12/31/17

Jordan Peele: "Your truth is more powerful than your mask"

Loved this Jordan Peele profile.

I’ve noticed that the truth works. People can feel the truth. If you’re being yourself and you’re just using your own emotions, they can feel it. If you’re doing fake, they can feel it. It took me a while in comedy to realize that your truth is more powerful than your mask.


The whole thing is worth a read.

12/6/17

How Todd Barry jokes about Alabama

All this Alabama talk's got me thinking about one of my fave Todd Barry bits:

I tour the South, though, I do. I love touring the South. Some people up North are afraid of the South, it's weird. I'll do a show in, like, Alabama. I'll tell someone I did a show in Alabama and they'll be like, "Oh my God! What was that like?" Oh, you know, chairs, a microphone. Oh, I'm sorry, I know what you're looking for. I'll tell you what it was like. Well, I flew into Birmingham. The Imperial Wizard from the Klan picked me up at the airport. Rode to the club on the back of an old mule. Tried to get a joke out over the shouts of "jewboy go home." At the end of the night I go "Where's my check?" They go, "You're not gettin' a check. You're gettin' this bag of porkrinds." Is that the answer you were looking for, you narrow-minded fake-liberal fuck?

He’s so good at tagging bits. And part of why I love it is because it goes the exact opposite direction you expect it to go. It's easy to be a NYC liberal who writes a bit attacking Alabama. Todd flips that. And I'd much rather hear a bit that ends with "you narrow-minded fake-liberal fuck" than one that just reinforces what I already think. I like when jokes make me question my own views and challenge my expectations. That's what the best comedy (and the best art in general) does.

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