being viewed more than one million times.
The skits feature Aaron Chewning, Hannah Rae Aslesen and Jonathan Pawlowski—along with cameos from PGA Tour players, creator Bradford Wilson and other personalities—as the group navigates hilariously exaggerated situations the average golfer encounters. That means everything from the experience of being paired with random people to having some backup when you need to confirm what score you shot while playing alone.
St. André is accessible in that anyone can be entertained even if their golf background is minimal. That is part of the magic.
But the relatable inside jokes hit the sweet spot of a die-hard golfer’s funny bone, cleverly punching at this self-serious game that lends itself to comedy in a way less-deranged sports can’t grasp.
Nobody else in the golf creator space has done this as well as they have.
The origins of St. André
Pawlowski (left), Aslesen and Chewning shoot a sketch with Tiger.
So how do you start a golf comedy sketch group?
The story starts with Chewning, who earned a film degree at Full Sail University in Winter Park, Fla., before transitioning to what he really wanted: “messing around on the internet with my friends,” as he puts it.
Chewning got traction in short-form video on the now-defunct Vine and worked as a creative director for different marketing agencies specializing in comedic sales videos. On the side, he produced some of his own comedy sketches and dabbled in standup.
Being in the Atlanta comedy and improv scene led Chewning to Aslesen and Pawlowski, comedians who had moved to the area.
When Chewning, a 7-handicap who has been a lifelong golfer, developed the idea of creating golf sketches, he knew Aslesen and Pawlowski had to be involved even though neither of them came into St. André as avid golfers (that has since changed as Aslesen is now playing three times a week and regularly breaking 90). He had worked with them previously on creative projects and felt they would get the concept.
Chewning grinded over sketches and setup for nine months prior to the group’s launch in August 2022. He got permission to film at Heritage Golf Links (in Tucker, just northeast of the city) which is where most of the videos are still shot.
(Despite some commenter concerns, St. André is not holding up anyone on the course during filming. Videos are shot on dedicated parts of the course that have been rented out or blocked off so nobody plays them at that time).
“That was my terrifying year of quitting my job, taking out a credit card and being like, ‘This absolutely better work or I’m screwed,’” Chewning said. “I went to a coffee shop to write a sketch and ended up writing nine to 10 pages of sketches. That was the lightbulb moment of golf being such a great backdrop for comedy like this. There is every dynamic on the course, so many feelings.
“It went from a couple sketches to ‘This could be a brand and I could do this forever.’”
Chewning had indeed invested a lot of time, money and emotion into the project. While he would have recovered back into his successful career if St. André somehow tanked, he didn’t want to do that.
After falling back in love with golf over the pandemic, he saw an opportunity for golf to embrace short-form content that differed from other creators who were focused on YouTube matches, the written word or whatever else it might be.
“I saw a lane open,” Chewning said. “I love golf content, love the Bob Does Sports guys. There are a lot of funny people in golf but not a ton of well-produced sketch comedy. I thought if I could find a way to mess around on a golf course and call that work, it would be a dream.”
For those wondering, the name St. André is a hybrid of St Andrews, the iconic golf course, and André 3000, the born-and-raised Atlantan rapper who formed one-half of the hip-hop duo Outkast. (Chewning was wearing an Outkast sweater during our interview.)
“The goal was to have a name that looks good on a shirt that wasn’t a golf joke like Fore Play or Mood Swings or whatever else it could be,” Chewning said. “I wanted it be a brand and sound like old-school golf a little bit.”
After the launch—the first video featured the crew looking through a rangefinder to get an encouraging message from their fathers rather than seeing a yardage—the response was instantaneous.
Chewning knew they had something after the first week.
“We had a year-long plan. We were going to give it a year and prayed that it worked. There were several pages like Zire Golf, PGA Memes, where if they picked up our stuff, we knew that we had something. We wanted to get on those pages in the first three to four months. By the end of the first week, we were on all of them.
“It quickly went from, ‘Let’s grow this thing and make it work’ to ‘Don’t screw it up. Let’s keep feeding the beast and see what happens.’”
A few months later, St. André was filming with the greatest golfer in history.
A viral rise and chopping it up with Tiger
Just three months after launching, St. André received an email from an Atlanta-based production company that worked with Bridgestone Golf. They had seen some of the sketches and wanted to see if the group could work to promote Bridgestone, a brand that wanted to be seen as having fun.
Bridgestone’s most famous golfer? Tiger Woods.
“We thought the email was fake until we got on a call,” Chewning said. “I had been playing Bridgestone balls and clubs for years and years. Honestly, I would have said yes to whatever brand emailed us first but thank God it was Bridgestone.”
Incredibly, St. André went from launching at the end of August 2022 to filming with Tiger (and other Bridgestone players like Jason Day and Fred Couples) that December. Multiple sketches were shot and then released in 2023.
Among those sketches was one where Tiger is standing over a tee shot as the St. André crew watches. Tiger accidentally knocks over his ball, leading to consternation among the group whether to tease him with the “that’s one” joke.
“He got the concept of what we were trying to do and loved it immediately,” Chewning said. “He’ll be the first one to admit he has a hard time remembering lines but he was into it. In between takes, he would come stand next to us and chop it up. We all were laughing. It was really cool.”
The morning before shooting, Chewning said he was crying in a bathtub, overwhelmed at what their group had accomplished. St. André had only amassed 30,000 Instagram followers at that time, but it felt like the group had already made it.
“Shooting with Tiger, that was just beyond bucket list. I didn’t even dream that big when we launched. But also it just kind of hit me that day how we took a big risk and went all-in on this idea and I think we’ve officially changed our lives.”
That is even more true today than it was back then. St. André is fully ingrained in golf culture. Your golf friends might not recognize the name immediately but most of them know the faces of the comedians. And when the crew goes down to the PGA Show in Orlando, they are universally beloved celebrities.
Nearly three years after forming, St. André has evolved. The group used to shoot once per week in Atlanta but now shoots more sporadically, preferring to batch content by filming more skits in the same time period to free up space for other endeavors like longer-form YouTube videos. They also have office space now so Aslesen, Pawlowski and the production crew can come together. Chewning still writes most of the sketches but everyone in the group has input.
This isn’t a full-time job for everyone involved. Aslesen, a talented writer, just released a short film and is shopping a sitcom pilot. Pawlowski, in addition to other comedy acting, plays in a Limp Bizkit cover band called Limp Triscuit.
But this trio and production crew love working together. There is an alchemy there and it comes out in the polished finished product. Others have tried to replicate the SNL vibe of St. André but nobody has come close in the short-form comedy category.
Moving forward, the idea is to keep the sketches while also expanding long-form YouTube content like travel, matches and longer, more-scripted content like this “Influencer Training” video they recently shot with the DP World Tour.
And watch out MyGolfSpy readers (and writers!) because Chewning is a regular here. His next idea for a sketch might be coming from this comment section.
“We try to figure out ways to parody (MyGolfSpy), which is a sign of respect,” Chewning said. “Just know, y’all are on our radar in a very loving way.”
Hey, St. André, here is an MGS-inspired idea you can have for free: A husband and wife wake up during the middle of the night to find a burglar in their house. The burglar starts asking for valuables and leads the husband into the garage where they come across a L.A.B putter. The burglar accosts the husband: “Well, does that thing work? Will it fix my putting?”
The frazzled husband takes the burglar outside during the middle of the night so they can both work on his putting on the driveway. Meanwhile, the wife is horrified; she called the cops a long time ago. The cop shows up and is confused by the scene of the husband now coaching the burglar. Once the cop gets the story straight, he takes a long stare at the two of them and says, “OK, show me how it works.” Now the three of them are standing over a L.A.B. putter like caveman staring at a fire.
Cut to the wife, who is rolling her eyes and going back to bed. End scene.
Their success has opened the door for partnerships
St. André doesn’t just work with Bridgestone. Their good-natured comedic act has delivered partnerships and a real business.
Among the partners are apparel brand Johnnie-O, PGA TOUR Superstore and Long Drink. St. André has collaborated with the brands to create videos for them or feature their products.
It’s an interesting space right now with creators. We have been seeing a lot of club manufacturers get more involved with signing and promoting YouTubers. Even Titleist—seen as a more traditional brand—now has relationships with the likes of No Laying Up, Peter Finch and Micah Morris.
We’re reaching a point where brands are spending significant resources on creators because those are the people connecting with the average golfer. There is no doubt creators impact the bottom line in a way the 100th-ranked golfer in the world doesn’t.
For Johnnie-O—a more lighthearted brand that likes to have fun—partnering with St. André was a no-brainer decision.
“If you sponsor a tour pro who made $25 million on the course, their job is to play golf,” said Dave Neville, Johnnie-O’s Senior Vice-President of Marketing. “I get the question a lot about which tour pros wear Johnnie-O and I explain to people that most of the tour pros don’t move the needle much and aren’t necessarily excited to wear the product. And if you work with them, you have to activate those people. You need a crew and schedule it and distribute it.
“Content creators like St. André, their job is to entertain people. That is how they get sponsorships and make money. People notice them. And they create the content themselves—they produce it and distribute it. And they are excited to wear our apparel. For someone like us that wants to increase our brand awareness, it makes sense.”
Johnnie-O has three prongs in its creator brand awareness goal: educate, inspire and entertain. Danny Maude, a top YouTube instructor, is a main part of the education piece. Finch, another YouTuber, is on the inspire side of the equation as he produces a lot of videos about chasing goals (like trying to qualify for the Open Championship). Lastly, there is St. André for the entertainment portion.
“Their vibe matches us with not taking themselves too seriously,” Neville said. “But if you watch them, everything they do is very high quality. And that matches us with how our clothing is high quality.”
While manufacturers still put a lot of eggs in the basket of top tour players gaming their equipment, the brand-creator space has “exploded” and “reached an inflection point,” according to Neville.
“Clearly these folks can drive sales,” Neville said. “And if you look at player No. 132 on the PGA Tour, I don’t think that guy is driving sales.”
When I was putting this story together, one of the things that stood out was how St. André has established a niche. We’re in an era where golf content creation focuses heavily on YouTube matches, collaborations and quick-witted social media commentary. There is nothing wrong with that but it’s easy to get lost in the shuffle if you fall into that category.
With a group like St. André, their lane is far less crowded while the product is still professional, relatable and marketable.
That’s a dynamic combination.
Golf is still as funny as we’ve always known it to be but the form has changed. It’s being reinvented.
For that, we can all pray to St. André.
The post How St. André Is Reinventing Golf Comedy appeared first on MyGolfSpy.
