About Those Dove Commercials...

A spot-on take on the whole Dove marketing viral video genre:



"So where's our peace prize or whatever?"

Let's Talk About How Delightful Nadia Kamil Is.

While doing my daily round of feminist websites, Jezebel did me a solid by posting an article linking to Nadia Kamil. Where to start?? Okay first, check out her amazing feminist burlesque piece:



And here's her new music video, a rap on pap smears:


Enjoy more of Nadia's work on her site.

Quick Q&A with Linda Mizejewski, Author of Pretty/Funny

Professor Linda Mizejewski from Ohio State University has penned the latest book, Pretty/Funny, on feminism and comedy. She graciously took the time to answer a few questions for your reading delight: 

Professor Linda Mizejewski

What inspired you to write Pretty/Funny?

Comedy has become THE place where feminism is alive and well in pop culture!  But very little has been written about this.  Because it's "only comedy," there's a reluctance to talk about the real-life effects it has.  Laughter is a bonding device--that's why racist, sexist, homophobic jokes are so dangerous.  But if people are laughing together AGAINST racism, sexism, homophobia--that's a powerful thing. 

How do you think conversations on women in comedy have changed or evolved since the infamous Hitchens article?

Hitchens knew very well that things had already changed by the time he wrote that article.  But I think a clue is the huge success of Tina Fey and Amy Poehler--arguably, among the most famous feminists today!--at the Golden Globes two years in a row.  That's a prime spot for our very top comedians.  Giving that spot to two feminists is quite a coup.

Do you think what the mainstream considers "acceptable" narratives of female comedians is changing? If so, how?

"Girls" on HBO is a measure of that change, as is the success of Kathy Griffin, who openly claims she has nothing to say to straight men.  She's willing to blow off the very part of the audience that's traditionally been considered most important.  I'd use those two examples to argue that we now have a space for different comic narratives for women--certainly way different than the standard romantic comedy, which is where we thought of funny women in the past.

You've probably heard that the BBC recently banned all male comedy panels on their shows. Why is diverse representation important in comedy?

Minorities have always used humor as a source of self-empowerment.  It's the reason some scholars say modern American comedy is based on Jewish and then African-American comedians post-1945.  Comedy is a place where you can talk back, speak up, make yourself heard--and make it entertaining enough for people to want to tune in.

Have you come across any lesser-known comedians in your work that you think are doing exciting work whom our readers might like to check out?

I hope everyone knows about The MisAdventures of Awkward Black Girl on the internet!  And it's hard to say who's well-known these days, but Janeane Garofolo has been doing amazing feminist work for years and years, and she doesn't get the attention she deserves.  I also hope Tig Notaro as become well-known following that stunning monologue on breast cancer that's available on the Louis CK website.

As a professor, how do your students respond to conversations on feminism and comedy?

They love it!  My next project is an anthology on this topic for college students because it's a prime topic for classes in pop culture, women's studies, American Studies, media studies, etc.

I know our many of our readers can't wait to read Pretty/Funny. Any plans for a paperback release? 

The press has said they'll go to paperback if they see a lot of interest and response, so I'm hoping that happens soon.

Pretty/Funny on Amazon

Related: Here's a link to her essay, "Queen Latifah, Unruly Women, and the Bodies of Romantic Comedy."

We Killed: What Other, More Legitimate Reviewers Are Saying

As a feminism and comedy blog, we are obligated to inform you of the newest book on women in comedy: "We Killed: Women in American Comedy," by Yael Kohen.

I haven't read it yet, but I can summarize its reviews for you:

New York Times:

Janet Maslin writes for the NYT that We Killed is filled with stories from people in the industry and is "...apt to raise more questions than answers." Maslin slights the book a few times, for not being as good of an account of Saturday Night Live as another book which focuses entirely on Saturday Night Live and not coming to any solid conclusions about women in comedy. (This article initially screwed up and credited a different author for the book. Whoops.)

NPR:

NPR's Linda Holmes calls it "sprawling" with "some sections are substantially more interesting that others."  She ends with:

...Some of what's here is well covered territory; Ellen DeGeneres doesn't say much about her coming-out experience that's different from what she's said before, and the treatments of Mary Tyler Moore and other comic actresses are too brief to be satisfying. But it does touch on a wide variety of challenges that really are specific to funny women — how vulgar to be, how cute to be, how sexy to be, how self-deprecating to be (the term comes up over and over), and, crucially, to separate the challenges in your career that have everything to do with being a woman from the ones that have nothing or only something to do with it.

What makes a story like this a little poignant, of course, is that to the degree there's a history of it being hard for women to break into comedy, the ones that would be most interesting to know about aren't the ones who made it anyway, whose names you know. They're the ones who didn't make it, who couldn't figure out how to navigate around the obstacles. And if they're out there, it's hard to say how you'd find them.

Teen Vogue:

So Teen Vogue is decidedly more positive, calling it "as entertaining as it is informative." This might be attributed to the fact that they scored an interview.  They also ask dumb questions like, "You quote Chelsea Handler saying that female comedians don't always support each other. Do you find this to be true?" (That's it. I'm cancelling my Teen Vogue subscription.)

In the first question Kohen says she wasn't familiar with the WAF (Women Aren't Funny) thing before Christopher Hitchens. Ugh. I can't help but suspect that someone who was that far removed from the dialogue has just jumped in, interviewed a few folks (okay, over 150 people) and re-hashed other people's analysis.

Here we go- Kohen may have summarized her book for us right here:

When you speak to a lot of people, you realize that there are trends and similarities in what they're saying, which is how I organized the book. All these women are storytellers—that's what they do for a living—so why not let them tell their stories? It's more interesting than hearing what I have to say about comedy!

 *Emphasis very much my own

Macmillan Website:

Okay, I cannot read past the intro paragraph.  Oh God! I forced myself. This is by far the dumbest review yet and makes me have no interest in reading the book:

And as each generation of women has developed its own style of comedy, the coups of the previous era are washed away and a new set of challenges arises. But the result is the same: They kill.

Did this person actually read the book? And if they did, is the message that women, categorically, are good at comedy? I don't know if it would be worse that they assumed this is what the book says or if this is what the book actually says.

Salon: 

Rachel Shukert's Salon review title says it all: "'We Killed': were women not funny until 1960?"

She responds to WAF in the first paragraph:

Since this question was first answered in the negative in the pages of Vanity Fair by the late, redoubtable Christopher Hitchens, it seems to have been designated by the chattering classes as one of the great unanswerables of the universe, destined to be dredged up every time someone’s looking for page hits by pissing off the wrong person at some heavily trafficked and influential ladyblog...

Women are human beings (no matter what some Republican members of Congress might believe); some human beings are endowed with an innate talent to make others laugh; ergo, some women are funny. The end.

(Shukert, come to Minneapolis so we can drink beer together and be best friends.)

“We Killed” is a well-meaning effort, at times even a noble one... 

Oh, I like Shukert even more. She ends with more analysis than Kohen's book appears to muster up, regarding the threat of women comedians:

Humor is power. We kill, and something inside them dies.

I wish Shukert would write this book. I really don't mean to be snarky. Maybe I'm just upset that Nancy A. Walker is still dead. Not to be confused with comedian Nancy Walker, who is also dead. (Did I ever mention that I found N.A.W.s obituary when I was looking for a way to contact her to thank her for writing A Very Serious Thing? It was so sad.)

From the sounds of the reviews and her own interview, it doesn't sound like folks who are looking for writing to further the dialogue of gender and comedy will get much out of it, aside from the stories from particular people about particular times and places. Some of these reviews say the book starts in the 1950's, some say the 1960's. Either way, I wish it went back further, because it's not too hard to find stories since the 50's. Although everyone who is alive to tell the story from further back is... actually dead by now.

Is it a good thing that dialogue about women in comedy might be sparked? Heck yes. Maybe if you've never thought about women and comedy, you'll like this book. But the fact that you have found this post probably excludes you from that category. If you're a comedy writer/performer/superfan then you're already familiar with the institutional sexism in the Comedy Industrial Complex.The reviews don't give any indication that this book will provide more than some nuggets of women in comedy trivia like this:

• Pauly Shore's mother Mitzi was incredibly influential in 1980's stand up. 
• Roseanne once had a Harvard-educated head writer ask her what lunch meat was.

Has anyone read it yet? Thoughts? Feelings? Highlights?

One last thing- A Public Service Announcement from Wisecrack: If you are writing an article that has anything to do with women and comedy or a specific female comedian and you use the words Funny Girl in the title, you will be added to the List of Shame.

Check it Out: Pam and Sue

Check out Sue Galloway and Pam Murphy's videos on their tumblr. Love it.

Roseanne Barr + Amy Goodman = OMG

What is Feminist Humor, Anyway?

When I talk about this feminism and humor project, a considerable number of people shift their glance, squirm a bit.  Sometimes they smile politely and change the subject.  Sometimes they smile and ask what I think of 30 Rock/Roseanne/this one prostitute joke.  Once, a guy tried to bait me into an argument over Andrew Dice Clay.  (My response: "Yeah... I guess his rise was before my time.") More than once, I've been treated to the "Feminism and comedy? Isn't that an oxymoron?" quip.  Zing!  Way to prove you know nothing about feminism.

But you can't really blame people for being confuddled, especially if they're not hip to what feminism actually is, compared to its stereotype: angry, male-hating bra-burners with a not-so-secret agenda to lesbianize our daughters, refinish our garage cabinets and rule the world.  And these people have jokes?

The internet is littered with "Feminist Humor" sites, only adding to the miseducation. These sites feature anti-male or anti-feminist jokes (like this, this, & this).  They were not written or labeled by feminists (we were too busy refinishing our cabinets).  But nonetheless, they reinforce the idea that feminism is about putting men down, which, if you're still confused about, isn't true. (There are millions of phenomenal feminist guys!)

So, here's the hard part.  It's easy to say what feminism isn't.  And much harder to say what it is.  Contrary to popular belief, feminism isn't one big united front, with a sneaky set of objectives.  Feminism or feminisms, as Make/Shift magazine likes to put it, are as varied as the groups that identify with the terms.  A commonality is a concern for the well-being of women and girls in a world that frequently treats them like crap.  Many feminisms recognize the intersectionality of how race, gender, class and sexuality can severely limit the opportunities for individuals... and think needs to be addressed and changed.  

And so, what is true "feminist humor"?  It's a slippery slope to try to create a classification system- this counts, this doesn't.  Generally, feminist humor is based on a worldview cognizant of the way the world oppresses certain groups.  It might address and invert cultural assumptions about identity or experiences of being marginalized.  But it might not.  In a world where women and minorities are given so few voices in the mainstream media, I feel that the act of a woman holding a microphone is feminist, in itself. (Er, unless she's reinforcing misogyny with that voice.  See how tricky it gets to start saying what counts and what doesn't?)

Feminist Humor Theory is a interdisciplinary field of scholarship devoted to intersections of gender, humor and power.   It's really cool.  I'd recommend Nancy A. Walkers, A Very Serious Thing, if you're looking to read more about it.  More recently, Sabiyha Prince is writing about the ghettoization of black female comedians.  

We at Wisecrack truly believe in the power of comedy to shape the world we live in.  We hope Wisecrack will be a virtual space for exploration of issues of gender, comedy, feminism and ultimately, justice.  We'd like to include as many voices as possible- if you're interested in contributing, please contact us at Wisecrack [AT] gmail [DOT] com.  

An Interview with Kate "Oates" Micucci

Photo w/ permission from katemicucci.com

This past Saturday you got a taste of Garfunkel and Oates.

As part of the duo, Micucci is well known on the West Coast for shows at the Steve Allen Theater and if you're a Scrubs fan, she was goofy lawyer Ted's girlfriend, Stephanie Gooch, this season. You can see her around town playing her ukulele or on the beach building sand sculptures (they're quite spectacular). I'm pleased to sit down and talk (via email) with Kate "Oates" Micucci.


LP: How does Garfunkel & Oates come up with the fun, true diddies, like Present Face?
Kate: Oftentimes Riki (Lindhome) says, "We should write a song about this." Then from there we sit with the piano and guitar and a tape recorder and just go.

LP: Do you consider yourself (or your duo) socially conscious humor?
Kate: I never think of my solo songs as socially conscious. I think my songs have pretty simple subject matter. But with Garfunkel and Oates, we touch on some social ideas. Our latest song is a pro gay marriage song called Sex With Ducks. With G and O, it is nice to be able to be more bold with both subject matter and melodies.

LP: What's your favorite experience or moment as a comedian?
Kate: I've only been performing for a little less than two years. But in that time I have a lot of favorite moments. Last month's Playin' With Micucci at the Steve Allen Theater was pretty special. It was the first time my mom and dad were seeing me perform. It was 420. And it also happened to be my mom's birthday. So it was the "Let's Get High With My Mom Birthday Show." Over 100 people sang happy birthday to my mom. It was pretty special. I'm not sure how many of those people then got high.

LP: Where did building sand castles come from? What's your inspiration behind this very cool hobby?
Kate: I studied sculpture in college and I always enjoyed sculpting in the sand. Then my brother told me that a fancy hotel in Santa Monica was looking for a sand castle building instructor. I got the job and spent every Sunday evening teaching kids how to build in the sand. The best part was, most of the time, nobody showed up for class so I got paid to go to the beach. I don't teach classes anymore but I do still go to the beach to sculpt when I have the time.

LP: Do you consider G&O the female version of Flight of the Conchords? Do you get that a lot?
Kate: We've been getting that a lot. I've actually never seen Flight of the Conchords although people tell me all of the time that I should check it out. That is the popular comedy band right now, so that is the automatic comparison. If it were ten years ago, we'd be the female Tenacious D. But it is all very flattering. I think as girls, we are able to get away with saying things that guys could never say. I don't think a guy could get away with singing Pregnant Women Are Smug. So I think it is new hearing songs like this from a female perspective.

LP: and lastly, do you think humor can be used as a tool for social change?
Kate: Absolutely. I wouldn't doubt Tina Fey's portrayal of Palin swung some votes Obama's way.

Hopefully she and her partner-in-crime, Riki Lindhome, will be able to swing some votes to overturn the Prop 8 decision in California with this:



If you're looking for Kate to come your way, she's thinking about it and would love to take her show on the road.  Kate loves Chicago - maybe a Wisecrack event? I'm crossing my fingers.

First Annual "ImprovBoston Women in Comedy Festival" May 13-16

Press Release from the WICF website:

Cambridge, Mass. - ImprovBoston presents the first annual "ImprovBoston Women in Comedy Festival" to be held May 13-16, 2009. The festival is a celebration of Boston-area women performing improvisational, sketch, film and stand-up comedy. Acclaimed artists include Comedy Central's Kelly MacFarland and Erin Judge, Second City's Leah Gotsik and Marty Johnson, film featuring Sarah Haskins of Current.com TV, and actors from ImprovBoston and Improv Asylum Mainstage. 

The festival's mission is to create a forum for people to experience the unique comedic expression of women, see strong female performers and, most importantly, to have a great time. The event is affordable and many shows are family-friendly. 

There will be workshops on sketch writing and improvisational comedy taught by award-winning, professional talent. The festival will also feature panel discussions with local talent and entertainment professionals to increase dialogue among Boston-area men and women performing comedy, as well as comedy workshops with area high school students and the Cambridge Women's Center. Co-produced by veteran performers Maria Ciampa and Michelle Barbera, the festival is a volunteer effort made possible by the hard work of its artistic staff, the not-for-profit ImprovBoston Theater, and a grant by the Cambridge Arts Council, nurturing the arts in Cambridge, and the Massachusetts Cultural Council. More information can be found at www.womenincomedyfestival.com and www.improvboston.com. 

Funny Women in Comedy Festival videos athttp://www.youtube.com/user/WomenInComedy 

Location:
ImprovBoston
40 Prospect Street
Cambridge, Massachusetts
617-576-1253 

Tickets:
Doors open at 7:00 p.m. Shows begin at 8:00 p.m., 9:30 p.m., and 10:00 p.m. Prices vary: $10 - $25 for adults, $7 - $15 for students and seniors. See website for details
*VIP Festival Pass: $70* 

Schedule:
Wednesday, May 13:
8 p.m. - "Comedy Kick Off", stand up comedy with Bari Olevsky, IB sketch group "User Friendly", and storytelling with Jess Sutich (A Night of Oral Tradition) 

10 p.m. - "Funny Guys Stand Up Showcase", hosted by Maria Ciampa, with Dana Jay Bein, Shane Mauss (Late Night with Conan), Ken Reid, Robby Roadsteamer, Micah Sherman, and Zach Sherwin aka MC Mr. Napkins. 

Thursday, May 14:
6 pm: - "Fabulous Females Cocktail Party" at ImprovBoston Lobby. Join us for a festive fundraiser to benefit women in comedy. 

8 p.m. - "Bastards, Inc.", featuring stand up comedy with Jess Sutich (A Night of Oral Tradition), Lindsay Gonzalez, Michelle Barbera (We're Making a Movie), and improv by Three Hole Punch and Bastards, Inc. 

10 p.m. - "Funny Films" featuring a night of short films and video sketch written, produced and created by women. Hosted by Rheri and Jim Kenney. 

Friday, May 15:
8 p.m. - "Atreus", Aeschylus meets Dallas. The world's first soap opera is reimagined in the modern-day, high-stakes business world. 

10 p.m. - "Friday Night Variety Show" with The Steamy Bohemians, stand-up comedians Carolyn Castiglia, M. Dickson, Shereen Kassam, Jennifer Myszowski, Sharon Spell, and special guests. 

Saturday, May 16:
6 p.m. - "Family Show", featuring the women of one of ImprovBoston's most popular shows. Suitable for the whole family, Family Show combines music, improv, and audience interactivity for a completely new show each time. 

8 p.m. - "The Women in Comedy Stand up Showcase" featuring Headliner Kelly MacFarland (Comedy Central), hosted by Erin Judge (Comedy Central's Live at Gotham) and Bethany Van Delft (Boston Comedy Festival) with Maria Ciampa (North Carolina Comedy Arts Festival), Selena Coppock (North Carolina Comedy Arts Festival), Desiree Burch (Hysterical Festival), Robin Gelfenbien (Hysterical Festival), Shane Webb, and special guests. 

9:30 p.m. - "Boston News Net", Boston's premier weekly fake news show features the funniest women in Boston: Kristina Smarz, Megan Golterman, and more. 

10 p.m. - "Improv and Sketch Showcase", featuring ImprovBoston Mainstage, Two Girls For Five Bucks, sketch comedy featuring Cathleen Carr and Daiva Dupree (Ars Nova), Somebody's In The Doghouse, sketch comedy featuring Marty Johnson and Leah Gotsik (The Second City at Sea)