It’s been a tough year for Italians in Los Angeles. Columbus Day officially got the axe, and was renamed Indigenous People’s Day to atone for the sins of Christopher Columbus six centuries ago. And the Feast of San Gennaro Festival Los Angeles — an annual Italian street festival in Hollywood held to raise funds for charities and celebrate National Italian Heritage month (October) for the last 15 years — has been cancelled at the last minute due to the loss of a major sponsor.

If this was a Coppola movie, somebody would be waking up with a horse’s head in his bed right about now. Instead, the Italian community has gone to the mattresses and cooked up a big pot of meatballs. The Meatballs of Comedy are a local sketch and stand-up comedy group trying to salvage the year by co-hosting the first-annual Los Angeles Italian Festival taking place in North Hollywood on Sunday, Oct 22.