Le Flâneur

Part of me resents the channel 4 weekend ‘list format’ for its lazy and cheap approach to programming, but ‘The 100 Greatest Stand Ups’ on Sunday evening was interesting and informative - the two of the four hours of it I watched anyway. It introduced me to some new comedians, and showed some rare footage of well established performers. Particularly shocking was footage of Eddie Murphy’s deleted ‘delirious’ show where he makes some very ignorant comments about homosexuals and AIDS, but Eddie Murphy was never exactly ‘alternative’. What was more interesting was how this program highlighted the radically alternative right-wing, misogynistic, proudly bigoted and down right obscene fringes of the circuit, and I’m not just talking about Jim Davidson here.

There is this vile man, the successful career of which stateside, I am probably too young to remember, who goes by the name of Andrew “Dice” Clay. He was selling out venues like Madison Square Garden in the 80s and 90s to an audience of white suburban adolescent boys who lapped up his obnoxious sexist take on life. On this page you can read samples of his trademark nursery rhymes which I’ve deemed too disgusting to reproduce here.

What puzzles me is that some fairly influential people must have thought him funny because in 1989 he hosted the MTV video awards. His act was so blue and offensive he was subsequently banned from the network. Even more remarkable was that shortly after this appearance, he guest hosted Saturday Night Live causing cast members and other performers to boycott the show. But looking back, it now seems that what was going on at that time was the beginning of the backlash against political correctness, and for a brief moment, it may have seemed hip to adopt such a stance. Feminism was coming under a sustained attack from the political right and it seems television executives couldn’t resist a piece of the action.

Fortunately Andrew “Dice” Clay’s star faded as quickly as it had risen and the entertainment establishment saw some kind of sense. After a brief spell trying to remodel his image in the 90s, he now performs (according to this website), in his “Dice Man” persona again in Las Vegas - but to considerably smaller audiences one would imagine.

The astute comedian, critic, and commentator Stewart Lee, who was one of the talking heads on the show, made the point that there are ‘comedy greats’ among us now, who may not be receiving the coverage and adulation they deserve. In particular he singled out Daniel Kitson for high praise. But this show also reminded me about people like Jerry Sadowitz and Dennis Leary who I’d like to hear more of in the future.

This entry was posted by Chris on Tuesday, March 20th, 2007 at 4:39 pm and is filed under Feminism, film/ televison/ entertainment.