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Post by budg on Apr 10, 2022 16:56:21 GMT -5
I thought Latka worked really well, especially with Carol Kane . The Mighty Mouse skit was funny. Other than that , meh for me.
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Post by langford on Apr 10, 2022 21:28:26 GMT -5
Speaking of funny, this still leaves me in tears every time I see. Not sure how well it translates south of the border, but it is very funny. Heads up, it's crude, but it's a smart crude, IMO. YMMV.
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MoJoe
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Post by MoJoe on Apr 11, 2022 2:28:12 GMT -5
AK being silently staring is kinda funny, I can relate to the art of omission. His funny voices and mimicking not so much. Jim Carrey or Robin Williams squeeking and grimacing cannot be inviting to share their POV but to the very young of heart (and mind), IMHO. But who needs to be entertained by professional comics anymore when you can have it all watching the news, with real life politics and all kinds of entrepreneurs b*tchslapping away to do the job. 😎
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Post by reverendrob on Apr 11, 2022 3:04:09 GMT -5
Never did anything for me, but it just doesn't translate to "not live."
I know people LIKE that and in the right moment, they're amazing, but....it doesn't translate outside it.
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Post by gato on Apr 11, 2022 7:54:04 GMT -5
Andy was a crafty bit of seasoning in Taxi: a dollop here, a pinch there. But just as you can't make a palatable breakfast out of salt and pepper, for me, Kaufman as a one man act was like trying to take Snow White and turn the movie on its head: Sneezy and Six Other Odd Dudes Plus Tragic Hot Babe.
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Vman
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Post by Vman on Apr 11, 2022 8:06:29 GMT -5
Acting like someone with a learning disorder for comedic entertainment isn't funny and I'm sure a lot of people with afflicted family members cringed at his shtick. I know I did and yes my younger brother was slow. It's like stuttering to someone who stutters. Maybe I'm too sensitive but, he really annoyed me.
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Post by Leftee on Apr 11, 2022 8:28:12 GMT -5
I don’t think his act was meant to poke fun at the disabled. I always viewed it more as a hapless English as a second language guy perpetually in an awkward situation.
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Post by Auf Kiltre on Apr 11, 2022 9:01:20 GMT -5
I always took the ambiguously Slavic Latka persona as a vaguely disguised Polish joke.
I don't find comedy that makes me want to leave the room until it's over all that entertaining. Borat comes to mind. Hard to laugh and squirm at the same time.
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Post by tahitijack on Apr 11, 2022 9:22:06 GMT -5
I'll add Will Ferrell to the list of comedians that are just not funny.
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Post by Taildragger on Apr 11, 2022 12:36:20 GMT -5
I think most comedians are, at least on some level, driven by a need for public attention/affection. That being the case, successful ones, like most powerful politicians, tend to surround themselves with sycophants who tell them what they want to hear rather than what they need to know. To stay funny, they really need brutally honest responses to their material so they can cull what's "un-funny". Otherwise, they become so enamored by their own, supposed "genius" that they lose the ability to objectively self evaluate.
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Post by langford on Apr 11, 2022 14:06:56 GMT -5
I'll add Will Ferrell to the list of comedians that are just not funny. I agree, which is a shame because Will is said to be a very likeable guy in real life.
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Post by Auf Kiltre on Apr 11, 2022 14:28:45 GMT -5
I understand the Will Ferrell dislike and for the most part I agree. Maybe it's the "likable guy in real life" coming through, but every now and then his tenaciously preposterous humor will push through and get a chuckle out of me. Anchor Man case in point. YMMV.
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Post by Taildragger on Apr 11, 2022 15:49:09 GMT -5
It would be very simple to remedy what's wrong with Ferrell's schtick: more cowbell...
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Post by walshb 🦒 on Apr 11, 2022 16:39:03 GMT -5
I might even choose to watch Andy over Will..... touch choice!
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Post by jazzguy on Apr 11, 2022 17:10:21 GMT -5
you can put Sandler in there too
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Vman
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Posts: 194
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Post by Vman on Apr 11, 2022 18:43:34 GMT -5
I don’t think his act was meant to poke fun at the disabled. I always viewed it more as a hapless English as a second language guy perpetually in an awkward situation. I don't think he was poking fun either. His imitations were in exchange for laughter. It was very strange and he appeared at times "too" desperate for an audience's positive response. Weird man! I thought Will Ferrell was hilarious in Step Brothers, Get Hard, & Talledega. The only movie I liked with Sandler was Happy Gilmore.
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Post by Leftee on Apr 11, 2022 18:44:56 GMT -5
It was very strange and he appeared at times "too" desperate for an audience's positive response. Weird man! Agreed!
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Post by LeftyMeister on Apr 11, 2022 19:02:05 GMT -5
+1 on Bill Murray, I'm not sure if he ever made me even chuckle once I didn't think he was funny on SNL but warmed up to him and liked a lot of his movies. Kaufman's Elvis was pretty good. But genius? Nah! Ditto on Robin Williams with a few exceptions. He was good in Hook. I hear Rosie Palmer was a fan of Pee-Wee. My head-scratcher is Will Ferrell. I don't understand why he's famous.
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Post by jazzguy on Apr 11, 2022 19:17:09 GMT -5
Williams was very good in Awakenings w Deniro, but it wasn't a comedy.
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Post by funkykikuchiyo on Apr 11, 2022 19:31:39 GMT -5
I love Andy. I get that it isn't for everyone. And, it isn't necessarily about rolling around laughing. It is like.... imagine a favorite musician who might not be the sort where you'll crank it up if it comes on the radio, but what he did was so new, different and imaginative that it changed a whole generation of music afterward. Old, scratchy blues recordings? Edgard Verese, maybe? Or, maybe you don't like to watch German Expressionist films as much as you do something made in the past 30 years, but in a lot of ways you can understand how much the Expressionist stuff was better and more important. "Avant garde" is a term that gets thrown around a lot, but it is a very real thing. The introduction of British comedy as well as Andy Kaufman gave us a much more diverse palate for comedy. Yeah, I know it sounds pretentious to talk about a comedian in these regards, but comedy is an art too, and it needs these sorts of people to experiment and stretch things out a bit.
Norm MacDonald is another one that people are just now figuring out what a genius he was, in part thanks to one woman who spent a lot of time cataloging and uploading old clips on the YouTube channel "I'm Not Norm". His jokes were very good, but his sense of pacing and way of messing around with an audience... it was perfect.
I kinda agree on Robin Williams. I like him, but people talk about his stand up as being some other-world level stuff, and it just isn't in that league. His energy and pace were amazing, but his material was rarely that interesting.
I've yet to hear anything funny from Pete Davidson. It is like his tabloid/pity-party stuff is the main draw, and people pretend he's funny to be nice.
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Post by Taildragger on Apr 11, 2022 19:49:00 GMT -5
I thought Williams was good in "Insomnia" (2002: crime thriller) with Al Pacino and Hillary Swank. Trouble was, I kept expecting him to break into a manic comedy routine, so that made it harder for me to objectively appreciate his efforts at dramatic acting. Would be curious to view the out-takes from that movie to see if he caused any of them by cracking wise to the crew during any of those shots. I used to know a woman who dated him for awhile when he was just starting out doing stand-up. She said he was one one of those compulsive, "class clown" types who just couldn't ever seem to shut it off: always performing, whether on or off the stage.
He was supposedly bi-polar. That would explain the manic side of his behavior as well as the depression that supposedly preceded his suicide. I'm sure the Parkinson's diagnosis didn't help, either.
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Post by Taildragger on Apr 11, 2022 19:56:48 GMT -5
One of our daughter's friends suggested that I watch a young comedian named Dane Cook. I tried...I really did...but he didn't make me laugh once. I could hardly even figure out what was supposed to be funny about his stuff.
Maybe it was a "generational thing": I just lack the shared, cultural references to make it work.
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Post by Auf Kiltre on Apr 11, 2022 20:18:49 GMT -5
I've aborted countless attempts to watch standup comedians these days. The one I'll usually hang with is Jim Gaffigan because his self effacing schtick is funnier than someone trying to demonstrate how much smarter they are than the rest of the world.
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Post by Taildragger on Apr 11, 2022 20:51:07 GMT -5
+1 for Gaffigan.
Gone but not forgotten is Jim Varney. That guy cracked me up:
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Post by rickyguitar on Apr 11, 2022 20:57:08 GMT -5
George Carlin is one I did not care for...at all.
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matryx81
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Post by matryx81 on Apr 11, 2022 23:45:52 GMT -5
One of our daughter's friends suggested that I watch a young comedian named Dane Cook. I tried...I really did...but he didn't make me laugh once. I could hardly even figure out what was supposed to be funny about his stuff.
Maybe it was a "generational thing": I just lack the shared, cultural references to make it work.
I am a few years younger than Dane Cook and never found him funny. At all. Same with Tom Green.
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MoJoe
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Formerly Known As: quiksilver
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Post by MoJoe on Apr 12, 2022 8:09:50 GMT -5
I also think that Robin Williams has had some nice movies and I was sad when he needed to retire early, awkward clown acts or not. Some I can gladly let go though, like Bill Burr with his hit 'em over the head devil may care routine.
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Post by LeftyMeister on Apr 12, 2022 8:49:22 GMT -5
George Carlin is one I did not care for...at all. Yup! I watched this routine with my girlfriend last weekend. He made us laugh several times.
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Post by Leftee on Apr 12, 2022 8:51:42 GMT -5
I recently discovered Jeff Allen. I like him a lot.
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Post by funkykikuchiyo on Apr 12, 2022 9:04:21 GMT -5
I've aborted countless attempts to watch standup comedians these days. The one I'll usually hang with is Jim Gaffigan because his self effacing schtick is funnier than someone trying to demonstrate how much smarter they are than the rest of the world. The smugness factor has gotten better in the past five years or so. It might have something to do with John Mulaney's huge success, sort of bringing an exit ramp to confessional/rant style comedy. Or, maybe "wokeness" killed it, because they often were smug in a very political way, but now comedians aren't on top of the world for politics. When Jon Stewart was king, comedians were the sages of the age (for better or worse)... now they're deemed offensive and "causing harm", and back to being subversive, which is probably where they belong.
The "look how smart I am" thing is what always kept me from liking Carlin. He could've been funnier if he dropped that. Maybe that is his appeal to an audience... his audience ends up feeling they're in on the smartness, too.
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