Melissa Rivers and Other Comics Strike a Pose with Joan Rivers’ Ashes to Celebrate Upcoming Tribute Show (Exclusive)

• Celebrities and comics gathered to pay homage to the late Joan Rivers in a tribute show
• The show will air on NBC on May 13, and an uncensored version will stream on Peacock the following day
• The stars of the show posed for photos backstage with an urn of Joan’s ashes, which Melissa Rivers says is exactly the kind of macabre joke that Joan would have loved

On May 13, NBC will air Joan Rivers: A Dead Funny All-Star Tribute, a comedy special that was taped at the Apollo Theater in Harlem last November during the 20th annual New York Comedy Festival.

“Given that I’m dead, I assume someone will finally decide to honor me. Well, it’s about time,” Melissa Rivers notes that her mother would have said about the upcoming affair. (Just in case the televised event is too censored for Joan’s die-hard fans, the following day, May 14, the network will stream the uncensored and extended cut of the event on Peacock.)

While audiences can expect the stand-up comics and celebrities at the tribute to pay homage to Rivers’ hilariously bold sense of humor with their own sets (which might include a little Joan roasting), they’ll also hear jokes from Joan’s famous catalog of quips, which she kept neatly organized on index cards.

At the taping, comics and funny people like Chelsea Handler, Nikki Glaser, Tiffany Haddish, Aubrey Plaza, Rita Wilson and Melissa and her son Cooper took turns posing with an urn of Joan’s ashes to honor the late comic, who died in 2014.

“Even though you never knew what she was going to say, I was always very comfortable around Joan,” Wilson told PEOPLE at the taping. “Sometimes she was incredibly mean and that’s what made her so funny, but she’d never be mean to you in the moment.”

“I grew up watching Joan on the Tonight Show, and she was so bold and she made that look easy,” Wilson continued. “But I remember seeing her documentary, and what was striking was how hard she worked on all those jokes and how organized she was and how she kept those files of jokes and material. To me, that was incredible.”

McHale told PEOPLE what he admired most about Rivers.

“She was obviously a pioneer, and she pushed things to the edge as they say,” the former Talk Soup host said. “But she was also such a glamorous woman in a world of sea of dudes who were, as I was saying, always terrified and jealous of each other and definitely not glamorous.”

He adds that she had what it takes to be a comic, and would be just fine with online trolls today.

“So many comics let those little comments affect them, but she didn’t give a s— and that was pretty impressive.”

The tribute was the brainchild of Melissa Rivers, who also serves as an executive producer of the special.

“This is more than a tribute. It’s a reminder of the trail she blazed and the joy she brought to so many,” Melissa says.

The event also raised money for God’s Love, We Deliver, an organization that Joan supported when she was alive.

“She loved giving back,” Melissa says of her mom. “Now we’re giving back, which is fantastic. And to be honored like this by all these amazing comedians and the women that have shown up to honor Joan, It’s pretty special.”

Dead Funny: A Living Tribute to Joan Rivers airs May 13 on NBC at 10 p.m. and will be available to stream on Peacock on May 14.