by Larry the Cable Guy hasn’t exactly stepped away from the limelight, but he hadn’t put out a solo stand-up special in a decade before this spring, with Remain Seated coming out in April for rental or purchase via Comedy Dynamics.
Has Larry the Cable Guy watched Nanette?
I’m seriously curious. Hannah Gadsby made a point in her Emmy-winning Netflix special from 2018 to distance herself from her career-long habit of self-deprecation, declaring in it: “Because do you understand what self-deprecation means when it comes from somebody who already exists in the margins? It’s not humility. It’s humiliation.”
Dan Whitney isn’t marginal by most measurements. He’s a wildly successful and wealthy comedian who has starred in movies (some hits, such as the Disney/Pixar animated franchise, Cars; some not so much, such as Witless Protection), sold a ton of merchandise and concert tickets, including a football stadium in 2009 (six years before Kevin Hart matched it). And yet he remains a proud, self-deprecating, character comedian, through and through.
Larry makes fun of his weight, his looks, and his reputation.
When he focuses on other people or topics, the jokes aren’t always the most creative or original, and sometimes they’re downright disgusting, but that’s not why anyone comes to see Larry. They keep coming to see Larry because he makes them feel good.
And despite a hacky joke here or there, you have to give Larry credit. He’s perhaps the first middle-aged male comedian in a long while to discuss his colonoscopy and completely avoid the most obvious jokes about it. That’s gittin’-r-done.
