Friday Fodder for Filibustering: Will We Ever Laugh Again?

Posted on by

The best news I’ve seen in a long long time on Twix came out:

Just gotta ask this today…what happened to the comedy movies…or comedy at all?

41 thoughts on “Friday Fodder for Filibustering: Will We Ever Laugh Again?”

  1. We’re too afraid of offending people, and people are too quick to take offense. That really puts a damper on good comedy. We ALL need to be able to laugh at ourselves, especially these days.

  2. Too many people wear their feelings on their shoulders and think silence is violence. Read the Hog Pen here on good old Refugees any Wednesday. Those people are what happened to comedy. They aren’t the majority. But they’re loud as shit and never stop fucking crying.

      • I have. I am certain you lack to self awareness to have ever done the same. Fuck you and your hog pen, hog boy.😆

        • “Too many people wear their feelings on their shoulders… But they’re loud as shit and never stop fucking crying.”

          When you’re right, you’re right.

          • I have wondered if your weekly blog is a comedy. If the Playpen is that then it’s brilliant. Otherwise it’s reads like a drunk Atlanta wine mom is trying recite what she heard on The View.😆

          • Whine mom Cooley. “Whine”. Sheesh, get it right. 🙂

        • Derek is a liberal fuck stick, don’t get caught up with that argumentative ass hole, it’s not worth your time!

          • And he’s a pussy on top of that. I just like telling him what a shit dick he is every so often to humble him. It makes me grin.

    • They have to cry Mike, they literally dont do anything else from the peanut gallery.

      • Oh Derek thinks what he does here on Wednesdays is important. Thinks he’s gonna win awards and shit.

        • Let’s just keep all of the commentary about how calm, mature and measured you all are on the Playpen, please.

          • I have a better idea. Let’s just leave all your posts on this site contained to the Hogpen and nobody but you and those five or six loons that read it will ever see them.

  3. Can any of us even imagine a movie like Blazing Saddles being made today?

    • Or Airplane with the jive subtitles?

      Or tropic thunder?

      Anyone remember: “I’m sorry. You sounded taller on radio.” That ain’t making it…

      • Smokey and The Bandit is comedy gold. Jackie Gleason was incredible as Buford T. Justice. And there is no possible way that movie is made today.

        • Really only the line “what is this world coming to?” and calling the Sheriff “boy” would have to go really. The rest of that scene would be ok I think.

          Maybe one word from the rant about dancers poontanging around with show folk would have to go as well.

          Anything else that can’t be done in 2025?

          Running over the biker’s motorcycles is timeless….

          Of course, I don’t know what the premise could be. What can’t be found in Georgia these days that can be found in Texas, that anyone would want?

    • Yes. People today still watch those movies and have a good time. It’s the “edgy” comedians who can’t tell a good joke that get mad when they offend someone. Tell better jokes – that’s their fault if people aren’t laughing. See Anthony Jeselnik – he’s good at telling jokes without resorting to a “But tha woke, amirite?” premise.

      • I liked Patrice O’Neal’s take on stand up being good when half of the audience is laughing and the other half is horrified/appalled.

        If anyone wants to see anything about the good old days of comedy where you could say whatever you wanted read anything about Lenny Bruce who was getting thrown in jail every week for the crime of saying “tits!” That was not so long ago.

        I also think that a comedian’s job in many ways, like that of Constitutional lawyers, the press, the clergy, etc… is to comfort the afflicted and to afflict the comfortable. You flip that around and you get unfunny pretty quick.

  4. The normalization of political correctness, followed by cancel culture is the most simplistic answer. Society has lost its ability to laugh at itself and deal with emotions.

    • There are probably more stand up comedians by volume in the public eye than there have ever been.

      What’s missing is comedy movies but movies are suffering across the board.

      There just isn’t enough money sloshing around for investors to take any chances. So we end up with hundreds of comic book movies and re-boots of shit that worked before.

      Similar dynamics are happening in music. If you aren’t pop music, you are not getting invested in by the industry. That’s why Nashville sends out rivers of horrible shit while you have to really look around to find anything good.

      I’m not suggesting that there are no cancel culture dynamics or folks who take themselves too seriously, but it doesn’t seem to slow down Bill Burr or Shane Gillis or on and on and on and on. The fact is that you can say whatever you want, but there may be consequences. Ask Ice-T and see the reaction to Cop Killa. Meanwhile, MDC (aka Millions of Dead Cops) survived unabated in near total anonymity. One pulled the record and eventually got a tv show career out of it. The other? No one knows who they are so no public controversy.

  5. Probably a combination of corporate risk aversion and the desire to profit off the international market. Studio Execs rather ride out virtue signaling criticism than for backing creativity or pushing boundaries. There’s no way to edit comedies for international censors and sensibilities – unlike action movies that can cut out strong minority characters or females. Remember, Merican Cancel Culture is a thousand times freer than the speech in almost any other country (that doesn’t make it right). Nor (regarding being canceled), is there an opportunity anywhere else in the World to rebound. Someone mentioned Shawn Gillis – dude never stopped drinking the BudLight and managed to get paid for it. Returned to SNL as a guest host triumphantly. Another example: Richard Pryor’s “Live on the Sunset Strip” was an America audience only project and could go to theaters to make money on a thinner margin than today, it could never go to racist arse China and make money for a studio’s international market appetite. Now he (like a Chapelle) can only be on streaming for a studio to get paid through the subscription model finances. Heck, many comedians can stream their own stuff for their own moneys and get by without the need for movies or TV.

  6. Not wanting to arouse a controversy better suited for Wednesday, but if it ain’t funny, it should be “cancelled.” Which, BTW, is a dumb word that some people have misappropriated for the term boycott. The whiners complaining about being “cancelled” should do a little introspection. If your shtick punches down on others and does not display any wit, or the commonality that we share as humans, then the public has the right to boycott you.
    I mean, JHC, “you might be a redneck if” attacks a wide swath of humanity and we all leave the shows laughing at ourselves. Ain’t nobody “cancelling” Jeff Foxworthy because he’s funny. “I don’t care who you are.”

    • The thought ever occur to you that he wasnt canceled because he only made fun of white people.

      • No. The thought occurred to me he wasn’t canceled was because he made fun of his own culture which happens to be white. Same reason that black comedians can poke fun at black folks. Same reason Dawg fans can bitch about Kirby but we lose our shit if Florida fans bitch about Kirby.

  7. Bud Light described his entire side of the political aisle. They own Hollywood and the rest of the entertainment industry. There is absolutely no risk for them but they want to talk about punching down. No self awareness at all.

  8. Perhaps I should’ve changed this to “what’s your favorite comedy movie”. Sorry for the political fodder for a Friday.

  10. Ole Mel still has the touch. I was amazed when I learned many years ago that he was and still is married to a fox like Ann Bancroft.
    He’s still a NizeJewishBoy.
    Also, schwartz is gonna trigger a few people (good!) Schwartz is German for black. Just a common noun. Hence the yiddish ‘schwartzer’. Remember Mel the indian chief in Blazing Saddles? Don’t EVEN try to pronounce it if you haven’t practiced for years.
    TOP TEN MOVIE LINE EVAH: “It’s good to be da king”.

Comments are closed.