Is standup comedy doomed? The future of funny post-Kevin Hart, Louis CK and Nanette

[rangerrebew]

 Is standup comedy doomed? The future of funny post-Kevin Hart, Louis CK and Nanette
 

Whether it’s censorship, problematic tweets or #MeToo, comics are being scrutinised like never before. Is there a ‘new sense of panic’ in the industry?

by Stuart Jeffries

Sat 19 Jan 2019 01.59 EST
 

Comedy is in a period of extraordinary flux. The past two years have witnessed the reputations of revered comics, such as Louis CK and Aziz Ansari, implode in the wake of #MeToo allegations. Then there is the culture of unearthing old tweets, with standups being held to account for problematic “jokes” they’ve made online (for Kevin Hart, it even cost him his most high-profile gig to date, hosting the Oscars). There are also increasing fears around political comedy and censorship. This month, Hasan Minhaj’s Netflix special was pulled because he criticised the Saudi regime over the killing of Jamal Khashoggi, while Michelle Wolf’s searing political set at the White House Correspondents Association dinner in 2018 led to the board announcing that 2019 will be the first time in 15 years that a comic would not be presenting the event. Elsewhere, Jim Davidson, a man once so vile he was almost immune to judgment, was reported for hate speech, at his own birthday party no less (although no action was taken). The comedy goalposts are shifting and there is a demand that the art form gets more socially conscious. But can you be woke and funny? And are we living in a time of such change and heightened awareness that the two can now never be mutually exclusive?

https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2019/jan/19/is-standup-comedy-doomed-future-of-funny-kevin-hart-louis-ck-nanette

[goatprairie]

It well might be a very scary world millennials will inhabit in twenty years when older generations who could take a joke have died  or passed into senility.
Will it be the America of AOC or Ben Shapiro?  I'm not betting on the latter. I probably won't be around anyway.

[jmyrlefuller]

Maybe the problem is not so much that they're controversial—there've been shock comics ever since Moms Mabley, and probably long before that—it's that they're simply not funny anymore.

[dfwgator]

Obama killed comedy.

[goatprairie]

Maybe the problem is not so much that they're controversial—there've been shock comics ever since Moms Mabley, and probably long before that—it's that they're simply not funny anymore.

Well, there are funny comedians around.   A while back I listened to some stuff on YT from Norm Macdonald and found myself doubling over with laughter.
Even foul-mouthed Bill Burr had some funny stuff I saw on a YT video.
I did watch one of Louis CK's bits (before his downfall) and wondered what all the hoopla about him was  about.
I think the problem with a lot of modern comedians is they think they're very hip and with it. Many use the f word as some sort of crutch. 
Certainly, with most lib comedians certain groups cannot be mocked.....feminists, minorities, homosexuals, major lib politicians. So they've severely circumscribed their material for p.c. sake.
They made their bed, they can lie in it.

[Fishrrman]

Never cared for stand-up comics, any of 'em.

The only one I could put up with is Steve Martin, and that's because he played the banjo as part of his routine.

[Wingnut]

Stand up died years ago.   Social justice and the "woke" MoFo's killed the comedy.

[EasyAce]

There's never a Fred Allen, Henry Morgan, Steve Allen, Mort Sahl, Shelley Berman, Bob Newhart, Lenny Bruce (before the dope eroded the talent), Mike Nichols and Elaine May, Sid Caesar and Imogene Coca, Tom Lehrer, Flip Wilson, or George Carlin (before bitterness eroded the talent) around when you need one . . .

[dfwgator]

Stand up died years ago.   Social justice and the "woke" MoFo's killed the comedy.

I can still laugh just as much today at Eddie Murphy's "Delirious" as I did all those years ago.  But there's no way he could get away with most of that stuff today.

[Smokin Joe]

Last funny guy I have seen was Jeff Dunham. Some of the Blue Collar Comedy Tour stuff still gets a chuckle.

Otherwise, too many effin' 'f' bombs to be funny, or just someone being nasty to someone else, no longer funny stuff, because they really mean a lot of it by their delivery.

[InHeavenThereIsNoBeer]

Last funny guy I have seen was Jeff Dunham. Some of the Blue Collar Comedy Tour stuff still gets a chuckle.

Otherwise, too many effin' 'f' bombs to be funny, or just someone being nasty to someone else, no longer funny stuff, because they really mean a lot of it by their delivery.

I think you'd like Rodney Carrington

[Smokin Joe]

I think you'd like Rodney Carrington

I'll check him out, thanks!

[goatprairie]

I'll check him out, thanks!

I think IHTINB is being sarcastic. Unless he's caught Jesus of late, Carrington's routines are usually x-rated.

[Smokin Joe]

I think IHTINB is being sarcastic. Unless he's caught Jesus of late, Carrington's routines are usually x-rated.

Yeah. It was.

[goatprairie]

Yeah. It was.

My older brother thinks Carrington is hysterical. One time about ten years ago he played a video of Carrington for me and the wife and my wife's sister and b-in-law visiting from England.
Virtually everything Carrington said had something to do with a perverse sex act accompanied by liberal use of the f word. I had my brother stop it after about ten  minutes and nobody but him laughing.
I'm far from a prude, but acts like that just don't float my boat.

[InHeavenThereIsNoBeer]

My older brother thinks Carrington is hysterical. One time about ten years ago he played a video of Carrington for me and the wife and my wife's sister and b-in-law visiting from England.
Virtually everything Carrington said had something to do with a perverse sex act accompanied by liberal use of the f word. I had my brother stop it after about ten  minutes and nobody but him laughing.
I'm far from a prude, but acts like that just don't float my boat.

That's odd (to me), because other than a few skits that are definitely R-rated (or would have been when I grew up), most of his stuff that I've seen is pretty mild.  I suppose I may just be burned out on the foul language at this point, but I don't remember him dropping the f bomb a lot.  Or maybe the one show that youtube always brings up is not like the others. 

[goatprairie]

That's odd (to me), because other than a few skits that are definitely R-rated (or would have been when I grew up), most of his stuff that I've seen is pretty mild.  I suppose I may just be burned out on the foul language at this point, but I don't remember him dropping the f bomb a lot.  Or maybe the one show that youtube always brings up is not like the others.

This was ten+ years ago, so maybe Carrington has cleaned up his routine a bit since then.  The one we saw was pretty raw.

[jmyrlefuller]

This was ten+ years ago, so maybe Carrington has cleaned up his routine a bit since then.  The one we saw was pretty raw.

Some people have a clean act and a dirty act. Dennis Miller, for example.

[InHeavenThereIsNoBeer]

Some people have a clean act and a dirty act. Dennis Miller, for example.

Bob Sagat

[Cyber Liberty]

Leftists have created a situation where one whiner out of thousands of audience members can veto things.

Until this changes, stand-up is doomed.

[Smokin Joe]

Leftists have created a situation where one whiner out of thousands of audience members can veto things.

Until this changes, stand-up is doomed.

That's because any sense of humour the Left had was placed against a wall and executed long ago.

It is their inability to see funny things in every day life that leaves them sloshing with vitriol.

[EasyAce]

That's because any sense of humour the Left had was placed against a wall and executed long ago.

It is their inability to see funny things in every day life that leaves them sloshing with vitriol.

The totally politicised creature has no capacity for humour. The left has a franchise on it, but the right isn't exactly immune to the disease.

[goatprairie]

The totally politicised creature has no capacity for humour. The left has a franchise on it, but the right isn't exactly immune to the disease.

John Kasich was so upset by the woodchipper scene in the movie "Fargo" that he sought to have the movie banned from video stores in Ohio.  He even wrote a screed about it in his autobio.
 "Fargo" is one of my all-time favorite flicks.  You're right....some people supposedly on the right have no sense of humor.

[Frank Cannon]

John Kasich was so upset by the woodchipper scene in the movie "Fargo" that he sought to have the movie banned from video stores in Ohio.  He even wrote a screed about it in his autobio.
 "Fargo" is one of my all-time favorite flicks.  You're right....some people supposedly on the right have no sense of humor.

Wow. I thought I hated that stupid jackass Kasich before but after looking into this Fargo matter I really think he is garbage....

A Beginner’s Guide to Hating John Kasich
Here’s why Republicans quietly loathe the Ohio governor.

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2016/03/a-beginners-guide-to-hating-john-kasich

Kasich’s rage has unpredictable targets, including the local Blockbuster that carried copies of the Coen brothers movie Fargo, which Kasich and his wife rented in the 1990s. “It was graphic, and brutal, and completely unnecessary, and it rubbed us in so many wrong ways we had to shut the thing off right there in the middle,” Kasich recalled in his 2006 book. “Next morning, I got on the phone to Blockbuster and demanded that they take the movie off their shelves.” Perfectly normal behavior.

[EasyAce]

John Kasich was so upset by the woodchipper scene in the movie "Fargo" that he sought to have the movie banned from video stores in Ohio.  He even wrote a screed about it in his autobio.
 "Fargo" is one of my all-time favorite flicks.  You're right....some people supposedly on the right have no sense of humor.

They're not as chronic as those on the left, but they do look like fools in those situations.

I'm not wild about such film scenes myself, but I'd rather write a critique about it without calling for it to be banned. What used to be true when we were growing up remains so---the more someone in actual or alleged authority calls for censorship, the more people want to see the item in question. (I mean, isn't it so that the more the leftists scream bloody murder about this or that it just makes everyone else want to see or hear this or that?)