HOLLYWOOD – With his Netflix comedy film Unfrosted debuting to abysmal reviews, 70-year-old comedian Jerry Seinfeld blames the failure on “extreme left, and PC college campus audiences”, unlike in his heyday, when the teenage girls he dated were fans of his comedy.

  • stinerman [Ohio]
    link
    fedilink
    English
    8214 days ago

    The thing about Seinfeld and other comedians who aren’t as popular anymore is that they blame the audience for not liking their material. Tastes change over time. The comedian either needs to change their act or live with the consequences that people aren’t going to like their material as much.

    Rodney Dangerfield was a great comic for his time. If someone tried to tell the same jokes today, I don’t think he’d get very far. That’s not the fault of the audience. It’s the fault of the comedian. No one owes you a laugh.

      • AwkwardLookMonkeyPuppet
        link
        fedilink
        English
        112 days ago

        “My psychiatrist told me I was crazy and I said I want a second opinion. He said okay, you’re ugly too.”

    • @SwingingTheLamp@midwest.social
      link
      fedilink
      English
      1314 days ago

      I don’t mean to undermine the point, which I agree with, but I did see a meme the other day which recycled a Dangerfield joke. (The one in which a girl told him to come over, that there was nobody home.)

      • @showmeyourkizinti@startrek.website
        link
        fedilink
        English
        2114 days ago

        That was a legit funny joke. Dangerfield’s stuff was pretty good and a lot of it still stands up today because he was usually punching up. His shtick was always “I don’t get no respect” but always because he was schulb not because the others were wrong.

    • @BurningRiver@beehaw.org
      link
      fedilink
      English
      814 days ago

      I’m 45 years old and grew up during the Seinfeld heyday. He wasn’t funny in the 90s and isn’t funny now. George Carlin is someone who made sense in the 70s and made sense until the day he died. Rob Reiner, Mel Brooks - guys I think that are amazing and funny whose work still holds up today. Jerry Seinfeld was a guy who failed upward.

    • @pdxfed@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      714 days ago

      Poor fucking Rodney out here catching strays.

      Nah, he’d agree, he had a sense of humor and would be the first person to know when something fell flat as he was full of empathy, comic 101

    • @shalafi@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      514 days ago

      Dangerfield is a good one to point out. With him, it’s not just the jokes, but the delivery. And he could freestyle like a mad man!

      He owned that schtick. No one will ever be able to do it again.

    • AwkwardLookMonkeyPuppet
      link
      fedilink
      English
      112 days ago

      Dangerfield was all about self-deprecation. That’s like one of the most popular attitudes of the current generation. I think Dangerfield would find a welcoming audience today. He’d probably have to tweak his material when referencing women, but otherwise he’d nail it.

      • stinerman [Ohio]
        link
        fedilink
        English
        212 days ago

        I probably used a bad example. I like his comedy, but you hear it and it’s immediately dates itself. It’s the same when you see a old 70s Friar’s Club roast vs a Comedy Central one. The jokes are still funny but trying to take that sensibility and make relevant today would be difficult.

  • snownyte
    link
    fedilink
    4414 days ago

    I’ve been hearing about this guy on the radio and how he’s complaining about wokeism and the challenges of comedy that has to do it.

    Nobody ever found you funny, Jerry. And if you think you were the star of the show named after you? There were more characters better than you on there.

    • @stembolts@programming.dev
      link
      fedilink
      English
      3114 days ago

      The worst thing I can say about Jerry Seinfeld is that he appeals to the widest American audience.
      Like the Big Bang Theory.

      Wait, do Lemmites dislike TBBT, sometimes I forget this isn’t reddit. It feels more active every day for me it has surpassed reddit. Didn’t take long.

      • Skua
        link
        fedilink
        32
        edit-2
        14 days ago

        I’m technically not on lemmy but I will enthusiastically throw my vote behind the TBBT-is-shit cause

        To be honest though it’s still just a shit TV show. There are plenty of those around. It’s not woth giving them much thought

        • @stembolts@programming.dev
          link
          fedilink
          English
          214 days ago

          Yeah, it’s a bit of a meme I just lean into.
          Psst, I actually like it, but don’t let anyone know.
          I’d be arrested and kicked off lemmy.

      • @Duamerthrax@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        814 days ago

        I try not to think of TBBT, but just about any show with a laugh track isn’t actually funny.

        Did you know the British airing of MASH didn’t have a laugh track cause the brits find it weird and it was forced on the writers by the executives. A laugh track was almost forced on The Simpsons as well.

      • @Default_Defect@midwest.social
        link
        fedilink
        English
        413 days ago

        I’d have a lot less of an issue with TBBT if people I know didn’t expect me to like it because I’m “a nerd” (I wear glasses and know how to use a computer). Also its just not very good.

    • circuscritic
      link
      fedilink
      English
      29
      edit-2
      14 days ago

      The show was funny because Larry David is a cantankerous curmudgeon who’s afflictions just happen to be a hilarious source of comedy material for him to write with. Also, the strength of Seinfeld’s costars let them carry the shows comedic acting and timing.

      The show is funny in spite of Seinfeld, not because of him. The fact that he insisted on doing those god-awful stand-up bits on every episode is all the proof you’ll ever need about that.

    • @JamesTBagg@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      814 days ago

      I did enjoy his show Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee. The cars were often gorgeous or interesting, and the guests often interesting and entertaining. Plus, I think I just enjoyed the premise, two friends going out and chat chitting over some coffee… something us regular folk find ourselves doing. More palatable then the structured sit down style interviews.

      • @glimse@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        714 days ago

        I loved Bob Mortimer’s fishing show for that reason. Just two friends riffing (though Bob is fuckin hilarious)

      • @jonne@infosec.pub
        link
        fedilink
        English
        414 days ago

        The thing that made that show good was the guests tho, it could’ve been any other guy asking the questions and it should be fine.

  • @Nobody@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    2214 days ago

    What is the DEAL with irrelevant comedians attacking basic decency for one last bit of the spotlight?

    And have you ever had airline food…?

  • @darkpanda@lemmy.ca
    link
    fedilink
    English
    1514 days ago

    ‘Member when Bobcat Goldthwait did the Montreal Just for Laughs festival in 1994? Every Canadian who had a cable package growing up ‘members.

  • @BurningRiver@beehaw.org
    link
    fedilink
    English
    1014 days ago

    Breaking News: guy who started a show “about nothing” 35 years ago is flummoxed that people still don’t find his jokes funny two generations later.

    • livus
      link
      fedilink
      4914 days ago

      What does “woke” even mean in this context?

      It seems to have turned into boomer slang for “social oopinions I don’t understand”.

      • @fsxylo@sh.itjust.works
        link
        fedilink
        English
        2514 days ago

        Woke is when girl or gay or black or fire hydrants or any number of other things that conservatives hate that I’m not going to elaborate on.

        And the less (see list above) it is, the more funny it is.

      • ...m...
        link
        fedilink
        English
        313 days ago

        …fundamentally it’s just an assertive paradigm shift toward empathy and compassion…

    • @Duamerthrax@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      13
      edit-2
      13 days ago

      “Woke” is humorless because it’s not trying to be funny. It’s just being considered for other people. I’ve don’t think I’ve ever seen something being sold as a “woke comedy night”.

      The things I’ve seen sold as “conservative comedy” is just some authority figure confidently and smugly confirming the audience’s preconceived notions. Real humor sets up an expectation, then subverts it.