Louis CK provided an appropriately terrible capstone to 2018 when a leaked recording from one of his stand-up shows spread around the internet. In it, CK performed a stretch of material filled with shitty old man jokes about not understanding personal pronouns and jabs at the Parkland school shooting survivors. It was, needless to say, bad.
Last Wednesday, Saturday Night Live alumni Sasheer Zamata tried to make something worthwhile out of CK’s astoundingly lousy set during a stand-up appearance at LA’s Dynasty Typewriter. Echoing the thoughts of just about everyone who heard it, Zamata points out that his jokes weren’t even interestingly subversive.
“I used to think he was really thought-provoking, but this wasn’t it,” she says. “And Louis fans should be able to tell the difference.” Zamata compares the new material to ordering chicken at a restaurant and being served pigeon instead. “[T]hen if you try to complain about it to the manager, he takes his dick out and calls you the N-word.”
Zamata goes on to say that no topics should be off limits for comedians, but that not having “a take” makes it lazy.
“You can’t just get up onstage and say blatantly racist, transphobic, victim-blaming statements without a punch line,” she says. “Like, who are you? All of our uncles?”
Lastly, Zamata announces that she’s “reworked his Parkland bit” where CK says that teenagers should be more concerned with having sex than pressuring Congress for gun reform legislation. “They can do both!” she says, later adding, “They just know how to separate sex from work, which I understand is a hard concept for Louis to grasp.”
The entire segment is great, Zamata clearly and neatly distilling why CK’s latest material disappoints on so many levels. Listen to it below to hear it for yourself.
[via Vulture]
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