In this article…
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Adam Carolla
Performing now!
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In a recent interview with the New York Post, comedian and former “Love Line” co-host Adam Carolla was frank about his feelings on women in comedy. To put it briefly—and politely—the man doesn't find women funny. And with that said, He joins the esteemed company of Jerry Lewis, and I don't know, a bunch of other people who are tragically misinformed. You go, Adam. Here is an excerpt of the interview:
The lesson you learned from a sexual harassment seminar was “Don’t hire chicks.” Do you hate working with women?
No. But they make you hire a certain number of chicks, and they’re always the least funny on the writing staff. The reason why you know more funny dudes than funny chicks is that dudes are funnier than chicks. If my daughter has a mediocre sense of humor, I’m just gonna tell her, “Be a staff writer for a sitcom. Because they’ll have to hire you, they can’t really fire you, and you don’t have to produce that much. It’ll be awesome.”
The “are women funny” debate has grown very contentious. You’re not worried about reactions to this?
I don’t care. When you’re picking a basketball team, you’ll take the brother over the guy with the yarmulke. Why? Because you’re playing the odds. When it comes to comedy, of course there’s Sarah Silverman, Tina Fey, Kathy Griffin — super-funny chicks. But if you’re playing the odds? No.
If Joy Behar or Sherri Shepherd was a dude, they’d be off TV. They’re not funny enough for dudes. What if Roseanne Barr was a dude? Think we’d know who she was? Honestly.
Yep, so here we have it folks: 1) Women are only hired in writers' rooms to fill invisible quotas, 2) We demand more out of funny men (thus Shepard and Behar being “safe” because they're women) and 3) Jews should just stop playing basketball already. His reasoning is almost funny, but like Carolla himself, not quite funny enough. From what I know of The View, it's a talk show, not a yuk-heavy comedy, despite the presence of Elizabeth Hasselbeck. He points to obvious “accepted” funny women, like Tina Fey and Sarah Silverman, but I guess an alumni from dude-bro-heavy The Man Show, where women were referred to as “juggies”, is pretty limited in his view on the opposite sex. I mean, The Man Show was basically assembled out of lazy jokes about how men like beer and women like baking. Everyone likes baking! Who doesn't like delicious cookies and cake and what not? C'mon.
In an age where women are show-running hit comedies and are able to play more roles than just “hot girlfriend/wife”, Carolla's perspective is a sad reminder that yes, some people still find women only suitable to jump on trampolines for some upskirt action. Yes, that is another staple of the “beloved”The Man Show. I would post a clip, but that would be very unkind to those who stumble across this little article, considering that show just killed at killing brain cells. Carolla has recently put out a new book, Not Taco Bell Material. Sadly, the book is sadly mistaken—Carolla and his sad worldview is totally Taco Bell material. Whatever that means.
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Comments (2)
Cinque Malcolm
June 24th, 2012 @3:40
You're an intern, so I won't be too harsh, but this was weak. I'll be brief and to the point and explain why and hopefully the next time you decide to write an article you'll actually do some research and look at the situation fro ma perspective other tan your own narrow one. First off, if Adam Carolla was such a woman hater then why does he always have a female co-host? Ever since he's branched on his own he has had a female co-host, the current one being Alison Rosen. Teresa Strasser was one previously. Instead of considering that you decided to make some lame reference to The Man Show and the trampoline, which is lazy and weak. So apparently this sexist hates women so much that he makes it a point to hire them on more than one occasion and have a female presence on his show. Remember he is paying out of his pocket too, without the influence of network suits. Taking this into consideration, anyone remotely familiar with him would know that his "don't hire chicks" line was an obvious punchline and said in jest. Why on Earth would he say that when he always hires women and is currently paying one out of his pocket? In addition to that, Carolla didn't say women weren't funny. He basically said that in general men are funnier than women. This of course is up for debate, but the top comedians in the business are overwhelmingly men, the top comedians in history are men, and the top grossing comedians are men, Truth hurts. Of course there are several good female comedians, but men dominate the field and always have. You can't argue that. Finally, for some reason you spent the bulk of the article referencing "The Man Show", but failed to focus on his other projects such as Loveline, his radio show on 98.7FM in LA , his previous best selling book, or his groundbreaking podcast and podcast network. You basically deleted 80% of his resume so you could talk trash. That's the easy route, but it doesn't work on informed readers and people that know their stuff.
Alexa Frank
July 2nd, 2012 @0:55
^ Hi Cinque. Thanks for your comment. You make some valid points, but at the end of the day, I stand by my article and my "narrow" perspective and my "trash-talking inclinations", or so you say. To preface my response, this piece was written, for better or worse, really as my own opinion piece. And I tend to take an angry and sarcastic tone with this kind of stuff, which again, might be a flaw of mine. I guess I am, sadly, no more fair or balanced than the NY Post, where Carolla made his comments in the first place. Yes, men dominate the field. Yes, Carolla has done other things of merit. Yes, he has a female co-host. All valid points. But that doesn't excuse or legitimatize the mean-spirited and frankly ignorant quality of comments. And you will find even unkinder commentaries and articles about said comment on websites that are prioritize research more than a lowly intern does. Also, you are correct that Carolla never flat-out said women were unfunny. But c'mon, the comments about being "funny enough for dudes"? The comment about women being the least funny on most writing staffs? Are you trying to tell me saying that stuff is okay because of a, b and c? No, I can't argue that men don't dominate the field of comedy, and honestly, that's a shame. The boys club nature of comedy is actually unfortunate, because I have always loved comedy and it saddens me that my chances of getting to work in that field are lower because I'm a girl, or that if I wanted to write for a sitcom, they would have to take me because of some gender quota and obviously not because of talent, like Carolla implies. Yes, I could've spent more time talking about Carolla's other gigs, like his stint on Loveline or even his role as the pig on Drawn Together. But even if I did, again, would that make his comments okay? Are you trying to say I should've wrote this article along the lines of "Well, Adam Carolla said something stupid about women not being funny, but that's okay, because he also wrote a best-seller and has this groundbreaking podcast and has a female co-host, so maybe what he said was stupid, but he does some other cool stuff, so it's all good!" Because that's, in your opinion, the fair and balanced thing to do? It's nice that he hires women and such, and he obviously doesn't hate women, but again, that doesn't make his comments okay, or even funny. I think you are trying to make me out to be this angry, annoying feminist to downplay the misogyny of his statements, and while yeah, I can definitely assume that role, I really don't appreciate that. Also, "Don't hire chicks", punchline or not, is unfunny. It's lazy and lame, kind of like how you find my article. You seem to be a fan of Carolla, and that's fine. If you like the guy, so be it. It might seem like I hate the guy but I don't. He's probably more successful than I'll ever be. However, his comments were insensitive and no amount of credentials can diminish that. Now, I'm going to have to apologize. You were nice enough to start out your own comment by saying you wouldn't be harsh because I'm an intern. Which I appreciate, because I'm just a sensitive kid meekly banging out articles on box offices and GIlligan's Island musicals. But I take offense to being called narrow-minded and lazy, just because I didn't feel the need to highlight Carolla's own history with working with women and such to be "balanced", or in other words, be considerate of Carolla's "humor". In the future, I will try to be more fair, but probably not to people like Carolla, whose comments weren't fair in the first place.