It’s always a good time to talk to Chris Gethard. Hundreds of people regularly vie for that opportunity, waiting for him to tweet the phone number for Beautiful/Anonymous, a podcast that is built entirely of Gethard taking calls from unidentified strangers. But now seems like a particularly good time to talk to the…
College campuses have long been steady venues for touring comedians. The crowds, after all, are often triple the size of those you’ll find in most clubs, and the money’s good if you’ve yet to hit that elusive “arena stage” of stardom. It was curious, then, when, a few years ago, some of the world’s most successful…
Few entertainment institutions have been more resistant to change in recent years than the humble comedy club, a series of privately owned, strictly controlled cash factories with little interest in anything beyond parading big names in front of two-drink-minimum audiences. Said clubs have faced unwanted attention in…
Last year’s brilliant first season of American Vandal didn’t just introduce the world to Baby Farting and the perfect comic timing of Jimmy Tatro (your biggest Emmy nomination snub of 2018). It also asked one of the most pressing questions of our time: “Who drew the dicks?” It was one-part mystery, one-part parody,…
Everybody has stuff they regret saying. That’s probably doubly true if you’re a stand-up comedian and the majority of stuff you’ve said has been in front of rooms full of strangers. But, for a long time, comedians were hesitant to say they regretted any of their old material or thought it was in bad taste. A new…
On Sunday night, Louis CK emerged from whatever hole he’s been hiding in to perform a surprise stand-up set at New York’s Comedy Cellar, just 10 months after rumors about him exposing himself to female comics and employees were confirmed in a New York Times article. CK had evidently decided that he had done enough…
Louis CK took the stage for a surprise set at New York’s famed Comedy Cellar Sunday night, 10 months after long-standing rumors about his abusive, seemingly compulsive habit of exposing himself to female employees and colleagues were confirmed in the pages of The New York Times, and then by CK himself. For as comedian…
Are YouTubers really the future of comedy? Not Darren Knight, a YouTuber and self-proclaimed “fastest rising comedian in American history” who blends the down-home condescension of Jeff Foxworthy and the kitschy misogyny of Tyler Perry’s Madea in a character he calls Southern Momma. Here’s his most recent video:
Over the last few years, Netflix has swiftly established itself as the new destination for televised stand-up, supplanting old mainstays like Comedy Central, and even the venerable institution of the HBO hour-long special, as the place where up-and-coming comics (and established arena-headliners) go when they want to…
Ah, summer—the hottest time of the year everywhere but in TV land. At least, it was until Netflix set a goal of 1,000 original releases by the end of 2018. But fear not: The A.V. Club is offering life preservers for those who are adrift in this sea of content, starting with the best of scripted and nonscripted series.…
You know what they say about heroes: They either die early, or live long enough to damn near kill themselves making a movie about Don Quixote, and then spout off a bunch of toxic bullshit about how they’re suddenly a trans black woman. That old axiom was never truer than in the case of director and Monty Python alum…
The sanitized, dead-eyed milieu of corporate America will never not be a prime subject for satire, as evidenced by the enduring legacy of comedies like The Office and Office Space. Still, no amount of satire can capture the numbing mundanity of the office better than stock photography, which is, like any corporation,…
Back in 2016, we reported that George Carlin’s daughter Kelly Carlin had donated his “archives” to the National Comedy Center in New York for a “museum experience” that was still in the works at the time. Now, that museum experience has grown into an actual museum, and the National Comedy Center is preparing to open…
You don’t need us to tell you that the world is grim out there at the moment, full as it is of racism, xenophobia, violence, misogyny, and more. Frequently, we look to our various comedians to lighten the burden for a minute, but what are they supposed to do when the cheerfulness supply runs low, huh?
Prince’s archives are the stuff of legend, but what about Mitch Hedberg’s? We’ll soon find out, as in a guest column in today’s The Hollywood Reporter, Hedberg’s widow, Lynn Shawcroft, reveals that she’s spent the last eight months diligently digitizing a huge archive of unreleased material from the late comedy…
Displaying her typically blunt yet thoughtful sense of humor, Cameron Esposito has just released a new special titled Rape Jokes, the proceeds of which will be donated to the National Sexual Assault Telephone Hotline (RAINN). The hour-long special is already streaming on Esposito’s website, but you can buy it for a…
Laughter is somehow different now. Blame Trump, blame outrage culture, or blame the terrifying rise of public shaming, but rarely does a week go by that some public (or even not-so-public figure) makes a joke that ignites a flurry of angry tweets and thinkpieces. Does this response fall under the umbrella of the First…
It’s Memorial Day here in the United States, which, as longtime readers of the site already know, means we’re taking the day off from Newswire for some rest and relaxation. It’s also the birthday of Zelda Rubinstein, the beloved 4'3" character actress with the childlike voice famous for her role as spunky-yet-motherly…
Julia Louis-Dreyfus is going to need a bigger awards shelf: The 11-time Emmy winner will have to clear some space, as Deadline reports that she’s this year’s recipient of the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor. The prize, which has been given out every year since 1998 by the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing…
Longtime A.V. Club readers may remember Joel and Stephen Levinson as two of the masterminds behind 2776: A Musical Journey Through America’s Past, Present, And Future, a 2013 musical comedy album that saw, among other delightfully absurd tracks, Neko Case singing about Star Wars and Aimee Mann serenading David Wain…
