Richard Bean, then, is one of a select band.
"I've got the photographic evidence," he says.
After the success of One Man, Two Guvnors, a farce that took New York by storm, the Hull-born playwright's thoughts are turning to home.
For a start, a new touring production of the show is heading to Hull New Theatre next month.
He is also writing two new plays – one about Hull's role in the English Civil War, a second inspired by stand-up comedy, which are to be staged here in 2017.
Relaxing in the foyer of Hull Truck Theatre, Richard's part in the City of Culture will begin with The Hypocrite.
This farce, a genre Richard describes as "The Everest of play writing" for its difficulty, will follow the actions of Sir John Hotham.
Hotham, the Governor of Hull in 1642, refused entry to the city to Charles I and sparked the English Civil War.
"He's the hypocrite," says Richard.
"He started the war as a Parliamentarian and then turned towards being a Royalist, before eventually being beheaded.
"It will be a historical farce but the history will be done seriously, not, though, in the sense that you have to sit there frowning before you are allowed to laugh."
The play is being co-produced by Hull Truck and the Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC).
After premiering in Hull in April 2017, the historical drama will transfer to the RSC in Stratford-Upon-Avon.
It is an era that the London-based playwright, who pitched the play to Truck and the RSC, says he always found fascinating.
"In one analysis, you could say Hull started the English Civil War because we were the first town to close the gates on the King," he says.
"And if you say that, you could say that we were the town that initiated constitutional parliamentary democracy, so we have got a lot to be proud of.
"I am hoping to make people ill with laughter – high stakes, impossible stakes, I know – but when they leave the theatre I want them to say 'I didn't realise Hull started the Civil War, or what an important town it was'."
His pride in his home city, where his parents still live, is evident. Richard was, he says, "thrilled" by the UK City of Culture announcement.
"I have always been excited by the potential of the Old Town for the arts," he says.
"The Freedom Festival shows that potential and Fruit is a good example of what to do with those empty warehouses.
"The water helps. If you look at the way Newcastle was regenerated, the Quay Side is much the same as the Old Town area."
Richard jokingly says he will spend "half of 2017" in Hull. Later in the UK City of Culture year, a second play, about a class for aspiring comedians, will be premiered at Truck.
It is territory has been covered before, in Trevor Griffiths's 1970s drama Comedians, but Richard says it is now a different landscape.
"So much has changed in stand-up since the 1970s, I think is worth having another go at the concept," he says.
"Trevor Griffiths's play was essentially a polemic against sexist and racist comedy, mother-in-law jokes, Pakistani jokes, that kind of thing.
"After alternative comedy blew all that away, current stand-up comedy is more like rock'n'roll than anything else."
The area is familiar to Richard. After leaving Hull in his late teens, and later working as an occupational psychologist, he made the switch to stand-up comedy at the age of 35.
It is a comic gift he has exploited in some of his plays, though he says farce – shown at its fluid best in One Man, Two Guvnors – is "incredibly difficult" to write.
"You can sit down and write a comedy, put some funny lines in it and everyone says 'I quite enjoyed that'," Richard says.
"The stakes are much higher in farce. The purpose of a farce is not to make people laugh, it is to make them hysterical, to make them ill with laughter. It is to stretch the Red Cross resources and to have ambulances outside.
"The purpose of the farce is change the physical state of people in the theatre, it is an insane and difficult task to take on."
Hence the two years he has given himself to write The Hypocrite.
Before then there is the continuing progress of One Man, Two Guvnors, an adaptation of the 18th century Italian farce Servant of Two Masters.
Gavin Spokes is taking the lead role of Francis Henshall, the ever-hungry, ever-bewildered everyman, who finds himself drawn into the seedy underworld of 1960s Brighton.
"I've seen it 86 times and I only mention that to say I still laugh at it," says Richard.
"The guy's a loveable idiot and there's something about that. You want to try and help him – it's a bit George Formby, a bit Norman Widsom.
"He's like a big fat Norman Wisdom."
Before he leaves, there is time for one more anecdote about its Broadway debut.
"At the press night, there were at least four people from Hull. I knew a couple of them, they are friends of mine, but it was still a big surprise to see them," says Richard.
"There was also a couple from South Cave who were getting married in New York.
"There was a thrill about that, something about touching home.
"It's like they were saying 'You are not alone on Broadway – we are going to follow you all the way'."
• One Man, Two Guvnors is being staged at Hull New Theatre from Monday, June 23, to Saturday, June 28. For tickets, call 01482 300300.
