Mad Tv Skits
Television Comedians Byline: Gene Robinson
What makes a comedian run from fame and fortune, as comedian Dave Chappelle recently did? What made Jerry Seinfeld retire? Is the pressure of TV too much?
Washington Post columnist Gene Robinson was online to discuss why comedians burn out or run out.
A transcript follows.
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West Coast, USA: So...you are exploring why stand up comics would step down from success in their field. I don't know whether you really want to know, but as a former full time childhood class clown and later on as an amateur comedian I can certainly give you a piece of my answer.
I was driven by a desperate and insatiable need for attention, to make people "happy" (from a child's perspective: laugh and smile), and, most desperately, to "control the ridicule" that was happening in any given situation and that permeates our mass culture. (In other words, to keep "them" from laughing "at" ME personally.)
While I have come to value what is truly, at times, an awesome sense of humor that surprises even me, I trust you can see that maintaining such a grand show and illusion on its original terms could get exhausting and even depressing. In other words, there are many,important, worthwhile, and deeply personal reasons to turn away from so-called "success" as a comedian for the mass culture.
Gene Robinson: Hello out there. Today's column tried to look at reasons why Dave Chappelle would run away to South Africa, leaving behind a $50 million contract with Comedy Central. Your question is an elegant statement of the "tears of a clown" phenomenon -- yes, I think it's at least plausible that by definition stand-up comics have personal qualities and issues that allow (or compel) them to do what they do. I was interested in the question of race, since that forms the basis for so much of Chappelle's humor -- not all of it, to be sure, but a lot. I was intrigued that the few statements we've heard from him since he took off, all in one Time magazine article, were centered on race and racial comedy.
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Detroit, Mi.: Mr. Robinson, I'm not certain of the argument you're trying to make. Is Chappelle's schtick funny because blacks perceive the skits as mocking white stereotypical beliefs about blacks while whites see the skits as depicting reality? Isn't there some element of truth in both these outcomes?
Gene Robinson: I think your question kind of demonstrates the point. On one level, Chappelle's schtick is funny simply because it's funny. Everybody laughs. But if you think about it (maybe too much), you can ascribe all kinds of motives to that laughter. I think the issue in Chappelle's case has less to do with audience reaction than his own reaction. If you're doing material that you yourself are not really comfortable with -- like the sketch he apparently does in blackface for one of the shows he has taped -- then the material is a problem.
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Arlington, Va.: So much of stand-up comedy seems to arise from being angry at the world. Do you think that successful comedians can begin to lose their edge because, after reaching a certain level of fame and wealth and comfort, it's hard to stay angry? I'm thinking of Seinfeld, Steve Martin, maybe Cosby.
Gene Robinson: I think you make a very good point. The three comedians you name were never all that angry, in my opinion, but the point is still valid. Look at somebody like Chris Rock, who I think is very funny. He used to be out there on the frontier, but then we got used to his humor and now it doesn't seem so outrageous. He stretched the boundaries, and now his material falls within the zone of acceptability. And you're right -- when you're a starving comic, you have good reason to be angry. When you're rich, you have much less to be mad about. Contrary to the saying about money not buying you happiness, most of the really rich people I know are pretty darn happy.
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Baltimore, Md: Mr. Robinson, interesting column on Chappelle and black comics today. Does it bother you - or do you ever consider - that if any white comic stepped into the areas that Prior, Murphy, Rock and Chappelle carved out, they'd be castigated? Does it bother you that the "n word" is considered taboo only to whites?
Gene Robinson: Castigated? They'd get beaten up. But no, it doesn't bother me, any more than the fact that Jewish comics can do material playing on Jewish stereotypes that Prior, Murphy, Rock, Chappelle and all other non-Jewish comics could never touch. George Lopez plays with Latino stereotypes in a way that no non-Latino comic could get away with. Some kinds of jokes (and even some words) just seem okay when coming from within a minority group, but hurtful and provocative coming from outside.
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Los Angeles, Ca.: I have known some comics, and it seems the lure of live performances with lots of alcohol afterwards can ruin a career. Has this contributed to the demise of the careers of any of the big comedians?
Gene Robinson: Well, it's not just alcohol. Richard Prior almost burned himself to death while freebasing cocaine. John Belushi killed himself with drugs. Freddy Prinz committed suicide. It must be a terrific rush, almost like a drug, to stand in front of a huge crowd of people and make them laugh. Afterward, there must be a terrific letdown, and a temptation to turn to alcohol or drugs to try to recapture that feeling.
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Morristown, N.J.: In what style is it easiest to write? Humorously? Or seriously?
Gene Robinson: Serious is easy, or relatively easy. Humorous is hard. Sometimes a funny line or paragraph or situation will just come to you fully formed, but that's rare. Try to think of writers who can make you laugh out loud. There aren't many. David Sedaris does it for me, and Dave Barry in his prime. A few others, but not that many. It's hard.
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Falls Church, Va.: This is a very good topic. I have watched Saturday Night Live for many years now, and have always wondered why almost everyone in the cast leaves after only a few years, or maybe 5 or 6, rarely more. And you never hear from most of these people again. A few go on to big movie or TV careers, such as Bill Murray, Dan Ackroyd, Eddie Murphy and most recently Will Ferell. But most SNL comedians just disappear from the public radar. Why don't all these cast members who leave realize that, for most of them, they will never be as famous as they were on SNL? Do they get burned out on that show or are they forced out? In particular, the past few years have been really hard on that show--almost all the best cast members have left. Thank you.
Gene Robinson: Saturday Night Live has been such a great incubator of comics over the past 25 years (or however long it's been). The ones with real star quality, like Murray and Murphy and Ackroyd, leave the show when they're hot and their market value is highest in terms of movie deals, etc. Others leave when they mistakenly THINK their market value is high (David Spade, Chris Kattan). Others leave when Lorne Michaels, the producer, decides not to offer them new contracts. The show is supposed to have a feeling of youth; nobody gets to stay forever. Except Lorne Michaels, of course.
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Chicago, Ill.: I hear a lot of people criticize Chapelle, in the sense they can't understand why anyone would turn down the money. I've even heard this from radio talk show hosts and other media commentators. But in his interview with Time, he says over and over again, "I need to check my intentions." So my question is why are we so cynical as a society to think that someone can't turn down money because of their conscious? Is it because it Dave Chappelle and his raw humor would make it seem that maybe he's not spiritual or is it just that money has become so important in society that its unbelievable that someone would turn it down?
Gene Robinson: That's the question that fascinated me. It seemed clear to me, from the little we've heard of Chappelle since he split, that this really was about "intentions." It's entirely plausible to me that he was facing questions of conscience. It's easy to be cynical about that, and to say, "For $50 million I'd do ANYTHING they want me to do." But everybody has limits. This was going to be a huge payday for Chappelle, but given his success so far he's certainly not indigent. We all have our limits, even if there's $50 million on the table.
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Washington, D.C.: While Chapelle may be edgy because of the subject matter he takes on, the depth of his comedy rarely goes into deep meaningful social commentary and insightfulness that eggheads and hip journalists try ascribe to him. I fear that the pressure of supposedly all of sudden being this great social commentator forced him into this funk, or whatever he is going through.
Gene Robinson: That's an interesting question. I think I partly agree, but not entirely. Chappelle seems to me to be a really smart guy, the son of two college academics. He chose comedy over college, but I don't think his comedy, while often quite broad, is entirely naive. I think there's intention and awareness in what he does. At the same time, I don't think he's a cutting-edge social analyst or a political philosopher. But it seems obvious to me that he's smart enough to calculate and assess some of the political and social messages of his work.
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Laurel, Md.: It is in the nature of comedy to exploit our foibles, and one of the most obvious foibles in modern America is our hypocrisy about issues of race.
In William McGowan's prize winning "Coloring the News" he points out that one of the reasons TV news is declining is that viewers see it as pushing a politically correct agenda. It comes from a parallel universe where homeless people are never drunken bums, people with AIDS are never sexual promiscuous homosexuals and African-Americans don't commit a highly disproportionate amount of violent crime.
TV regards these as "myths" that must be dispelled in their mission to comfort the afflicted and vice versa. When do we stop having to conflict the negative stereotypes that are TRUE?
Gene Robinson: Journalism is worthless if it doesn't seek and report truth. But we find truth in facts, not in stereotypes. The problem with generalizing from stereotypes is that stereotypes tell you absolutely nothing about any given individual. When I started my career many years ago at the San Francisco Chronicle, the editors sent me out a few times on stories with another young black reporter, a few years older than me, under the assumption that he would be a good mentor since we obviously had so much in common. Turned out that we had nothing in common. He liked country music, wore cowboy boots and espoused basically libertarian views (before the word was coined). I did none of those things. We got along fine, but all the assumptions about why we'd get along had been wrong.
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New York, N.Y.: Getting back to your comment about routines and materials that only members of an ethnic group can touch (Only black people can make the n -word funny, etc.) I think what bothers a lot of white comedians, and a lot of white people (especially men), even if only on a subconscious level is the fact that there is no material and or stereotypes that only when people can joke about, especially white me. For example, no one would be appalled if a black man or a Latino essentially did the act that the blue collar comedy guys do. Or am I missing something?
Gene Robinson: Well, there must be SOMETHING that only white people can joke about. This sense of group identity that binds black people together as a group, and Jews together as a group, and Latinos together as a group, etc., wasn't really OUR idea. It was imposed. In West Africa, different ethnic groups joke about themselves and each other, but when they arrived here they all became simply "black." The concept of "white" took some time to emerge... but that's another column, and another chat.
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Louisville, Ky.: Perhaps a reality TV series on the life of comedians is in order?
Gene Robinson: It might turn out not to be so funny.
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Gene Robinson: Thanks for joining me, everybody. Talk to you again next time. Did you hear the one about...
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Editor's Note: Washingtonpost.com moderators retain editorial control over Live Online discussions and choose the most relevant questions for guests and hosts; guests and hosts can decline to answer questions.
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COPYRIGHT 2005 Gale Group
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