The Definitive Guide to Comedy
America has Comedy Central’s The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. Egypt has Dr. Bassem Youssef. Big difference. Especially since the latter nation doesn’t have as much of a sense of humor about political satire, or satire, or jokes of any kind, for that matter. Sunday’s 60 Minutes profiled Youssef, calling …
On Thursday night’s The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, Patton Oswalt talked about turning 45, and receiving a very special gift from his brother, writer/director Matt Oswalt. It’s a wood frame emblazoned with all of the jobs Patton held before deciding to pursue stand-up comedy full-time. “He burned my employment history …
In case you missed it, last night’s episode of comedy game show @midnight on Comedy Central featured a potential spin-off for you daytime TV viewers. Move over, Chris Hardwick. Meet Chad Softwick, host of @midday. And he thinks pointing is rude, so instead of POINTS!, he hands out hugs and …
Forrest MacNeil doesn’t review food, books or movies. “I review life itself,” he declares. Which, in tonight’s debut episode of Review with Forrest MacNeil on Comedy Central, means reviewing stealing, addiction and prom. In that order. It’s the first starring vehicle for Andrew “Andy” Daly, whom you may have seen in …
The third time was the proverbial charm for the comedians who just earned a 10-episode sketch comedy series order today from TruTV. Friends of the People — Kevin Barnett, Jennifer Bartels, Jermaine Fowler, Lil Rel Howery, The Lucas Brothers and Josh Rabinowitz — will debut their series this summer on …
The Daily Show with Jon Stewart has a new correspondent, and his name is Jordan Klepper. Klepper files his first on-air report tonight, “live” from “Ukraine.” And here that is/was! Comedy Central’s news parody program lost two correspondents late in 2013 to other shows — Al Madrigal is co-starring in NBC’s …
If you feel like you’re missing out on pilot season, do not lose all hope. Comedy Central once again is putting out $7,500 and a potential development deal in the waters for writers and producers through a contest via The New York Television Festival. If you’ve got a scripted-comedy format …
When John Ridley won the Academy Award for writing the adapted screenplay for 12 Years A Slave, he may not have mentioned the film’s director last night, but he didn’t forget his roots in comedy. Ridley told the worldwide audience that his writing career began in sitcoms. Which ones, though? …
Stephen Colbert must keep up appearances as blowhard mouthpiece “Stephen Colbert” on Comedy Central’s The Colbert Report, but at the tail end of Monday night’s episode, “Stephen Colbert” offered that if he, in fact, were a comedian…”as a young, bookish man with glasses looking for a role model, I might …
When Jay Leno took over The Tonight Show from Johnny Carson in 1992, there was no visible late-night TV war to be waged. At 11:30 p.m. Eastern/Pacific, there was The Tonight Show, or there was Arsenio Hall. Leno’s ascension over David Letterman, however, revealed a civil war within NBC that …
