I love women: being a woman, writing about women, supporting art created by women. So when I heard that The Hollywood Reporter was releasing its annual Women in Entertainment: Power 100 issue, I was jazzed. But when I learned that Lena Dunham would guest edit the issue, I was…well let’s just say that I was less than jazzed. This is because everything I’ve come to know about Dunham—everything I’ve read,
Continue ReadingTen years ago, you could be a comedian without a social media presence. Back in 2008, saying, “Oh, I’m not on Twitter,” or even, “What’s Twitter?” was commonplace. If you can believe it, there were comedians wary of putting their material on the internet for free or worried someone across the country would steal their jokes. But something has changed. While those who achieved celebrity status before the mid-2000s can
Continue ReadingComedian Nick Di Paolo took to Twitter Friday afternoon to shame one of the nine covers released by Glamour for their Women of the Year edition. The cover features five of the student activists behind March for Our Lives, a group formed to combat gun violence in schools in the wake of the Parkland shooting. One of those students is 12-year-old Naomi Wadler. Di Paolo tweeted, “Fuck these dumb cunts and
Continue ReadingSome of the best comedy out there is created on accident, and few movie genres prove this theory more than those comforting yet corny Hallmark Christmas movies. You don’t even have to watch A Boyfriend For Christmas to know there’s a scene where Santa earnestly tells an adult man named Ryan (the titular boyfriend) to live in the moment and let love in. The movie itself centers around a woman
Continue ReadingStop pretending club bookers have an ethical puzzle on their hands. For the love of comedy, please stop interviewing club owners about their Louis CK “dilemma” as if it’s some kind of Sophie’s Choice. It’s a business decision. To state the obvious, club owners own the club. They can—and do—decide to turn comics away from their stages for any number of reasons; reasons, by the way, they’re not required to
Continue ReadingOn a recent appearance on Andy Cohen’s gossipy blabfest Watch What Happens Live, wherein the Bravo king instructed her to “name one celebrity in Hollywood who you think is the biggest misogynist,” Dunham selected the Tosh.0 comedian. After performing what could be described as a moist inhalation of thoughtful contempt and measured dread, Dunham answered. “This is a roughie because there’s so many.” After a brief laugh, the celebrated actress,
Continue ReadingAfter receiving (merited) backlash to Louis C.K.’s first unexpected drop-in set on August 26th, the Comedy Cellar made a move that conveniently shifts the onus of their booking choices back onto the audience. Rather than take a stand in either direction, the Comedy Cellar’s way of dealing with the “controversy” of Louis C.K.’s return is by posting a new disclaimer sign in the club (which is also printed on tickets).
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Continue ReadingDave Chappelle slaps the mic to his knee and laughs—he’s playing the famed Comedy Store. “Everything’s funny, until it happens to you.” From the start of his Netflix special The Bird Revelation, Chappelle’s brow is furrowed, face flat, as he levels his Black experience to that of white feminists who dragged him in the name of #MeToo for expressing “as little empathy as possible.” The audience laughs with the Chappelle’s Show star as he
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Continue ReadingBefore we go further, if you’re reading this looking for life-changing diet tips, I can’t help you. The 500 pounds I refer to in the title of this article is my ex-husband, standup comic Ralphie May, who you may know from Last Comic Standing or his many comedy specials like Unruly and Too Big To Ignore.
At first when I met Ralphie we started out as friends and eventually it turned into something more. I never thought I would date a comic, let alone a man that big, but I always thought Ralphie was very handsome and I loved him with all my heart.
Over the 4th of July weekend in 2006, we got married in Las Vegas by three Elvis impersonators. Why three? I have no idea. Maybe because it’s a magic number. Ralphie wore the biggest tux we could find and I wore a simple, chic wedding dress that a friend of a friend made for me at the last minute. It was a really fun wedding.
Continue ReadingThe following is a guest post by comedian and songstress Lahna Turner, who has just released the first ever comedy music and visual album. Titled LIMEADE, it’s available now on Amazon, YouTube and iTunes. For more info check out, lahnaturner.com. ——————— When I was just 23 and straight out of college, I had the opportunity to travel through India with my Israeli boyfriend Gil who I had met that summer
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