We Killed: The Rise of Women in American Comedy By Yael Kohen Sarah Crichton Books/Farrar, Straus and Giroux 336 pages, $27 In the early 1980s, while I was reporting a story on female stand-ups for Ms. magazine, Adrianne Tolsch, the host at New York City’s Catch a Rising Star, agreed to arrange a special night…
The best class I took in my last quarter of college didn’t have tests or quizzes. The teacher made us laugh. Our homework was (literally!) fun. And the final exam was an oral presentation… in the back of a bar. Bad grades? Not an issue. Bad jokes? Now that was something to stress over. I…
When my mother retired not long ago, I suggested she join Twitter. “You’ll love it,” I insisted. “It’ll make you laugh.” She gave it a go, but claims that only old standbys like Albert Brooks and The Daily Show’s Twitter accounts crack her up reliably. Far be it from me to defend Twitter’s raison d’etre…
Ira Glass is no Howard Stern — yet. By that we mean he isn’t the King of All Media (Stern’s self-anointed title), but at the very least he’s the crown prince and heir apparent. Glass, of course, is the host of Chicago Public Radio’s popular program This American Life. More recently, he’s taken on the…
Jerry Seinfeld, a famous comedian, used to be the star of “Seinfeld,” a sitcom about a comedian named Jerry Seinfeld and his friends. Larry David, a less-famous comedian, was a writer and co-creator of “Seinfeld,” and now stars as Larry David in “Curb Your Enthusiasm,” a show about the daily life of Larry David, co-creator…
Woody Allen’s new movie “To Rome With Love” is a montage of stories on the titillating streets of the eternal city. Allen (who hadn’t appeared in any of his films since 2006) plays Jerry, a restless, retired opera director whose world collides with Giancarlo, played to hilarity by Italy’s renowned tenor Fabio Armiliato. Roberto Benigni…
Daniel Okrent has a punch line ready when he’s asked how he discovered “Old Jews Telling Jokes,” the Web-video-series-turned-book that became a viral sensation in 2009. “I became an old Jew,” said the esteemed historian, inventor of the fantasy game Rotisserie League Baseball and first public editor of The New York Times. Now, Okrent can…
While he is waiting for Larry David to decide if there is going to be a ninth season of the HBO hit “Curb Your Enthusiasm,” comedian Richard Lewis is embarking on a comedy tour that will take him to Carolines on Broadway in New York City and the Helium Comedy Club in Philadelphia in the…
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