you may be one of these people that likes to spend your pandemic watching high stress thrillers about pandemics, if so, have at it. don’t get me wrong, i love a good thriller but i prefer an element of escape. if i want to watch a high stress thriller about pandemics, i’ll turn on fox news. it’s also great to just laugh out loud.
last week we tuned into two absolutely fabulous netflix comedy specials: hannah gadsby: douglas and marc maron: end times fun — super short youtube trailers below:
despite the comics’ pretty different demographics (gadsby: 42 year old australian non-binary female of evangelical background; maron: 56 year old american male of jewish background), the specials have much in common:
1) first and foremost, hilarious
2) very strong points of view and opinions about the world
a) educational to an extent about topics of concern to them
b) including both ranting hard against anti-vaxxers
c) both expressing strong concerns about toxic masculinity
d) maron focuses on the end of times and the trump administration with uncanny prescience (taped at the end of february 2020)
3) both are, like all the best comics, just unabashedly themselves (or at least unabashedly their comic personas. i’m aware that they may not be the same thing but they feel the same. a great comic makes us feel that we’re seeing the real them.):
4) both talking about things that appear to be high stakes for them: gadsby telling us about her autism; maron leaning into his jewish heritage.
5) both were filmed in front of a live audience. gadsby’s in 2019 and maron’s was created in 2020 immediately pre shutdown. i have to admit the live audience really does help me get into it—i do laugh a lot at stephen colbert, trevor noah and the like on camera from home in front of now one now, but not at level of hilarity that i felt when they were vibing with the people in the room.
gadsby’s opening, which i’m not going to describe to you because i don’t want to spoil it, is sheer genius. i have never seen anyone use that technique before in comedy. as the critics say, she continues to redefine the genre. maron probably isn’t as groundbreaking but he continues to balance on a high wire as perhaps the world’s most likeable asshole male (in contrast to our current president who maron believes is the least likeable, no matter what his profession). warning: maron’s ending is so over the top sexually provocative & defiant of minimal respect accorded to public figures or, maybe, anyone that some people will not want to watch this in mixed gender or political company. I have to admit that this irreverent reverend was literally doubled-over with laughter at it though.
anyway, do yourself a favor and kickback one of these pandemic evenings to enjoy the catharsis of these brilliant comedy specials.
[note: there’s a good chance you don’t care or haven’t noticed that i’ve moved from a “snout-based” to a “mask-based” rating system during the pandemic. i reserve the right to revert to snouts at any time. at first i was just using masks for reviewing public in person things but then i realized, we also need to review our online content from a point of view of not only physical but emotional safety. so the masks are an indication that i highly regard the physical and emotional experience of what ever i’m reviewing from the point of view of me during this pandemic.]
