The Definitive Guide to Comedy
There’s a fun new oral history piece out from ESPN The Magazine today about the late great Garry Shandling and his longtime Sunday basketball games that brought together so many funny people to his home over a couple of decades. “It was ‘Fight Club’ with better jokes,” said Shandling’s writing …
“It was 2007, and at this point, the Internet was basically just a place for perverts to talk dirty to each other,” says writer/director Adam McKay. “It was rubble,” added comedy star Will Ferrell. “It was just a vast field of rubble.” Enter Saturday Night Live alums McKay and Ferrell, …
The Writers Guild of America held simultaneous award ceremonies in New York City and Los Angeles on Saturday night, with Patton Oswalt hosting the Hollywood crowd, and Michael Ian Black presiding over the Gotham nods. If you want to know how L.A. and NYC are different in show business, just …
This week found Stephen Colbert welcoming a star and the director of the upcoming dark comedy about Wall Street’s 2008 collapse, The Big Short. But Colbert really wanted to look further back in time and comedy history to the years he spent with Steve Carell and Adam McKay in Chicago. …
How does a Mormon guy from Orem, Utah, wind up spending endless hours sifting through R-rated jokes for several of the big-screen comedies you’ve enjoyed in the 21st century? Brent White’s journey started at Sundance. The Sundance Institute, more specifically. But how White has become the go-to editor for Paul Feig, …
Before Parks and Recreation, before SNL, before the Upright Citizens Brigade set up shop in New York City, Amy Poehler was a fresh-faced college grad studying with the rogue improv mastermind Del Close and performing with The Second City. In 1995, Poehler and Close starred together in a pilot called …
The post-WWII era shall be spoofed again by author “Eric Jonrosh” and an all-star cast, as IFC announced Monday it’d ordered a second six-episode miniseries from Funny or Die’s “Spoils” franchise. The Spoils Before Dying will bring back Jonrosh (Will Ferrell) to open and close each of the six episodes …
Before Anchorman 2 found its way into movie theaters this past Christmas amid a flurry of promotional advertising, director Adam McKay boasted there were enough alternate takes and improvised jokes that could fill a second version of the movie. Now he’s backing up that boast. For real. Anchorman 2: The …
Remember when Saturday Night Live‘s head writers stayed behind the camera? Lo, those were days, pre-Y2K. SNL and NBC announced today that Colin Jost, currently the show’s co-head writer, would take over the Weekend Update anchor chair held by other co-head writer Seth Meyers when Meyers departs next month for …
Meeting today’s TV Critics Association in Pasadena, the cast of IFC’s new miniseries spoof, The Spoils of Babylon, seemed both apologetic and triumphant. Tragically triumphant? Tobey Maguire told the critics: “For those of you who will watch this, I’m sorry and you’re welcome.” Kristen Wiig added: “It’s always fun to …
