It's just such a trip that even when Gervais is laughing at *another person's joke* it still reads as if he's in competition with everyone else who's laughing
Ricky Gervais is a master at annoying British one-upmanship i.e. it's not enough to laugh at a joke someone else makes. You *have* to laugh so hard that it draws attention away from the joke and the person who made it, and then proceed to add your own spin/sequel to the joke to try and steal the limelight.
He seems really narcissistic. I think he's a good actor, but he is truly transphobic, won't look at all at the harm he does or the science he's denying. He's also spectacularly self-involved. I think he's just intelligent enough to have made his self-involvement funny in the past, but it seems to have got the better of him in the present.
@@UkuleleVillain we have our fair share of pricks, which is why we try to export (exile) them as often as possible. No fucking thanks for sending Piers Morgan back btw
This is something I picked up on in the Ricky Gervais Show. I loved that show, but I began to notice Ricky’s obsession with Karl was due to the enjoyment he got out of being “smarter” than Karl. And because of that there is something about the Ricky Gervais Show that is unintentionally poetic: Karl is often correct and more philosophically inquisitive. Karl may be ignorant, and often his ignorance leads to very wrong or foolish opinions. But I see Karl as someone who is actually very thoughtful. A moment that I remember well that illustrates this perfectly: Karl, Ricky, and Steve are discussing a hypothetical scenario in which you create a clone of yourself. Both of these clones are the same age and share the same memories. Karl’s response is “how would I know which one is me?” Which causes Ricky to burst out laughing. Ricky laughs because he thinks Karl is so dumb that he would see a clone of himself and get confused about his own identity. But actually Karl was right, if both clones shared the same memories, then both clones would remember stepping into the cloning machine. Both would be under the impression they had just cloned themselves. So without an outside perspective you couldn’t tell which one was the original. Karl actually worked out an interesting problem of the hypothetical and he was ridiculed for it by the supposedly “intelligent educated person” in the room.
I actually get the impression that a lot of his dismissal of Karl is BECAUSE it's Karl. He already has this idea in his head that Karl only ever speaks nonsense and so he is incredibly quick to call him an idiot, not even entertaining the thought that he could be correct. Like in the example you gave, I wouldn't be surprised if he would agree with Karl's response if it were from someone he actually considered intelligent, because the concept isn't really all that complicated.
I mentioned this is another comment, but in An Idiot Abroad 2, Karl meets a group of trans women in Thailand and within a few hours his viewpoint totally shifts and becomes inclusive (in his own words, he went from thinking if his gf was revealed as trans that he would break up to saying she should help carry the groceries). Karl showed more ability to learn and improve in a few hours than Ricky has shown in the several years since.
Case in point Karl’s plots and ideas about a boyfriend sharing a brain with his girlfriend after an accident and a doctor feeling the pain/illness of his patients to cure them being randomly made into lots of Black Mirror. They were so dismissive of a oddly outside of the box and creative idea. Ricky’s only good when he’s writing a very particular style of comedy. Hate his standup
It’s really cool that Gervais is like 60 and still doing stand up specials where his whole thing is being like “Yeah I’m an atheist. Does that…shock you?” It feels like he got trapped in amber as an annoying 2007 epic debate guy.
Watching Sausage Party induced a similar feeling. It's like everyone on the writing team thought they were the first to discover atheism and shock comedy.
@@hughcaldwell1034 and weed they discovered weed and atheism and shock humor which is just sex jokes that last way too long. I was half asleep giggling to that movie when it came out with my ex we both got weirded out by that ending. Ruined the whole movie for our sleep deprived brains.
“Comedy is dead because we’re not allowed to offend people anymore, so I’m going to be as shocking and offensive as possible for the next hour” is the most predictable, least shocking posture for a comedian to take these days.
restriction is a fantastic tool for comedians. only breaking it rarely actually makes a joke shocking enough to be funny, otherwise the expectation is that you'll say anything, therefore, theres no shock to that. Additionally, it forces comics to approach jokes in a unique, interesting way. aiming to offend for its sake is imo bad artistic quality. so i suppose ricky's killing comedy more than anyone.
You can actually take this same approach and flip it and suddenly become super transgressive...if you're a conservative. There's so many shitty things in life that're ripe for parody, but these same things often benefit rich comedians like the ones we see, so they punch down or they're Jerry Seinfeld and complain about confectionery packaging.
If your audience does not laugh bc of the jokes but laugh bc they enjoy to make people suffer then you're not a comedian, you're a bully which is the case, this can be easily seen on transphobes, you can tell anything against trans women, and they will clap as hard as they can, including directly pointing out how many trans women have been killed, and you can see this on any transphobic group
Just to add to the “did he do the whistle” bit, Ricky clearly gets up and goes for a high five, realises he’s going to be left hanging and transitions into a knee slap. Just a wonderful moment captured on camera
does he though? Do you actually think he's transphobic? Other than making some naive jokes about transgenderism that probably didn't help transfolk in society, and complain that people take things too seriously when he isn't in a position to really know how serious things are - can you point to anything that would lead you to think he is anti trans in the way someone like Matt Walsh is?
My mom wanted me to watch a Gervais special and it was the first one I'd ever seen, and I was shocked that like 50% of his act at least was responding to responses to his past jokes. If you're unfamiliar with him, it's really bizarre to see.
Like Russell Brand. I saw a set of his that was easily 15-20% just reading off mean comments or emails he got online and responding to them. What's happening with His Majesty's Comedians??
The only genuine laughs in his specials are the times he's quoting Karl Pilkington. I kind of wonder if the reason he never talks about him anymore is because he's funnier by accident than Gervais could ever be on purpose. Seems like a lovely fella, too. An Idiot Abroad shows how open minded and accepting people can be if they get out of their comfort zone.
@@Bagheadman Karl could be surprisingly insightful sometimes! Ricky was always trying way too hard to milk him for laughs, often to the point of saying things that were blatantly wrong, like "People don't have literal internal monologues."
louis ck honestly earned a little bit of respect from me, not as a person but as a comedian, when he came out with his first special after his scandal. my mom started playing it and i was like oh god great time to listen to another comedian spend their whole special complaining about people cancelling them and refusing to tell funny jokes, but he didn't mention it once and the special was actually pretty funny, which at least is actually sticking to the idea that comedy should stand on its own as opposed to all these comics who say their jokes should stand on their own even though their specials have just become unfunny ranting.
The bit from this where they talk about using the N word on stage was very telling. Louis C.K. is being just authentically awful, and you could tell it bothered Ricky that he wasn't the edgiest person in the room.
@vlad5042 i mean with chapelle and other comedians being "cancelled" is a badge of honor, comedians for the most part are supposed to be edgy controversial. (Them and their audience don't realize how much they're punching down tho and actually supporting the mainstream status quo) theres not much to lose by making trans jokes for them, so of course they're going to bring it up to bolster their image. (Chapelle won best comedy album over tig notaro after his cancellation I don't think Lois would have after jerkoffgate) With CK, he came off as a sex pest toward comedians in the industry, and also as a dude with bad game (yes I know game has nothing to do with sexual assault) it doesn't really look edgy or controversial to talk about how you jerked off in the green room, consensual or not. Chapelles cancellation didnt involve specific victims so some people were able to frame it as a free speech thing.
Speaking of irony, Ricky saying he doesn't like going for the easy laughs while his entire schtick is being mean to people for easy laughs is amazingly ironic.
Some people seem to think comedy is only valid if it makes some serious transgressive point. To which I always respond that Jim Gaffigan is considered one of the greats for quips about Hot Pockets.
Gervais is genuinely so strange. Stewart Lee has a (brilliant) book called "How I Escaped My Certain Fate" which is half autobiography and half really good analysis of some of his own sets, talking about what comedy is and what he was trying to achieve with different jokes and techniques. But in the autobiography part he talks about how, earlier in their careers, he knew Gervais spoke highly of him and later he saw Gervais perform and realised with horror Gervais had kind of stolen/aped a lot of his stage presence from him. And honestly the clip from his more recent work where he's explaining to the crowd what irony is, really really reads as a bad rip off of what Stewart Lee does well. But Lee is like, playing the character of a comedian who hates the audience and thinks half of them are stupid. Where Gervais in that clip is genuinely that guy.
That was the first thought that went through my mind, seeing that. Such a ripoff of something you have to get so spot-on in order to even be funny at all... and such a clumsy ripoff that misses that mark so wide.
That's interesting to hear. As someone who's listened to all of Ricky's old xfm show with Karl Pilkington and Steve Merchant, I can confidently assert that a huge chunk of Ricky's early 2000s standup is just him repeating funny stuff Karl said there, so it doesn't surprise me.
I'd somehow forgotten about that part of the book, but yeah, the 'deconstructing comedy' Stewart Lee rip off in his latest special is really blatant and absolutely painful. I think it's because he belabours it and lacks Lee's eloquence. Also, I don't think Gervais really understands irony. He makes a sexist joke about women comedians not being funny and then excuses it as 'irony' and 'satirising attitudes'. But that's obviously not what he's doing. The butt of his joke isn't sexists - it's women. To the extent that it's ironic it's because we know this opinion is offensive and regressive and therefore he can't mean it. But that's a very weak form of irony; essentially winking at the audience and saying 'Only joking'. Good irony is barbed and has a point and a deserving target other than the ostensible one. But no one who hates sexists is going to see this bit and be satisfied that he put it to the sexists. He even repeats the joke, having broken the forth wall and removed the irony fig leaf, which basically proves that the joke is trading on the preconception that women comedians aren't funny.
watching gervais desperately try to impress his comedic idols while they continue to interact with each other as peers is this weird and human and pathetic thing and and i love it
Not that I’m sympathetic to Ricky Gervais, but now I’m thinking about how terrifying it would be to be in his shoes, like some kind of imposter syndrome nightmare. Imagine being a mediocre but moderately successful musician and being thrown into a room with Paul McCartney, Eric Clapton and Stevie Wonder and being told “these are your peers, interact with them”
@@cargoshipgaming Seinfeld is unwatchable, both the show and the comedian. I'd say that the show 'Louie', created by Louis CK is every bit equal to the UK Office, though they're very different.
The crazy thing about this special is that Ricky Gervais is the executive producer and it was basically a vanity project to put himself in the same room as the comics he looked up to. The difference between him and the others is that he never had to earn an audience as a stand-up, he started doing it when he was already a successful TV star with an existing fan base. He never "paid his dues" as a stand-up and it's painfully cringe to see him interrupting the perspective of these veterans of the craft with his fanboy energy and disconnected takes. Ricky Gervais might be the second unfunniest man to be exported from England after James Corden.
james corden stole his entire schtick from ricky gervais. it’s harsh to say he’s not funny, he’s just not a standup. he wrote the most influential sitcom of the 21st century and was hugely responsible for popularising podcasts. he’s not a hack like corden. at least he wasn’t, until he started with all this anti SJW transphobic bullshit instead of growing up
Idk, the Ricky Gervais podcast was pretty hilarious. Although you could argue that was more down to the dynamic between the three hosts than Ricky himself.
His stand up specials are all him doing impressions of animals when he’s not making trans jokes as well. Like animal impressions can definitely funny but I wouldn’t say they are show us much about our society.
Ricky Gervais didn't say don't do easy jokes. The guy said if the joke seems too easy he feels he wont put that in a special because it's not doing his best. That doesn't mean he wont do it by accident. It's the intention to do his best. The fact that his comedy is loved by the top comedians is because they think Ricky Gervais is highly talented.
@@Fragenzeichenplatte That is not what Ricky Gervais says. The guy says jokes that annoy the left wing because they are often wanting to police jokes. Though the guy is left wing in many ways. The guy says things that annoy the right wing because they are bigoted haha.
Ricky is the kind of guy who deeply wants to analyze and understand something that largely runs on empathy and feeling, a thing he has an obviously hard time connecting to
I'm pretty sure he doesn't want to do that because then he would get it eventually, instead he's deeply uninterested in understanding how anything he doesn't immediatly agree with works.
I mean, his entire stand-up career comes from insecurity. I also re-watched Talking Funny recently and it struck me as kind of pathetic that he just fully admits he started doing stand-up to prove he deserved his success from The Office. All the stuff about "I don't want to be judged" being met with laughs and "well you're in the wrong business" from the other 3 of them was amazing. They all actually came up through stand-up comedy and he just didn't. And the fact that they all have far more stand-up experience than him and don't get nearly as worked up about it says quite a lot. I think some of it also has to do with him being somewhat ashamed of his working class background. Think that's where he gets his "everyone has to know how smart and correct I am at all times" attitude, even towards a dumb joke. My father came from a poor, rural community. Once he left and went to University, he had a need to be the smartest man in the room at all times.
well except Seinfeld got omega triggered by an audience not laughing at an outdate gay joke told - and he def would not be as ok with a similar joke about Jewish people - so he might not be Gervais, but he clearly is also a baby if you poke the correct area.
@@xBINARYGODx Oh for sure, I'm not saying any of these guys are perfect, and Seinfeld is my least favourite of them aside from Gervais. But he's always been a bit out of touch. He grew up rich and lived a cushy life. But he still understands more about stand-up comedy than Ricky ever will. Ricky does stand-up as a hobby, but for all three of these guys, especially Chris Rock, it is/was their job for a long time.
Hearing that he didn't come up in stand-up explains a lot actually. He never developed the crucial skill of being able to laugh at himself, which most comics get by working small rooms where you have to diffuse tension or just by hanging out with other comics at mics and shows. Like there is no way he's ever done comedy in a room where he'd have to do real crowd work. There's just like...there's no way. He wouldn't be able to handle it.
@@yapenggao3548 Yeah, he definitely doesn't have that skill. As I understand, he started doing stand-up at benefits he was asked to go to and then theatres and concert venues. He already had his audience from The Office, so he didn't have to try, or play a crowd that wasn't there for him. Plus, most of his early routine was made of bits practiced on a radio show he did for a few years. The rest is basically just Stewart Lee, but worse.
There's this phenomena I call "stepping on your own cock", when you meet someone (usually while dating) who is just getting in their own way. Someone wants to impress their date- but they are too busy being angry at the thought of their date being unimpressed, or impressed too easily. He as a comedian is there to make people laugh, but he's too busy angrily insisting what they should and shouldn't be amused by.
The date analogy is a good one, as is the analogy of sitting at a table with a group of friends. It feels extremely manipulative to use forms of humor that I don't personally find funny to try to win people over. It feels like I'm talking down to them, like playing Peek-A-Boo with a baby. Sure, they're having a good time, but am I not being disingenuous? I can completely relate to Ricky's concerns here. If it turned out that I could just yell "FART!" every few seconds and make an audience laugh hysterically, I still couldn't bring myself to do it.
@@vargonian Maybe the problem stems from seeing yourself as talking down to others, even the fools and bastards have something worthwhile to say somewhere within them. Idk, just a tiny baby here, shitting itself in glee.
i'm glad i'm not the only person who has been haunted by the "Sittin on a cock 'cuz I'm gay" argument for years. The bizarreness of it being undeniably a dumb joke but if it's dumb it can ONLY be enjoyed ironically. You HAVE to be an intellectual about humor. A room of people laughing while one yells "but you don't ACTUALLY find it funny!!!" is so weird that it just lodged in my brain for all this time. So i guess i'm saying thanks for the vindication of remembering it??
No no, you're enjoying it all wrong, so you're not actually finding it funny, I know what's funny. You have to be sure to mentally strip it of all its comedic validity before you're allowed to laugh.
I am not a big fan of Ricky Gervais, but to be fair to him, I think he thought this round table would be more analytical than the others. What he said was true, that is why the joke is funny. The others weren't interested in the why so he looked silly for bringing it up.
@@willdouglas1617 You don't have to be highly educated or have several layers of irony to find something stupid funny. He's trying to elevate his intellect above others when he makes statements like that because he views the audience as stupid but the comedians as genius. The comedians he looks up to simply disagree with him, his assessment, and his reason for writing jokes.
@@willdouglas1617 No that is not why the joke is funny. The joke is funny simply because it's completely out of nowhere, like a fart. That's it. There's nothing deep there. Many jokes are just funny because they're a complete non-sequitur (and it doesn't hurt if it's about bodily functions). It's just a verbal fart.
Ricky Gervais has this deeply unsettling air of smug ego and sweaty insecurity that shows itself in how he always has to assert that he's always the smartest person in the room.
Joel thanks for this video. Ricky Gervais is absolutely the kind of guy who sees someone else make a good joke, gets jealous, and then intentionally laughs really loud so the moment is about him and not the actual funny person.
right that seemed weirdly competitive like he kept getting louder and more agitated instead of how normally people laugh which you sort of fade your laughter
That's a keen insight. If I might, I'd guess you've seen this in others before? I'm sure of it now, that I have, but failed to find the words to describe it. I wish my social circle, such as it is, included you or someone like you. I had a bff whose skill at describing odd behavior was both accurate and insanely funny. Such a gift, and sadly not one of mine. I'm the one thinking, "what was that?" in a social situation, you know, sometimes just a minute or two behind the curve. But Joel made a good one here, and thanks for your wit!
It's the same thing James Corden does. Watch him on Big Fat Quiz of the Year a while ago. His whole thing is to let someone else make a joke, laugh like an idiot (or you know, Ricky Gervais) and repeat the joke even louder. It's just horrendous.
The best part of Talking Funny for me is how much genuine insight comes from deconstructing Ricky's ideas. The other three tear his insecurities apart out of a desire to discuss the idea rather than being right or wrong (each telling their own stories, with no tryharding), and great material comes from it. There's humanity through suffering, and nobody is trying to knock him down a peg so much as they critique his ideas. And he has failed to learn the lesson in there ever since.
Ricky is the kinda guy who would laugh at "I turned myself into a pickle, I'm Pickle Rick" and then let you explicitly know he is laughing only ironically and that the author of the meme is a hack, getting angry
Rick and Morty is actually a good example of the kind of humor Ricky tried to outsmart. Like sometimes it’s just kinda funny to hear a guy brag about being a pickle idk
Ricky sounds more like a nervous comedy nerd who's listened to too many comedy podcasts. The way he stands up to laugh, it's so performative, like he wants so badly to be liked, but he doesn't know how embarrassing he looks. Honestly, relatable. Anyway, transphobia sucks.
Ricky isn't interested in being funny. He's interested in being the smartest person in the room, and being so incredibly smart that his mere observations can make people laugh. Ricky is the definition of doing something for all the wrong reasons.
"He's interested in being the smartest person in the room, and being so incredibly smart that his mere observations can make people laugh" This is perhaps my favorite type of comedy. I know it doesn't resonate with everyone.
@@vargonian My favorite type of comedy is *observing* and satirizing people who are interested in being the smartest one in the room, are you talking about like.. House MD?
Ricky Gervais is a fascinating comedian. He's spent his entire career engaged in a public performance of a man on the cusp of realizing what a giant wanker he is, but never quite making the connection. I used to think it was intentional, given the character he played on the Office, but now I realize that's just how he really is. Sad!
It makes me think of the David Brent movie in 2016, which he made himself without Steven Merchant, which was based around us finding Brent sympathetic and likeable - IE closer to how Gervais actually saw the character. I feel like I see this a lot with people playing semi-Self-Insert, "me but a bigger asshole" characters, where the actor eventually gets uncomfortable with playing an asshole and tries to reframe them as sympathetic or just misunderstood.
He might well have been at first, but then The Office became a smash hit and Ricky decided to bury all of his self-doubt under a giant pile of money where he's been ever since
@blacknight Really. That's my sentiments exactly. And you know on Curb, Larry David kind of explored this aspect with him being a self insert of George and being annoyed when other people saw him as a shmuck. But it worked so well there because Larry David doesn't have the same ego levels and is actually somewhat self aware. For RG everything is so serious and so intense and he'd rather die than be thought of as unfunny or stupid. He doth protest too much methinks
It is quite interesting going back listening to the old podcast Ricky did with Steve Merchant and Karl Pilkington and noticing just how much naturally funnier the other two guys are and how they're carrying Ricky comedically. Karl has all of his weird ideas and unique turns of phrase, Steve has his intelligence and his anecdotes, and Ricky is always like "HA HA HA, KARL LOOKS LIKE AN ORANGE".
he also talks over Karl so often, like you get invested in what hes saying then ricky says something like “YOUR MIND IS MADE OF MUD” every time karl starts a new sentence
@@loshen8286 I really enjoyed Ricky’s Politics standup show when I was younger, but now listening to him talk about studying philosophy at university it all forms part of a bigger picture of a person who’s deeply insecure about their own intelligence
Karl is a natural comedy genius because he doesn't even know he's funny, something that Gervais has successfully and, at times, cruelly exploited for his own gain.
I think Bill Maher got into comedy exclusively because it's the one place where being a pretentious dick can be seen as a positive trait instead of a negative one
I think a lot of Ricky Gervais' "philosophy" is a reflection of how much he has internalized the class system in the U.K., that he desperately doesn't want to be seen as "common" or "working-class". He very much wants to be a member of the "upper class", and if he was doing jokes that literally anybody can do, if he was getting laughs that the guy at the end of the end of the bar can get, it would absolutely kill him.
@Queewe There's a huge class and access culture to the media industry in the UK too, he's a sad wee man trying to appeal to a coterie of hacks who only talk to each other.
This. You can see the difference between him and the Americans' approach in the awkward sit down. I'm not saying UK comedians are all like Ricky, but he in particular is influenced by British classism. And I second that he's insecure because he's sitting next to very successful comedians and trying to be too clever because he thinks that will impress them.
Given the type of celebrities that are able to crossover into Hollywood this makes a lot of sense. There are many American celebrities like Chris Rock who climbed their way to the top from a working class background whereas the vast majority of UK celebs that were able to crossover to the US have a upper class background with years of academic training in their field like Eddie Redmayne went to Eton and Cambridge; Benedict Cumberbatch literally descends from rich slave traders, Florence Pugh attended private schools with access to acting training, etc. Very rarely do does the UK media give the same international push to actors of working class backgrounds. Daniel Kaluuya’s a working class British actor whose gotten a Hollywood push from Jordan Peele. So, I can see why someone like Ricky Gervais would feel that that the only way to truly establish yourself among the best of his peers is to present as a pseudo-intellectual elite and gatekeep comedy as an inner circle.
@@eiephants i randomly found a UK comedian on netflix a few yrs back. She was talking about how she wasnt going to make self depricating jokes anymore cuz she wants to like herself and it messes up her mental health. Honestly she got me to stop making those same jokes about myself. She was so sincere and hopeful and hilirious and she didnt make fun of herself or anyone else in her special i still remember it even tho i can not remember her name ar all. Like she literally changed how i treated myself subconciously. So i think like with all comedians theres good ones like her and bad ones like ricky who let that fame go to his head and the passage of time mess him up.
Ricky gives off the energy of a guy who got into a specific field more because he got positive feedback when he tried his hand at it and... that's it. Like he clearly wants to be the new George Carlin, but doesn't seem to understand that Carlin was progressive and not just contrarian.
in regards to the first line... whats wrong with that? Thats literally all you need to go after a dream, some encouragement. Idk maybe you don't mean it in the way Im interpreting it but something about that first line rubs me the wrong way. Agree with the second tho lol
To be fair all comedians are kind of contrarians just 'cause that's what gives them attention, even George sometimes. But yeah, your point is pretty spot on
@@kieranhurst8543 That's just what you want in a stand up comic. For a joke to bomb because it's not funny and then wait 3-4 days for the twitter replies to come in
Holy f'ing Sh*t Joel! I've been thinking about this moment for literally years, the moment when Ricky stands up looking for a high five after the whistle line and doesn't get it during that special has given me second hand embarrassments every day since. I'm so glad you highlighted it. You are a master of the form!
@@mightymeatymech You know, I've been a huge admirer of all the radio shows and podcasts Ricky and Steve did with Karl for many, many years. I think the interaction and different personalities of Ricky and Karl were exceedingly important to make stuff like "The Ricky Gervais Show" work so well, but the real genius of the whole thing really was Karl. Ricky and Steve (whom I do find funny too!) were really just the sidekicks.
@@leow3696 thing with Ricky is that he's had a lot of banger jokes when his main purpose is to actually make a joke instead of proving a point. The Office UK is the kind of show where you HAVE to be funny, its not a place where you can make some assertion over your audience, its a place where every comedian who wants to write something can come up with the stupidest idea and make it bright with deadspan deliveries. When he's not in project like that, he has to sell himself and that's where he stops being funny.
@@HawkOfGP But even Steve put in effort. So few of the funny moments from that show are actually Ricky. Merchant and Pilkington seem to put a lot more effort into running it each week and general organising. He never seems to put in the effort beyond the occasional tired offensive Chinese impression or trying to seem smarter than Karl.
I think the fact that Gervais is British plays into this. The 1980s alternative comedy scene, probably is a major influence on him, played itself off the more traditional variety show comedy which was considered hack, less intellectual and often deeply reactionary. British alt comedy played itself off as more difficult. I know alt comedy exists in the US, but I don't think it was the same in it's peculiarities.
I was thinking the same thing, that it might be cultural to an extent. I love comedy, but I like English comedy for different reasons than I like American comedy.
Gervais’ incessant need to be the smartest guy in the room (without, crucially, being any measure above an average person) is basically the core concept of the Ricky Gervais show, where he constantly talks over Karl Pilkington’s ideas and refuses to even let him explain his rather unique way of thinking before cutting him off midsentence with some variation of “YOURE STUPID LOL”. Even back then Ricky is terrified of ideas or ways of living that are different to his own because they threaten his tiny, shell-shaped worldview.
Steve Merchant is by far the quietest of the three on the podcast and I realise now that in between getting Karl to say weird shit and Ricky screaming at Karl for saying weird shit, Steve could barely get a word in
Yep, it’s utterly insane to listen to a guy with a degree in philosophy shout someone down (ie Karl) when they question things like mind-body dualism and imply that there is only one way of looking at things. The entire practice of philosophy is to question and debate things which are normally taken for granted, like did he retain anything at all from university? Love the podcast with all my heart but good lord it’s as annoying as it is baffling.
The bit when he said "Do you know who I'm trying to impress?" and then silently pointed to each of them in turn instead of just saying "you guys" was 100% a Brentism.
The thing I notice is that the golden points of Ricky's career; The Office, Extras, and XFM (which is seriously my favourite piece of media ever made, I doubt anything will ever top that for me) is that Stephen Merchant was always involved. Always a much quieter partner, to the point you question how much he adds, until he's removed and it becomes starkly apparent how much weight he was pulling. Karl obviously does a lot during XFM as well, it really was his show, but the episodes without him (usually with Claire) are still great and again, it becomes clear how much Steve is doing there.
I actually thought of Ricky Gervais the other day and in many ways I feel like he’s is the antithesis of Conan O’Brien and everything I love about him. Conan is a smart guy who proudly owns his stupid jokes. He uses his intelligence to elevate and play off his guests and co-hosts without ever feeling desperate to prove himself. Ricky always feels very insecure and like he has to prove his own brilliance by ascribing meaning to, and overanalyzing everything he says. “Something can’t just be funny, it has to be funny because Ricky Gervais was smart and innovative enough to come up with it.” Ricky’s main concern is to be the funniest guy in the room whereas a comedian like Conan just wants everyone in the room to have fun.
Also, Conan seems like a really nice guy who has no need to punch down. Ricky's jokes seem to boil down to "Religious people are dumb" "Fat people are lazy" "Trans people are crazy" Conan wouldn't stoop that low. Also he couldn't, man is way too tall
Not to be a party pooper but... Conan isn't that smart. Of course he's a comedy genius! And a joy to listen to. But when it comes to understanding the world, he's just an average lib
@@hayk3000 don't associate "lib" with not being smart, makes you sound dumber actually. people dismiss how easy it is to succumb to the liberal mentality and discard all the rest
I remember seeing this segment ages ago and at the time it really stood out to me how naturally the other three comedians banter and joke with eachother and Ricky is off to the side awkwardly trying to enter the conversation as if he has no idea how to interact with his peers at joke school.
I’ve always felt that Ricky’s weirdness in this conversation is due to him being nervous because he is PROFOUNDLY out of his league in this room and knows it. This is 3 of the best 7-ish stand ups of all time and the dude who co-wrote the Office.
Honestly though props to Ricky Gervais for sitting next to Jerry Seinfeld and Louis CK and still managing be the weirdest, cringiest guy in the room. That actually does take a weird kind of talent.
@@70sman I would argue that requesting to whack it in front of somebody is pretty awkward behavior. A bit of a yank on your collar moment, a bit of a “yikes” as the kids say
I used to be a huge standup comedy nerd so its so surreal hearing someone reference this special lol. Like the "does he do the whistle" thing has also been burned into my brain for a decade. Even when it came out I thought Ricky was out of place in this. Like we have Rock and Seinfeld, two standup legends, Louis CK, who was the hottest comic at the time, and... Ricky.
@@gracie1312 Sitting on the Dock of the Bay has a bridge in the tune which is whistled. Imagining someone singing the "Sitting on a Cock 'cos I'm Gay" version COMPLETE with the whistle... just compounds the (funny) stupidity of the joke :)
I think what made me realize how much Ricky saw himself as something more than just a funnyman, was his entire relationship with Karl Pilkington. Karl would often say baffling, bizarre and yet often oddly profound things, and Ricky would crack up before calling Karl an idiot and moving on. It was like he saw himself laughing at a simple moron, and that must be why everyone else laughed too. Yet Karl Pilkington carried both Ricky's podcast and "An Idiot Abroad", because the audience found themselves laughing along with his strange, often uneducated but poignant observations; they found Karl endearing, not simply the bald simple fella Ricky would sometimes make him out to be. Ricky Gervais was a great comedy writer, especially when paired with Steven Merchant. He is obviously a quick witted man. But lord jesus does he have one strong little egotistical personality.
@@lw8882 Nah he's right in that Ricky often missed the point in making it about himself. Listen to a compilation of Monkey news segments, Ricky is often actively making it less funny by shouting over Karl to call him an idiot, predict the story in advance or repeating what he just said instead of sitting back, laughing and making the odd joke.
@@lw8882yes and no. Ricky would often show himself to be very closed minded and would shoot Karl's points down instead of listening to them. Which was funny because a few times, it would turn out Karl was accidentally/actually right. I will never forget the fact that they had read "scientists predicted that in x years, gender as we understand it today will not exist and more and more people will have an androgynous expression". It stuck with me because they've read it like, what, 20 years ago? And now Ricky is/seems firmly anti-trans.
Something that always sticks with me is the part of An Idiot Abroad 2 when Karl meets some trans women in Thailand, and easily shifts his own world-view to accommodate them. Ricky was so keen to play himself as the smart guy and Karl as the fool, but throughout the series Karl constantly proved his own ability to learn in ways Ricky still hasn't managed after several years.
I think the issue with Ricky Gervais is that he's just not made for being the face to his own words. He can *write* great comedy (when he's not trying too hard to be clever and/or a contrarian) but he himself is just a charisma vacuum. I feel like there's something worth unpacking in the fact that every film & TV character he writes for himself is some variety of miserable, horrible person who's desperate to be liked and thought highly of while being completely unlikeable, and yet he's clearly still the one the audience is supposed to be rooting for.
In his more recent stuff (AfterLife) I find Ricky writes himself in TV/movies to be like the 'truth teller' like the most profound and brilliant lines have to come from his mouth. I feel like he's the epitome of 'nah comedy isnt about being funny it's about SpEaKiNg ThE TrUtH'
He's clearly deeply insecure about his place in comedy. He strikes me as someone who wanted to be a comedian rather than someone who wants to make people laugh. He looked at all his favorite cemedians and decided that he too wanted to be a Comedy Genius but took the phrase smart comedy way too literally
he wanted the upper hand on morality, being able to say anything but hide it in a comedy curtain, so he can be both serious about what he says but hide it under a curtain. you see that with plenty of comedians from time to time but its normal, I bet all comedians have dealt with those dilemmas plenty of times, with Ricky that's almost like his staple and his legacy.
@@picahudsoniaunflocked5426 lol it's the first pfp Ive ever had, I made it on my iPod touch like 15 years ago. You're the first person to ever say anything about it, thanks
Gervais is clearly very insecure but he's managed to convince lots of people that he isn't. He's managed to convince lots of people that he's edgy, but he's not doing anything that his contemporaries haven't already done. The fact that people genuinely believe his hosting of the Golden Globes was some defiant act of rebellion against Hollywood despite the fact they paid him to be there several times and he didn't actually get into any trouble with anyone is baffling.
One of my favorite words is 'sprezzatura,' from Italian. It's originally defined as the ability to make your words and actions look effortless and cool even when it takes a lot of effort. Trying hard to make it look like you're not trying hard, as it were. More recently it's also meant a defensive kind of irony, pretending that you don't care about anything by acting like nothing matters and it's all just a game to you. I think Gervais perfectly embodies every sense of sprezzatura. He really goes after that image the "cool guy who doesn't care what anyone thinks." The irony of course being that he cares a ton about coming off that way.
Amazing that his issue with easy jokes is not "if they're based on bigotry they might harm a maginalized community" because clearly he doesn't actually give a shit about that. His issue with them is "Jerry Seinfeld won't think I'm smarter than him" Very nice Ricky, good stuff
@@07W So people can just say outrageously racist stuff, then just go "it was a joke, you're not allowed to be mad!"? I don't think you understand how jokes work. Jokes aren't harmless just because they are jokes, it depends entirely on what the point of the joke is.
@ 2:12 I actually understood Ricky's philosophy or rather point of view. Ricky is expressing an important element that both the audience and sometimes creatives don't understand. Ricky just doesn't want his jokes to be just funny, he wants them to be interesting, and most of the time, the artist (In this case Ricky) wants the joke to have the same sensibility on perception of art to be seen as something worthwhile. Most of the time the people who can understand or grasp this aspect or element of art are essentially critics and creatives who share the same art form. Sometimes the audience will never grasp it because essentially their focus (80-90%) of the time is just (In this case comedy) to laugh and have a good time. But at the same time, Seinfeld's argument is also correct and that making the joke to make people just laugh and the comic making it their own is also worthwhile and actually very fulfilling. He as a fellow artistic colleague who shares the craft understands the feeling and the importance of the audience appreciating the joke and the artist owning it, rather than feeling shy and missing out on a very cool joke that will laugh and have a good time. Essentially Both Comics have a different point of view and both comics' arguments or perceptions are equally important. I don't think Jarvis disagrees with Seinfiled's viewpoint he just wants more from his craft and this leads to pressure and the self-judgements he keeps talking about which leads to artistic anxiety which clearly either Seinfield never had, or overcome while Jarvis is clearly still struggling with it. I disagree with Big Joel making the argument that Jarvis's philosophy is out of place.
oh man something about this resonated in my bones. i always feel like I'm trying to prove something about myself with my art and. oh man. what a cautionary tale. i think i wanna be as little like ricky gervais as possible
I think you're fine, dude. Everyone has these insecurities and hangups about thier art. Gervais's mistake is internalizing them and using them as the entire basis to do his craft.
@@09daniscool Yes, absolutely! It's very important for your own sanity to do art because you're chasing something you enjoy, not because you're running away from something that hurts.
There is a moment where Chris Rock says something like "I do standup for a living. I don't have The Office." Chris Rock does not try as hard to hide his contempt for Ricky Gervais. Gervais has the shortest standup career of the crew, yet he is actually the producer of Talking Funny. It is really outrageous that he lumped himself in with 3 icons, "the funniest people in the world." You can tell the 3 other guys vibe and he's left out.
thats like sandler, cruise, gordon-levitt etc. who write and produce their own movie to star in, and cast the hottest woman on earth as their wife/love interest
I was wondering who put Gervais alongside the others and whether there was some kind of sponsorship involved! I guess Ricky's ego is the only sponsor needed!
@@seanmatthewking one example: vanilla sky. a remake he produced almost shot for shot and cast the same actress: penelope cruz. changed almost nothing about the movie except put himself in the lead role
@@daltonbedore8396 when I saw Don Jon had Scarlett Johansson, Julianne Moore and Marisa Tomei, all of whom I had a crush on at some point, I knew the movie was just a means to an end and I couldn't help but clap in hatred.
I used to love the old XFM shows with Steven Merchant and Karl Pilkington, and the animated series they based off of them. However, I realized years ago that despite being titled “The Ricky Gervais Show”, the comedy was entirely carried by Merchant and Pilkington. Pilkington is so naturally funny and entertaining without even trying, and his uneducated Everyman character was super endearing. Despite him being an “idiot”, I often found him much more likeable than Gervais.
I’m 21 and British, my dad absolutely adores Ricky gervais and everything he does, and my mum loves the show Extras, so my childhood was pretty much dominated by Ricky. It took me so, so long to realise that all this time, I have greatly disliked pretty much everything he’s done, and even longer to admit it to myself, but oh my god I could rant for hours about my disdain for this man and how he has impacted my life, ESPECIALLY my relationship with and how I view my dad, who pretty much shaped himself in Ricky’s image, HEAVY on the atheist narcissist ‘self-aware’ ‘intellectual’ stuff. He dunks on people for idolising celebrities and ignoring/forgiving their terrible behaviour but I can’t criticise Ricky’s blatantly transphobic show without waging a war on him. I liked the Ricky Gervais show for Karl Pilkington but I can’t watch it anymore, it just makes me feel bad for Karl. I have too much to say, this hit a nerve with me ig, really good video Joel, as always!
Tbh I liked a lot of Extras but I would've liked it way more without Gervais being the dominant character or in it at all. If he'd just produced it & focused on the other main actor, I think it would've been a good show. He's this derailing presence in every scene he's in, detracting from everyone else.
I really liked Karl too, and the podcast they did with Karl. Especially the fact that a lot of what Karl said back then WAS right, or well informed, he just misquoted it, or didn’t explain it the best way. Karl is a lot smarter than people have him credit for, I think it’s just the way he spoke, or the way he viewed the world, that Ricky and the other guy (I wanna say Steve or Stephen? Sorry I wasn’t very familiar with him) constantly laughed at or made fun of him for. Karl was even right about the increase in non-binary/trans/gender non-conforming people in the modern day, which Ricky laughed at him over for believing the article he read. Looking stupid now, aren’t you Ricky?
I like The Office and Extras because it seemed like Gervais was writing those characters to usually be the butt of the jokes, which in hindsight is kind of weird considering how badly he needs to be better than everyone else now.
I got to have a conversation about comedy with Chris Rock before he was on SNL. He was just another up-and-coming New York area comedian and we met at an audition. I never forgot it. He was a pro even then.
Funnily enough, later in that special (I think it was later, it's been a while since I've seen it) Jerry talks about cutting a bit from his act early on because he realised that it only got a laugh because of an f-bomb he dropped. That was apparently the whole reason he became such a famously clean comic. So it sounded like he had something of a similar mindset to Ricky when he started, albeit not necessarily so snobbish. Also a nice companion piece to this special (that Ricky set up) is the interview he did around the same time with Garry Shandling, where Garry deliberately went into his shell and was as low-energy and deadpan as possible to leave Ricky hanging with everything he said. There was this remarkable mini era where Ricky was going around, meeting his comedy heroes and being effortlessly humiliated by them in public.
Well I can get Jerry's point. He realized when he left the f-bomb out of the joke it didn't work and he didn't understand why back then. So trying to build a similar joke without cursing was a challenge. Has nothing to do with Ricky's ego issues of being the smartest guy in the room.
I think that's different, since often laughing at swear words is more of a nervous laugh about the taboo being broken rather than actually finding something funny. Ricky seemed to be claiming that being funny on its own wasn't enough and he had to have some kind of intangible intellectual element to the joke. Jerry wants to make the audience laugh because they find the idea behind the joke funny, whereas Ricky wants them to laugh and think he's very smart at the same time.
@Sad Panda Seinfeld explains it futher. he days that the swearing was channeling his anger at that point but he couldn't figure out how to translate the anger without swearing so he cut the joke out.
Although I appreciated many of his sketches, recently I have found in Ricky Gervais the same problem I have found in Dave Chappelle: the desire to be seen as someone more than a comedian, someone akin to a crusader on a moral quest for truth. Also, is it me or does Ricky's last laugh sound like those Mariachi's screams when they start playing?
hahahah. I think it's an ego thing too. The whole "comedians are the modern day philosophers" thing is so cringe. Just do your damn job, you aren't that important..
It's funny because that is normally something also thrown at 'woke' comedians like Hannah Gadsby, a comparison which would immensely annoy Gervais but would fit. People don't look to comedians for moral lessons!
I’m not sure I agree. Chappelle definitely didn’t use to be that way and tbh I don’t think either of them are crusaders the closest either gets to thar his when chappelle did a show about George Floyd I think what they both have in common is they don’t seem to really care about anyone other than themselves and this quality has become magnified due to their money and prestige and now they have just become the establishment and are very defensive and jealous of their power and happy to punch down on people
That’s why it’s so hard to take their “it’s just a joke” shit seriously. Like obviously it’s NOT “just” a joke to YOU ya big baby crying about cancel culture and trans ppl you make up in your head to be angry at.
@@idontwantahandlethough I think comedians can be important, but I also believe that the medium through which they communicate important ideas should be comedy. you can't just say that your ideas are important, spend an hour making people uncomfortable, and then insist that you're a good comedian
I watched the first series of afterlife with my parents and he basically wrote arguments for himself to win against other characters about things he believes. It felt like fanfiction about himself, but with added tragedy. Terminal illness is used in a lot of media and it can be done so well so I'm not bashing that, I just wasn't a fan of it. There were lots of tropes I found quite boring. I feel he could've benefitted from speaking to people who've lost loved ones to the disease or who have depression, and maybe he did but it felt like someone trying to portray something they didn't know enough about to do it in a compelling way. Maybe it would've been more impactful if the main character was likeable or had anything redeemable about him. I'm glad the show helped some people but yeah it wasn't for me. Also as an autistic guy I felt weird watching his show Derek, again watched that with my parents who watch a lot of sitcom type things. I did like Karl's character but then I like Karl a lot, he's very open-minded despite not being the most well-informed person. And I wouldn't be surprised if he was autistic because the way he describes the world is unique, albeit rather bleak at times. Also, I'm an atheist too and there are ways of talking about it without just shitting on entire cultures or religions that they find comfort in. I'm against fundamentalism and religion being used as an excuse to hurt others (like abortion bans etc), that should go without saying, and I have had bad experiences with religion due to being queer, but I think RG comes across as really cocky with his 'takedowns' of religion. Like I said you can do it well, I watch Emma Thorne who does it well for example, but she doesn't act like she's a fuckin genius and deserves a medal for it lol But yeah if you enjoy his shows or he's helped you get through something then I'm glad, just not a fan personally. My parents liked idiot abroad and the office so I remember parts of that from it being on the telly when I was a kid, and I remember liking those but I think that's cos of Karl and Merchant mostly lol, seeing as I like their individual work a lot more
I completely agree about After Life. The whole thing felt super lazy and self indulgent. Merchant was such an integral part of their early sitcoms. Ricky is a brilliant comic actor but he massively lacks discipline in his writing.
This is actually such an interesting look into what motivates Ricky, not just as a comedian but as a person. He is only interested about what he considers "the elite" thinks of him. He needs that validation in order to be able to count himself among them. He considers himself so above the common people that the reactions and praise of people who're specifically fans of his work doesn't matter. He's a status chaser, and he's isn't as much climbing towards the highest status imaginable knowing he started from the bottom, instead before he reaches that level he thinks of himself as a "temporarily embarrassed member of the elite", much in the same way many who believe in the meritocracy fully, thinks of themselves as temporarily embarrassed millionaire. In that way he's very similar to people like Tucker Carlson. Both are clearly part of theelite socioeconomic elite, but both are equally unsatisfied because they hunger for the approval of the very few at the absolute top.
Now I kinda want to see Ricky Gervais interviewed by Tucker Carlson - two egos that manage to be both arrogant and fragile, together in the same room. It would be a lab experiment from hell.🍿
@@kylebookout1789 yeah, but whats crazy is that Ricky does not care that you, a genuine fan, finds him funny. he only cares that the perceived elites think he is smart
It’s so strange (good strange) to see this dissected, it’s always rankled me but I’d totally forgotten about it. I remember discussing it with other buddies as obsessively into comedy as me and we all just couldn’t understand now he was even in the same room. And although I don’t think he’s on their level, I still appreciate some things he does…but this is a sure fire way to make yourself look like an absolute awkward tool.
@@jonathand6952 Stewart Lee isn't a fan. Frankie Boyle isn't a fan. Lots of good comedians aren't impressed by his lazy recycling of the same tired old jokes
@@dzonbrodi514 A lot of the best comedians love him though. There will be though who don't like him. There are people who don't like the best comedians. There are people who like what I would called average comedians. I bet that what you think is recycled has a connection to religion and politics that don't match yours. Am I correct?
I can't find it anywhere, but there's an old Ricky Gervais and Karl Pilkington bit where Ricky basically introduces Karl to the concept of improv comedy and they do a scene together, and it's an absolute masterclass in bad improv versus good improv. Ricky assumes the character of some kind of weird creepy troglodytic neighbour who talks about his balls hanging too low and that he keeps pissing himself in a kind of exaggerated Grima Wormtongue voice, and it's just utterly DOA because Ricky Gervais cannot play a character to save his life. He asks Karl what it was he wanted to talk about as the setup, and then Karl just responds in his normal voice that Ricky keeps forgetting to take the bins out and it's ruining the scenery, getting increasingly frustrated, and completely resuscitates the bit just by incorporating a genuine human interaction into Ricky's ridiculously overacted piece of misanthropy.
@@pepijnstreng4643 I think what he means is that Ricky implies his true potential is wasted by being a comedian when really he could be doing something much more meaningful and important
Karl Pilkington has the comedic timing that even the greatest in the craft would KILL to have. He's one of the funniest people around whether that's intentional or not.
This is one of those situations where someone already made my comment for me. Maybe this is baseless, but I've seen a lot of dumb people in my life, and Karl doesn't seem dumb at all. He just has a very downbeat, unusual personality that average people might interpret as dumb, but intelligent people might see as simply unique and interesting.
I say this every time Ricky comes up, the last time I watched him host the golden globes, he gave an opening speech with a sentiment at the end that summed up to “don’t get up here and try to be righteous about some cause during your acceptance speech cuz you’re a rich arsehole at a televised awards show” Which was already a dubious sentiment around MeToo activism, but then the immediate first award went to Russell Crowe who couldn’t be in attendance because his house was under threat of climate catastrophe, forest fire in Australia so he was “home” with his family. And I hope if nothing else that it made Ricky feel insecure and want to take back what he had just said because oh yeah some problems we all face no matter how wealthy/privileged
I've never seen a comic who didn't appticiate how hard it is to get a good laugh. This is like saying "It's not funny bc its a good joke, it funny bc I am smart."
Ricky Jervais kinda reminds me of that one friend we all have who tries to be the funniest person in the room and keeps looking at each person to see if they laughed, instead of just relaxing snd having fun with friends. Oy vey
The only time I see people saying "Oy vey" on the internet is when they're being anti-semitic, but since this is a leftist space... is there something I'm missing here?
Had a friend like that. He would INSIST on having his joke acknowledged, even when it would have been funnier to drop one dryly in passing and move on. He also had this habit where he'd get competitive about jokes. If someone else got a big laugh he'd try to top it instead of letting the joke land and letting someone else have their own moment. It never really worked, of course, because you can't spontaneously be funnier than an organic joke if you're that focused on your ego.
The moment I expected this video to end with: Louis CK drops the hard R and Chris Rock laughs and says it back to him. Seinfeld says "I don't think he should be allowed to say that" and they have a brief back and forth about it. RICKY drops the hard R and Chris Rock and Louis look at him like "woah bro what the fuck, calm down dude Jesus Christ"
Ricky strikes me as a middle-aged guy who never got over his edgy atheist teenage years. You know, the kind of guy who still laughs at the "I identify as a helicopter" joke... unironically.
I have fond memories of seeing Ricky Gervais first popping up on a British comedy show called the 11 o'clock show which i used to watch religiously during the late 90s (also the lauch point for Ali G & Bruno etc.). A while after that i was excited to see a stand up show of his screened on the tv. When i watched it, i remember being so disappointed to find that so much of it was just making fun of disabled people in really cheap and unfunny ways for shock value. From that moment on, the only thing about him that surprised me was how good the office was (although this could be down to the many other great talents involved, including Makenzie Crook who was one of the original presenters of the 11 o'clock show). All his lame athiest takes, attention seeking, and needing to have Karl Pilkington as a foil to talk down to and patronise, came as absolutely no surprise after watching even that one crappy standup show...
I think Ricky Gervais is a comic genius as a component of a team and unbearable chore when he's solo. When he's in a writer's room where others can curb his worst instincts, his comedy shines. But in his stand-up, he just comes off as condescending, trite, and painfully edgy.
@@inigo137 the purpose was intentional overstatement for greater contrast between my praise and my criticism. it was rhetorical hyperbole. but yes, I do think some of Ricky Gervais's work (like the original office) took genuine talent and insight, and just because I think he can be an absolute wanker doesn't necessarily take away form that.
There's a stand up set by Ricky Gervais about homophobia and how it's not the same as fat-phobia. I think it's really worth a watch because of how it doesn't work, it's one of the most confused stand-up bits I've ever seen. If I was a video essayist I would definitely make a video unpacking why that particular joke doesn't work because I think it's really really interesting.
sexual assault mention tw just searched it up and wow. this is so bizarre …. love how he specifically says that if they were the same thing, you’d have to deliberately “wean yourself on cock” and then enacts a bizarre incident of like. domestic sexual abuse? it’s so gross and so bizarre ???
i know this sounds really depressing, but i literally cant remember the last time i genuinely laughed but joel suddenly doing that Ricky Gervais impression at the end really caught me off guard and somehow made me cry laugh😅😂
I think part of the awkwardness comes from the fact Rock, Seinfeld and CK are stand-ups first, and Gervais is primarily a writer and comic actor. I can sort of see his train of thought in the "sitting on a cock cause Im gay" section because if you were writing a scene with that joke you would probably be thinking about what the subtext is, and what the character motivations of somebody laughing would be, and what sort of pathos you can extract etc - it is exactly the sort of David Brent fuck up you get in The Office; but a stand-up has a whole different set of skills.
I was absolutely obsessed with the Ricky Gervais show with Pilkington and Merchant as a high schooler. I decided to look into his other work and liked The Office and Extras quite a bit. once I got into the deeper stuff, like his stand up and interviews and his social media presence, I had this moment like "Oh. He is ACTUALLY miserable and annoying, it's not a character. It's not ironic." I started seeing how utterly desperate he is for a laugh to the point that it is painful to watch. I have never seen this clip, but I am also going to be quoting, "DOES HE DO THE WHISTLE?!" from now on. Its..... incredible.
i liked the office uk and made the mistake of watching his stand up and even as a dumbass 20 something in 2008 it was just painfully unfunny. seeing that his standup material hasn't progressed past edgy shock humor and just complaining about people being mean to him on twitter while he scrolls throug his twitter is really telling. last thing i remember sitting through with him in it was when he was trying to talk to garry shandling and seeing that same kind of desperation and need to be liked right down to the uncomfortably loud fake laughing and shandling's utter contempt for him in response was probably the funniest thing about it
It's possible you didn't clock this because of your age at the time @bigjoel , but it's an important fact that may shed some illumination on the entire 'talking funny' special. The setup of the show APPEARS like 4 comics sitting in equal standing, but in reality, it was an interview. One man (Ricky) interviewing three other men. The project was set up by Ricky, and the other 3 were his guests. In a sense it was a genius move, because by putting himself in the same room as these others, it created the optical perception that he belonged in that room with them.
It's not a secret, it's just been obscured by the veil of time. All he had to do is offer the right amount of money to get those appearances, and thanks to the success of his (then) two TV series, 'The Office', and 'Extras', combined with the residuals he was still receiving for the US version of 'The Office' meant that his pockets would have been plenty deep enough to accommodate that.@@Krokrodyl
I absolutely _love_ the level of disdain you can see in Louie and Jerry's eyes. It's amazing. edit: the really dumb thing about all of this is that honestly, Ricky Gervais *DOES* know what's funny. Better than almost anyone else I can think of. If it's funny, he will laugh that dumb laugh. If you've seen An Idiot Abroad (and you should, it's an experience) or anything else he's produced or written, it's abundantly clear that the dude has a genuine knack for knowing when something is funny. That _is_ a super worthwhile skill, he's really good at it, has even made a solid career out of it.. but unfortunately his ego is so ridiculously overinflated that he'll never allow himself to not be the center of attention. He wants to be the funny guy so badly.. and he's just not that guy. He's the guy who says "omg, that's hilarious. Let's keep doing that!" and then everyone makes a ton of money. He should have stuck with that. [one of] The issue[s] in this clip is that he's trying to intellectualize it. Sometimes shit is just funny, and dissecting the frog kills it. The other issue is, obviously, his gigantic ego. It's not his philosophy that makes him unfunny, it's his ego. It's just that his ego has also informed his weird philosophy and basically everything else about him. It's hard to be funny when you see your audience as unwashed plebians.
It's easy to tell he's faking it because real artists seem to not really see themselves as important as their art, and their art comes from so many different observations of things. Things outside of themselves. Ricky is that threatened ego talking, most of the time, and his best moments are when he can shelve it away and take the pain of humiliation with grace. Like a true court jester. We are what we eat, and if we're dissecting the frog we're also kinda eating it in a way. Let's not be Fwog men, let's be human beans (they look like tasty morsels for the fwog men, unfortunately)
Total tangent, but it’s always bothered me: I completely disagree with the “dissecting the frog kills it” mentality. Dissecting a joke will make it stop being funny… **to you**. If your objective is to laugh, never dissect a joke. If your objective is to make other people laugh, you need to dissect jokes all the time, because you need to understand how they work in order to make more.
I disagree with your diagnosis of the problem. The problem isn’t that trying to intellectualize it is bad inherently, the problem is that Ricky, despite his best efforts and inflated self importance, is bad at intellectualizing it. He’s not half as smart as he’d like the world to believe.
The ironic thing about Gervais' definition of irony is that his entire career has been built on everyone thinking that him being a grating, smug asshole was an act when in fact it was just his personality.
I get the impression that the last piece of media Ricky Gervais consumed was an ‘Athiest DESTROYS Creationist’ video in 2007, and thought it was so funny that it informed his entire routine for the next 15+ years
@@colinreynolds01 no, I’m an atheist as well. But the reddit core ‘I’m so smart because I’m an atheist’ shit was cringe in 2007 and it’s definitely cringe now
@@yaketysaks It seems to me that his stand up these days tends to revolve around ‘fat people are lazy’ and ‘trans people are weird’ moreso than his atheist takes. Every now and then one of those clips will do the rounds but that’s just people re-sharing old shit.
I think the common thread through a lot of modern stand up is the attempt to launder it into being an intellectual or a pundit. There's a big element of this in Chris Rock and Seinfeld's work too, but I think they are better at handling it than Gervais. Gervais was basically trying to get them to break kayfabe and admit "No, a lot of this is my actual views and I'm being serious about what I say and do. I care deeply that people think I'm smart" but the others know better than to ever do that.
I love George Carlin specifically for his political jokes, and what makes it work is that.. He's not just fucking making fun of marginalized and oppressed people. It's weird that this is something comedians need pointed out to them, but like, it's not funny to joke about people whose lives are made miserable for no good reason, but it is absolutely fucking hilarious to make fun of people who are terrible and persist in being terrible despite being given ample chances to stop doing so. I remember reading or watching something about how the right wing simply cannot comprehend how humor works, and they seem intent on proving that sentiment correct.
@@swedneck Reductionism and literalism 'literally' structure our modern technological and diverse world... it always had, to some extent. Ghosts and goblins were shortcuts to explain things that made no sense to our eyes, I guess. It's no wonder there are sycophants, after all, any void is a vacuum that pulls all matter nearby into it. Power vacuums. There will always be a Ricky or a Trump or a Russel to be pulled in (by lack of barrier?) to be a workhorse that can't see (any good reason to venture) outside the confines of a space, of self. Great artists and comedians are analytical and curious by nature of their mature self-awareness and able to unpack the general unconscious, the shadows that we tend to bat away into our periphery. Or you can take a shortcut, and try to maneuver your mask towards the audience at all times, a dimly lit façade, begging silently to not be put back on the shelf of normality where you started, and will eventually end your journey. Trick is? We're all on that shelf, all the time, and the quicker we are to accept it, the better shot we have of changing our hearts and minds OH MY GOD I'M PRETENTIOUSSSNOOOOO
Thank you for this. It encapsulates how I feel about Gervais. His special "animals" years ago where he discusses Noah's Ark made me laugh so hard but his latest where he just spews transphobia made me so mad. He not only thinks his audience is beneath him but pretty much everyone in the world is.
i think its nice that people can sustain a successful comedy career off of being the equivalent of the guy on twitter who follows up spewing any old dumb shit with "hahaha lots of triggered people in the replies!!", while still somehow managing to make that dumb shit the most boring string of words imaginable. a talent, really
@@JjJj-kv7wu With Stephen Merchant, and he was really the creator of the show, though Ricky created the David Brent character. Looking at the stuff Ricky has done without Merchant it's starting to look like Merchant was the really funny one, at least when it came to the slightly more sophisticated humor that is completely lacking from Ricky's other works.
I appreciate that Ricky can be so open and honest with the other comedians in this conversation. It's clear his views don't come from a place of malice, but from a place of insecurity. I'd like to say I hope he took something away from what the other comedians said in that conversation, but it's been 10 years now..
I agree. "The funny" is actually serious business. Comedians know that there are underlying rules to comedy and that there has to be an element of truth for something to be funny; when a joke resonates with me it lands so smoothly. So Indont begrudge him trying to dissecr the craft. But he also views his opinions as gospel (ironically?) And thinks he has gotten to where he is through merit. He hasn't. He's ridden on the shoulders of giants straight in to illusions of grandeur and a god complex. As dogmatic and intransigent as the "religious fanatics" he derides. He may have had good intentions at one point but now he is sour. His fat phobia and edge is just his insecurity, hypocricy and narcissism manifested.
I heard an interview with Steve Carrell once where he said Gervais had told him (paraphrasing) "Everyone knows a person like David Brent [Michael Scott] in real life, and if you can't think of someone, you are that person." and ever since I heard that I can't help but think Ricky Gervais and David Brent really are the same.
The story of Gervais being criticised on twitter for his casual use of the word mong (a derogatory british slang for someone with Down's Syndrome), and how he then went on to make the series Derek (patronising the kindness of an autistic/schizoid man) is something
Comedians have to reckon with the fact that they are descended from jesters and clowns. Wearing a tight black shirt doesn't make you an artisan. Ricky is constantly running away from this realization.
Hearing Gervais say the purpose of his comedy isn't to make people laugh, but to impress comedians he loves gives me a better insight into why his comedy is the way it is. I honestly think many of the shitty "don't censor my comedy" comedians are also trying to be a comedian's comedian like him, but just won't admit it. When a good comedian tells a joke that bombs, whether it's just not funny or most of the audience finds it offensive, the comedian simply won't tell that joke anymore. But Gervais and others see comedy as a religion & have to vehemently defend their jokes like they're dogma.
that little delay before he absolutely erupted into laughter like that at the whistle joke, it was almost like he was looking at everyone else in the room first to see if he should laugh too, then when he got up and almost seemed to go in for a high five from chris rock before sitting back down without getting one while simultaneously being the loudest one in the room.... it's so embarrassing, he wasn't lying, he is DESPERATE for approval
Except I’ve seen Ricky be the only one laughing like that on talk shows and such many times. He might have been a little self conscious with these heavy hitters, but I think he’s funny as hell.
Idk this feels like when people over analyze body language, we don’t know what’s going on in someone’s head just from some edited clip of a conversation
@@ataraxia7439 yeah maybe you're right about this, still i couldn't help but like..... recede into myself watching that part of the clip. it gave me the same icky feeling as when i think of something embarrassing i did in like 8th grade. but you're right, speculating on the intent behind a display of human joy even if the guy displaying it is someone i think is both unfunny and unlikeable is maybe a little fucky. apologies to ricky
@@ratfromsewer6683Yeah that's super fair. I think the big elephant in the room is that Ricky Gervais holds deeply transphobic views and has expressed them in public as well as his act regularly. It's deeply disappointing and sad to see as well as something that at best, isn't doing any good for the world. It's hard not to let that color our perception of him but I do worry we might fall into a trap of taking a negative aspect of someone and letting that lead us to see them in an inaccurate way. Like I think if you took the average person that didn't know much about any of these four guys and had them say what they thought about them in the documentary, they'd just say RIcky was a guy who was laughing and talking with the rest.
I think my favorite bizarre Ricky gervais moment is the absolute disaster of an interview he gave to Gary Shandling where throughout the entire interview it seems like Gary could not possibly want to be further away from another human being than he did in that moment.
Great vid. Gervais's behaviour in that video always gave me extreme second hand embarrassment. It's clear the other comedians do not respect him at all.
But they're American comedians which means they are by default not funny at all and that particular joke - it's not funny and I didn't laugh. British comedy is just superior
One of my favorite comedy shows was An Idiot Abroad. When I was young I thought "Wow, Ricky and Stephen really outdid themselves, this is great!" But in hindsight the show was entirely carried by Karl himself, and basically anyone could've played Ricky and co's parts. They were mostly laughing with us at Karl bumbling around like an idiot, but not really doing anything funny themselves. They were the straight men at best, and even then their performance was just something your average person could do, especially since it was over a phone. Watching this I had another realization, he was mostly doing that show so he could feel better about himself and how smart he was over Karl, someone who was deliberately playing an idiot
Hearing “Why are you so upset, it’s just funny” used so perfectly against Ricky Gervais is so satisfying.
It's amusing and Louis CK loves him and admires his comedy.
I wonder what these guys would think about "I'm Barack Obama and i'm gay"
@@elponchex
Thx gay Obama…
@@elponchex is this Ryan Schutt?
nah because that's exactly how his fanbase sounds honestly glad he got to hear it in that kind of context
It's just such a trip that even when Gervais is laughing at *another person's joke* it still reads as if he's in competition with everyone else who's laughing
Ricky Gervais is a master at annoying British one-upmanship i.e. it's not enough to laugh at a joke someone else makes. You *have* to laugh so hard that it draws attention away from the joke and the person who made it, and then proceed to add your own spin/sequel to the joke to try and steal the limelight.
P.S. no diss to the Brits, it's just an annoying and inescapable aspect of pub interactions.
He seems really narcissistic. I think he's a good actor, but he is truly transphobic, won't look at all at the harm he does or the science he's denying. He's also spectacularly self-involved. I think he's just intelligent enough to have made his self-involvement funny in the past, but it seems to have got the better of him in the present.
@@ameerhamid89 Those pesky Brits really starting to get on my nerves tho. They should stand trial at Hague for the damage Gervais and Corden caused
@@UkuleleVillain we have our fair share of pricks, which is why we try to export (exile) them as often as possible. No fucking thanks for sending Piers Morgan back btw
This is something I picked up on in the Ricky Gervais Show. I loved that show, but I began to notice Ricky’s obsession with Karl was due to the enjoyment he got out of being “smarter” than Karl. And because of that there is something about the Ricky Gervais Show that is unintentionally poetic: Karl is often correct and more philosophically inquisitive.
Karl may be ignorant, and often his ignorance leads to very wrong or foolish opinions. But I see Karl as someone who is actually very thoughtful.
A moment that I remember well that illustrates this perfectly: Karl, Ricky, and Steve are discussing a hypothetical scenario in which you create a clone of yourself. Both of these clones are the same age and share the same memories.
Karl’s response is “how would I know which one is me?” Which causes Ricky to burst out laughing. Ricky laughs because he thinks Karl is so dumb that he would see a clone of himself and get confused about his own identity.
But actually Karl was right, if both clones shared the same memories, then both clones would remember stepping into the cloning machine. Both would be under the impression they had just cloned themselves. So without an outside perspective you couldn’t tell which one was the original.
Karl actually worked out an interesting problem of the hypothetical and he was ridiculed for it by the supposedly “intelligent educated person” in the room.
I actually get the impression that a lot of his dismissal of Karl is BECAUSE it's Karl. He already has this idea in his head that Karl only ever speaks nonsense and so he is incredibly quick to call him an idiot, not even entertaining the thought that he could be correct.
Like in the example you gave, I wouldn't be surprised if he would agree with Karl's response if it were from someone he actually considered intelligent, because the concept isn't really all that complicated.
I mentioned this is another comment, but in An Idiot Abroad 2, Karl meets a group of trans women in Thailand and within a few hours his viewpoint totally shifts and becomes inclusive (in his own words, he went from thinking if his gf was revealed as trans that he would break up to saying she should help carry the groceries). Karl showed more ability to learn and improve in a few hours than Ricky has shown in the several years since.
@@Ivytheherbert exactly my point about Karl. He’s ignorant but humble and willing to learn.
he's also genuinely likeable and charismatic, i'd get a beer with karl.
Case in point Karl’s plots and ideas about a boyfriend sharing a brain with his girlfriend after an accident and a doctor feeling the pain/illness of his patients to cure them being randomly made into lots of Black Mirror. They were so dismissive of a oddly outside of the box and creative idea. Ricky’s only good when he’s writing a very particular style of comedy. Hate his standup
It’s really cool that Gervais is like 60 and still doing stand up specials where his whole thing is being like “Yeah I’m an atheist. Does that…shock you?” It feels like he got trapped in amber as an annoying 2007 epic debate guy.
It makes him feel intellectually superior though, his only purpose in life.
Watching Sausage Party induced a similar feeling. It's like everyone on the writing team thought they were the first to discover atheism and shock comedy.
I get the same EXACT vibes from Bill Maher.
@@hughcaldwell1034 and weed they discovered weed and atheism and shock humor which is just sex jokes that last way too long. I was half asleep giggling to that movie when it came out with my ex we both got weirded out by that ending. Ruined the whole movie for our sleep deprived brains.
He’s been cryogenically frozen
“Comedy is dead because we’re not allowed to offend people anymore, so I’m going to be as shocking and offensive as possible for the next hour” is the most predictable, least shocking posture for a comedian to take these days.
It gives me a direction on what not to be like.
restriction is a fantastic tool for comedians. only breaking it rarely actually makes a joke shocking enough to be funny, otherwise the expectation is that you'll say anything, therefore, theres no shock to that. Additionally, it forces comics to approach jokes in a unique, interesting way. aiming to offend for its sake is imo bad artistic quality. so i suppose ricky's killing comedy more than anyone.
@@shawnbay2211 limitation is the mother of creativity
You can actually take this same approach and flip it and suddenly become super transgressive...if you're a conservative. There's so many shitty things in life that're ripe for parody, but these same things often benefit rich comedians like the ones we see, so they punch down or they're Jerry Seinfeld and complain about confectionery packaging.
If your audience does not laugh bc of the jokes but laugh bc they enjoy to make people suffer then you're not a comedian, you're a bully
which is the case, this can be easily seen on transphobes, you can tell anything against trans women, and they will clap as hard as they can, including directly pointing out how many trans women have been killed, and you can see this on any transphobic group
Just to add to the “did he do the whistle” bit, Ricky clearly gets up and goes for a high five, realises he’s going to be left hanging and transitions into a knee slap. Just a wonderful moment captured on camera
In that moment he summited and reached Peak David Brent
8:10 it deserves to be in a museum right up there with fist bumping a handshake good lord that was bad
transcendant.
Oh god, this is a Nathan Fielder level of awkward
thank you for this@@myoak108
To be fair, Ricky Gervais has a vested interest in convincing people it’s ok to laugh at jokes for reasons other than them being funny.
Which is what I can’t stand
🔥
Holy shit this is brutal.
Savage af
does he though? Do you actually think he's transphobic? Other than making some naive jokes about transgenderism that probably didn't help transfolk in society, and complain that people take things too seriously when he isn't in a position to really know how serious things are - can you point to anything that would lead you to think he is anti trans in the way someone like Matt Walsh is?
My mom wanted me to watch a Gervais special and it was the first one I'd ever seen, and I was shocked that like 50% of his act at least was responding to responses to his past jokes. If you're unfamiliar with him, it's really bizarre to see.
He's a deeply insecure and desperate man, and not in the fun way most comedians are.
Like Russell Brand. I saw a set of his that was easily 15-20% just reading off mean comments or emails he got online and responding to them. What's happening with His Majesty's Comedians??
That’s like Chappelle’s last couple specials. Stop addressing cancel culture, just be funny like you already have been the last 25 years
The only genuine laughs in his specials are the times he's quoting Karl Pilkington. I kind of wonder if the reason he never talks about him anymore is because he's funnier by accident than Gervais could ever be on purpose. Seems like a lovely fella, too. An Idiot Abroad shows how open minded and accepting people can be if they get out of their comfort zone.
@@Bagheadman Karl could be surprisingly insightful sometimes! Ricky was always trying way too hard to milk him for laughs, often to the point of saying things that were blatantly wrong, like "People don't have literal internal monologues."
It's actually really impressive that Gervais manages to be the weird presence in a room that also contains Louis c.k
The only way Louis CK could have been more awkward than Ricky is if he did his infamous ‘masturbation’ super move.
@@thenablade858 might end up in circle jerk if he does anyway tho
louis ck honestly earned a little bit of respect from me, not as a person but as a comedian, when he came out with his first special after his scandal. my mom started playing it and i was like oh god great time to listen to another comedian spend their whole special complaining about people cancelling them and refusing to tell funny jokes, but he didn't mention it once and the special was actually pretty funny, which at least is actually sticking to the idea that comedy should stand on its own as opposed to all these comics who say their jokes should stand on their own even though their specials have just become unfunny ranting.
The bit from this where they talk about using the N word on stage was very telling. Louis C.K. is being just authentically awful, and you could tell it bothered Ricky that he wasn't the edgiest person in the room.
@vlad5042 i mean with chapelle and other comedians being "cancelled" is a badge of honor, comedians for the most part are supposed to be edgy controversial. (Them and their audience don't realize how much they're punching down tho and actually supporting the mainstream status quo) theres not much to lose by making trans jokes for them, so of course they're going to bring it up to bolster their image. (Chapelle won best comedy album over tig notaro after his cancellation I don't think Lois would have after jerkoffgate) With CK, he came off as a sex pest toward comedians in the industry, and also as a dude with bad game (yes I know game has nothing to do with sexual assault) it doesn't really look edgy or controversial to talk about how you jerked off in the green room, consensual or not. Chapelles cancellation didnt involve specific victims so some people were able to frame it as a free speech thing.
Speaking of irony, Ricky saying he doesn't like going for the easy laughs while his entire schtick is being mean to people for easy laughs is amazingly ironic.
Literally the easiest kind of “comedy”
Some people seem to think comedy is only valid if it makes some serious transgressive point. To which I always respond that Jim Gaffigan is considered one of the greats for quips about Hot Pockets.
Like yeah im sure talking about trans peoples junks really took a lot of workshopping ricky i truly never heard that before
@@bandidocavalier hey, guess what?
I identify as an attack helicopter.
*mic drop*
@@Jurgan6 damn I didn't realize the next Ricky Gervais special just leaked
Gervais is genuinely so strange. Stewart Lee has a (brilliant) book called "How I Escaped My Certain Fate" which is half autobiography and half really good analysis of some of his own sets, talking about what comedy is and what he was trying to achieve with different jokes and techniques. But in the autobiography part he talks about how, earlier in their careers, he knew Gervais spoke highly of him and later he saw Gervais perform and realised with horror Gervais had kind of stolen/aped a lot of his stage presence from him. And honestly the clip from his more recent work where he's explaining to the crowd what irony is, really really reads as a bad rip off of what Stewart Lee does well. But Lee is like, playing the character of a comedian who hates the audience and thinks half of them are stupid. Where Gervais in that clip is genuinely that guy.
Stewart Lee is fantastic!
That was the first thought that went through my mind, seeing that. Such a ripoff of something you have to get so spot-on in order to even be funny at all... and such a clumsy ripoff that misses that mark so wide.
That's interesting to hear. As someone who's listened to all of Ricky's old xfm show with Karl Pilkington and Steve Merchant, I can confidently assert that a huge chunk of Ricky's early 2000s standup is just him repeating funny stuff Karl said there, so it doesn't surprise me.
Thank you for saying this, I was wondering why the opening bit of stand up felt familiar but off.
I'd somehow forgotten about that part of the book, but yeah, the 'deconstructing comedy' Stewart Lee rip off in his latest special is really blatant and absolutely painful. I think it's because he belabours it and lacks Lee's eloquence.
Also, I don't think Gervais really understands irony. He makes a sexist joke about women comedians not being funny and then excuses it as 'irony' and 'satirising attitudes'. But that's obviously not what he's doing. The butt of his joke isn't sexists - it's women. To the extent that it's ironic it's because we know this opinion is offensive and regressive and therefore he can't mean it. But that's a very weak form of irony; essentially winking at the audience and saying 'Only joking'. Good irony is barbed and has a point and a deserving target other than the ostensible one. But no one who hates sexists is going to see this bit and be satisfied that he put it to the sexists. He even repeats the joke, having broken the forth wall and removed the irony fig leaf, which basically proves that the joke is trading on the preconception that women comedians aren't funny.
watching gervais desperately try to impress his comedic idols while they continue to interact with each other as peers is this weird and human and pathetic thing and and i love it
when one sees what one wants to see
Not that I’m sympathetic to Ricky Gervais, but now I’m thinking about how terrifying it would be to be in his shoes, like some kind of imposter syndrome nightmare. Imagine being a mediocre but moderately successful musician and being thrown into a room with Paul McCartney, Eric Clapton and Stevie Wonder and being told “these are your peers, interact with them”
@@jett3474Ricky is obviously the worst stand up in that room, but the office uk is better than anything any of them have done
@@cargoshipgaming Seinfeld is unwatchable, both the show and the comedian. I'd say that the show 'Louie', created by Louis CK is every bit equal to the UK Office, though they're very different.
Yeah, Clapton can't play though.@@jett3474
The crazy thing about this special is that Ricky Gervais is the executive producer and it was basically a vanity project to put himself in the same room as the comics he looked up to. The difference between him and the others is that he never had to earn an audience as a stand-up, he started doing it when he was already a successful TV star with an existing fan base. He never "paid his dues" as a stand-up and it's painfully cringe to see him interrupting the perspective of these veterans of the craft with his fanboy energy and disconnected takes. Ricky Gervais might be the second unfunniest man to be exported from England after James Corden.
Same laugh too, horrible pair.
Yeah the "does he do the whistle" bit was giving me crazy James Corden vibes
Designer man watched Little Joel?! Wha😮?!
james corden stole his entire schtick from ricky gervais. it’s harsh to say he’s not funny, he’s just not a standup. he wrote the most influential sitcom of the 21st century and was hugely responsible for popularising podcasts. he’s not a hack like corden. at least he wasn’t, until he started with all this anti SJW transphobic bullshit instead of growing up
Idk, the Ricky Gervais podcast was pretty hilarious. Although you could argue that was more down to the dynamic between the three hosts than Ricky himself.
Gervais- 'hey we comedians should not do easy jokes'
Also Gervais - repeats the 'i identify as a attack helicopter ' joke
My bad, he still did not do an easy joke... It was not a joke 😝
His stand up specials are all him doing impressions of animals when he’s not making trans jokes as well. Like animal impressions can definitely funny but I wouldn’t say they are show us much about our society.
Ricky Gervais didn't say don't do easy jokes. The guy said if the joke seems too easy he feels he wont put that in a special because it's not doing his best. That doesn't mean he wont do it by accident. It's the intention to do his best. The fact that his comedy is loved by the top comedians is because they think Ricky Gervais is highly talented.
Or "He's not a woman because he has a penis". Such a novel, well-thought out howler that's so original /s
@@Fragenzeichenplatte That is not what Ricky Gervais says. The guy says jokes that annoy the left wing because they are often wanting to police jokes. Though the guy is left wing in many ways. The guy says things that annoy the right wing because they are bigoted haha.
Ricky is the kind of guy who deeply wants to analyze and understand something that largely runs on empathy and feeling, a thing he has an obviously hard time connecting to
I'm pretty sure he doesn't want to do that because then he would get it eventually, instead he's deeply uninterested in understanding how anything he doesn't immediatly agree with works.
I mean, his entire stand-up career comes from insecurity. I also re-watched Talking Funny recently and it struck me as kind of pathetic that he just fully admits he started doing stand-up to prove he deserved his success from The Office. All the stuff about "I don't want to be judged" being met with laughs and "well you're in the wrong business" from the other 3 of them was amazing. They all actually came up through stand-up comedy and he just didn't. And the fact that they all have far more stand-up experience than him and don't get nearly as worked up about it says quite a lot.
I think some of it also has to do with him being somewhat ashamed of his working class background. Think that's where he gets his "everyone has to know how smart and correct I am at all times" attitude, even towards a dumb joke. My father came from a poor, rural community. Once he left and went to University, he had a need to be the smartest man in the room at all times.
well except Seinfeld got omega triggered by an audience not laughing at an outdate gay joke told - and he def would not be as ok with a similar joke about Jewish people - so he might not be Gervais, but he clearly is also a baby if you poke the correct area.
@@xBINARYGODx Oh for sure, I'm not saying any of these guys are perfect, and Seinfeld is my least favourite of them aside from Gervais. But he's always been a bit out of touch. He grew up rich and lived a cushy life. But he still understands more about stand-up comedy than Ricky ever will. Ricky does stand-up as a hobby, but for all three of these guys, especially Chris Rock, it is/was their job for a long time.
Hearing that he didn't come up in stand-up explains a lot actually. He never developed the crucial skill of being able to laugh at himself, which most comics get by working small rooms where you have to diffuse tension or just by hanging out with other comics at mics and shows.
Like there is no way he's ever done comedy in a room where he'd have to do real crowd work. There's just like...there's no way. He wouldn't be able to handle it.
@@yapenggao3548 Yeah, he definitely doesn't have that skill. As I understand, he started doing stand-up at benefits he was asked to go to and then theatres and concert venues. He already had his audience from The Office, so he didn't have to try, or play a crowd that wasn't there for him. Plus, most of his early routine was made of bits practiced on a radio show he did for a few years. The rest is basically just Stewart Lee, but worse.
@@JustSomeDamnGinger Chris rock is sexist af, and Louis CK is a bit rapey...they all suck
There's this phenomena I call "stepping on your own cock", when you meet someone (usually while dating) who is just getting in their own way. Someone wants to impress their date- but they are too busy being angry at the thought of their date being unimpressed, or impressed too easily. He as a comedian is there to make people laugh, but he's too busy angrily insisting what they should and shouldn't be amused by.
Comparing this show to a bad date is both accurate and cursed
Do you want to unpack something there?
The date analogy is a good one, as is the analogy of sitting at a table with a group of friends. It feels extremely manipulative to use forms of humor that I don't personally find funny to try to win people over. It feels like I'm talking down to them, like playing Peek-A-Boo with a baby. Sure, they're having a good time, but am I not being disingenuous? I can completely relate to Ricky's concerns here.
If it turned out that I could just yell "FART!" every few seconds and make an audience laugh hysterically, I still couldn't bring myself to do it.
@@vargonian Maybe the problem stems from seeing yourself as talking down to others, even the fools and bastards have something worthwhile to say somewhere within them. Idk, just a tiny baby here, shitting itself in glee.
@@vargonian Do you tell people they're not actually laughing and that what they think funny isn't actually? Because that's what Ricky here is doing
i'm glad i'm not the only person who has been haunted by the "Sittin on a cock 'cuz I'm gay" argument for years. The bizarreness of it being undeniably a dumb joke but if it's dumb it can ONLY be enjoyed ironically. You HAVE to be an intellectual about humor. A room of people laughing while one yells "but you don't ACTUALLY find it funny!!!" is so weird that it just lodged in my brain for all this time. So i guess i'm saying thanks for the vindication of remembering it??
No no, you're enjoying it all wrong, so you're not actually finding it funny, I know what's funny. You have to be sure to mentally strip it of all its comedic validity before you're allowed to laugh.
I am not a big fan of Ricky Gervais, but to be fair to him, I think he thought this round table would be more analytical than the others. What he said was true, that is why the joke is funny. The others weren't interested in the why so he looked silly for bringing it up.
@@willdouglas1617 You don't have to be highly educated or have several layers of irony to find something stupid funny. He's trying to elevate his intellect above others when he makes statements like that because he views the audience as stupid but the comedians as genius. The comedians he looks up to simply disagree with him, his assessment, and his reason for writing jokes.
@@willdouglas1617 No that is not why the joke is funny. The joke is funny simply because it's completely out of nowhere, like a fart. That's it. There's nothing deep there. Many jokes are just funny because they're a complete non-sequitur (and it doesn't hurt if it's about bodily functions). It's just a verbal fart.
"You don't have to be smart to laugh at a fart, but you'd have to be stupid not to" -Louis
Ricky Gervais has this deeply unsettling air of smug ego and sweaty insecurity that shows itself in how he always has to assert that he's always the smartest person in the room.
I find JonTron gives off a similar energy tbf
This is the only way I’ve ever seen him
you seem to be one of these "American Anti-intellectualism TM" poster boys
It’s like he watched Stewart Lee and forgot that the insufferable smugness was part of the on-stage act.
@@morbideddieStew is such a gem in real life, very warm and affable man.
Joel thanks for this video.
Ricky Gervais is absolutely the kind of guy who sees someone else make a good joke, gets jealous, and then intentionally laughs really loud so the moment is about him and not the actual funny person.
So he's the British version of Jimmy Fallon.
Love your username
right that seemed weirdly competitive like he kept getting louder and more agitated instead of how normally people laugh which you sort of fade your laughter
That's a keen insight. If I might, I'd guess you've seen this in others before? I'm sure of it now, that I have, but failed to find the words to describe it. I wish my social circle, such as it is, included you or someone like you. I had a bff whose skill at describing odd behavior was both accurate and insanely funny. Such a gift, and sadly not one of mine. I'm the one thinking, "what was that?" in a social situation, you know, sometimes just a minute or two behind the curve. But Joel made a good one here, and thanks for your wit!
It's the same thing James Corden does. Watch him on Big Fat Quiz of the Year a while ago. His whole thing is to let someone else make a joke, laugh like an idiot (or you know, Ricky Gervais) and repeat the joke even louder. It's just horrendous.
The best part of Talking Funny for me is how much genuine insight comes from deconstructing Ricky's ideas. The other three tear his insecurities apart out of a desire to discuss the idea rather than being right or wrong (each telling their own stories, with no tryharding), and great material comes from it. There's humanity through suffering, and nobody is trying to knock him down a peg so much as they critique his ideas.
And he has failed to learn the lesson in there ever since.
Joel I love that you are as wildly obsessed with Ricky’s strange behavior as I am. It feels like these are being made just for me
How's this comment from one day ago O_o
Maybe Patreon
@@Ying-yang6969 they're a time traveler
@@ashikjaman1940woah.
Why are you obsessed?
Ricky is the kinda guy who would laugh at "I turned myself into a pickle, I'm Pickle Rick" and then let you explicitly know he is laughing only ironically and that the author of the meme is a hack, getting angry
H-hey Morty, look! Look! I turned myself into Ricky Gervais, I'm an angry dick!
@@18skeltor "some trans women have penises, funniest shit I've ever seen!"
Rick and Morty is actually a good example of the kind of humor Ricky tried to outsmart. Like sometimes it’s just kinda funny to hear a guy brag about being a pickle idk
To be fair, you need to have to have a very high IQ to understand Sitting on a Cock Cause I'm Gay.
@@SystemFailing despite the fact that Rick and Morty has some genuinely smart humour buried under all the dumb
Ricky sounds more like a nervous comedy nerd who's listened to too many comedy podcasts. The way he stands up to laugh, it's so performative, like he wants so badly to be liked, but he doesn't know how embarrassing he looks. Honestly, relatable. Anyway, transphobia sucks.
8:11 Ricky Gervais stood up to go for a high-five, but he failed and sat back down.
Rupert Pupkin vibes
@@Mooglatan I just watched King of Comedy, and yes.
my favorite thing about Ricky has become that he'll only remind us approx 37 times how much he definitely doesn't care about something lol
Ricky isn't interested in being funny. He's interested in being the smartest person in the room, and being so incredibly smart that his mere observations can make people laugh. Ricky is the definition of doing something for all the wrong reasons.
"He's interested in being the smartest person in the room, and being so incredibly smart that his mere observations can make people laugh"
This is perhaps my favorite type of comedy. I know it doesn't resonate with everyone.
@@vargonian Has to be done well by someone actually intellectual or else it's pretty harmful, as we can see.
Weak observations, poorly performed.
@@vargonian My favorite type of comedy is *observing* and satirizing people who are interested in being the smartest one in the room, are you talking about like.. House MD?
Yes, he's kind of an asshole
Ricky Gervais is a fascinating comedian. He's spent his entire career engaged in a public performance of a man on the cusp of realizing what a giant wanker he is, but never quite making the connection. I used to think it was intentional, given the character he played on the Office, but now I realize that's just how he really is. Sad!
It makes me think of the David Brent movie in 2016, which he made himself without Steven Merchant, which was based around us finding Brent sympathetic and likeable - IE closer to how Gervais actually saw the character. I feel like I see this a lot with people playing semi-Self-Insert, "me but a bigger asshole" characters, where the actor eventually gets uncomfortable with playing an asshole and tries to reframe them as sympathetic or just misunderstood.
Exactly, the more you get to know him the bigger the dissappointment.
He might well have been at first, but then The Office became a smash hit and Ricky decided to bury all of his self-doubt under a giant pile of money where he's been ever since
@blacknight Really. That's my sentiments exactly. And you know on Curb, Larry David kind of explored this aspect with him being a self insert of George and being annoyed when other people saw him as a shmuck. But it worked so well there because Larry David doesn't have the same ego levels and is actually somewhat self aware. For RG everything is so serious and so intense and he'd rather die than be thought of as unfunny or stupid. He doth protest too much methinks
A bit like John Cleese's satire of conservatism through characters like Basil Fawlty.
It is quite interesting going back listening to the old podcast Ricky did with Steve Merchant and Karl Pilkington and noticing just how much naturally funnier the other two guys are and how they're carrying Ricky comedically.
Karl has all of his weird ideas and unique turns of phrase, Steve has his intelligence and his anecdotes, and Ricky is always like "HA HA HA, KARL LOOKS LIKE AN ORANGE".
he also talks over Karl so often, like you get invested in what hes saying then ricky says something like “YOUR MIND IS MADE OF MUD” every time karl starts a new sentence
@@loshen8286 I really enjoyed Ricky’s Politics standup show when I was younger, but now listening to him talk about studying philosophy at university it all forms part of a bigger picture of a person who’s deeply insecure about their own intelligence
You can also hear how much Gervais rips from the other two and then uses it in his stand up specials after the podcast.
I’m pretty sure there were multiple instances where Steve just had to tell Ricky to shut up and let Karl talk
Karl is a natural comedy genius because he doesn't even know he's funny, something that Gervais has successfully and, at times, cruelly exploited for his own gain.
Doing comedy to make yourself seem smarter and better than everyone rather than make them laugh is also very big Bill Maher energy
I think Bill Maher got into comedy exclusively because it's the one place where being a pretentious dick can be seen as a positive trait instead of a negative one
@@skeetsmcgrew3282 well put Good sir
@@skeetsmcgrew3282 there’s quite a few other places where pretentious people thrive tbf; acting, academics, conceptual arts to name a few
@@ItsAnGoose Don't forget the comment sections 😅
Bill Maher does comedy? You could have fooled me
I think a lot of Ricky Gervais' "philosophy" is a reflection of how much he has internalized the class system in the U.K., that he desperately doesn't want to be seen as "common" or "working-class". He very much wants to be a member of the "upper class", and if he was doing jokes that literally anybody can do, if he was getting laughs that the guy at the end of the end of the bar can get, it would absolutely kill him.
It's so weird cause he used to be so comfortable talking about his working class upbringing.
@Queewe There's a huge class and access culture to the media industry in the UK too, he's a sad wee man trying to appeal to a coterie of hacks who only talk to each other.
This. You can see the difference between him and the Americans' approach in the awkward sit down. I'm not saying UK comedians are all like Ricky, but he in particular is influenced by British classism. And I second that he's insecure because he's sitting next to very successful comedians and trying to be too clever because he thinks that will impress them.
Given the type of celebrities that are able to crossover into Hollywood this makes a lot of sense. There are many American celebrities like Chris Rock who climbed their way to the top from a working class background whereas the vast majority of UK celebs that were able to crossover to the US have a upper class background with years of academic training in their field like Eddie Redmayne went to Eton and Cambridge; Benedict Cumberbatch literally descends from rich slave traders, Florence Pugh attended private schools with access to acting training, etc. Very rarely do does the UK media give the same international push to actors of working class backgrounds.
Daniel Kaluuya’s a working class British actor whose gotten a Hollywood push from Jordan Peele. So, I can see why someone like Ricky Gervais would feel that that the only way to truly establish yourself among the best of his peers is to present as a pseudo-intellectual elite and gatekeep comedy as an inner circle.
@@eiephants i randomly found a UK comedian on netflix a few yrs back. She was talking about how she wasnt going to make self depricating jokes anymore cuz she wants to like herself and it messes up her mental health. Honestly she got me to stop making those same jokes about myself. She was so sincere and hopeful and hilirious and she didnt make fun of herself or anyone else in her special i still remember it even tho i can not remember her name ar all. Like she literally changed how i treated myself subconciously. So i think like with all comedians theres good ones like her and bad ones like ricky who let that fame go to his head and the passage of time mess him up.
A funny article is named "Ricky Gervais Starves to Death After Massive Fire Destroys All Low-Hanging Fruit". Read it, it's hilarious.
Ricky gives off the energy of a guy who got into a specific field more because he got positive feedback when he tried his hand at it and... that's it.
Like he clearly wants to be the new George Carlin, but doesn't seem to understand that Carlin was progressive and not just contrarian.
That second sentence sums up Ricky Gervais' entire career better than I have ever seen
Carlin would rip Ricky to shreds.
in regards to the first line... whats wrong with that? Thats literally all you need to go after a dream, some encouragement. Idk maybe you don't mean it in the way Im interpreting it but something about that first line rubs me the wrong way.
Agree with the second tho lol
To be fair all comedians are kind of contrarians just 'cause that's what gives them attention, even George sometimes. But yeah, your point is pretty spot on
Bill Burr is on track to be the next Carlin with the way he skewers everyone/everything and has no time for bullshit
Looking more insufferable than Jerry Seinfeld is an art in itself.
Imagine somehow looking more pathetic than an adult man who dates highschoolers.
"Why go for the easy laugh when I can insult minorities and literally beg the audience to laugh at it?" -Ricky Gervais
But it was funny
Righties find things funny when they affirm their own worldview, not when they’re funny
@@M_k-zi3tn 🤡
You're right, those jokes aren't funny. It's the over the top reactions those offended by them give that make it funny
@@kieranhurst8543 That's just what you want in a stand up comic. For a joke to bomb because it's not funny and then wait 3-4 days for the twitter replies to come in
Holy f'ing Sh*t Joel! I've been thinking about this moment for literally years, the moment when Ricky stands up looking for a high five after the whistle line and doesn't get it during that special has given me second hand embarrassments every day since. I'm so glad you highlighted it. You are a master of the form!
I don't know how people have forgotten about this moment
Well I'd never seen it before, but I'm certainly not going to forget it now.
Thank you for informing me of the high five. Hilarious.
yes god i noticed the high five part too. So fucking agonizing to watch unfold
Watching it again I don't think he was going for a high five.
I have been saying "Ricky Gervais is not funny" for literal decades and I am so glad people I respect and admire are getting on this train with me
The more time goes by, the more convinced I am that the actual funny bits of 'The Office' etc. were the work of Stephen Merchant.
@@leow3696 I very unironically loved karl, justice for karl
@@mightymeatymech You know, I've been a huge admirer of all the radio shows and podcasts Ricky and Steve did with Karl for many, many years. I think the interaction and different personalities of Ricky and Karl were exceedingly important to make stuff like "The Ricky Gervais Show" work so well, but the real genius of the whole thing really was Karl. Ricky and Steve (whom I do find funny too!) were really just the sidekicks.
@@leow3696 thing with Ricky is that he's had a lot of banger jokes when his main purpose is to actually make a joke instead of proving a point. The Office UK is the kind of show where you HAVE to be funny, its not a place where you can make some assertion over your audience, its a place where every comedian who wants to write something can come up with the stupidest idea and make it bright with deadspan deliveries. When he's not in project like that, he has to sell himself and that's where he stops being funny.
@@HawkOfGP But even Steve put in effort. So few of the funny moments from that show are actually Ricky. Merchant and Pilkington seem to put a lot more effort into running it each week and general organising.
He never seems to put in the effort beyond the occasional tired offensive Chinese impression or trying to seem smarter than Karl.
I think the fact that Gervais is British plays into this. The 1980s alternative comedy scene, probably is a major influence on him, played itself off the more traditional variety show comedy which was considered hack, less intellectual and often deeply reactionary. British alt comedy played itself off as more difficult. I know alt comedy exists in the US, but I don't think it was the same in it's peculiarities.
I was thinking the same thing, that it might be cultural to an extent. I love comedy, but I like English comedy for different reasons than I like American comedy.
Gervais’ incessant need to be the smartest guy in the room (without, crucially, being any measure above an average person) is basically the core concept of the Ricky Gervais show, where he constantly talks over Karl Pilkington’s ideas and refuses to even let him explain his rather unique way of thinking before cutting him off midsentence with some variation of “YOURE STUPID LOL”. Even back then Ricky is terrified of ideas or ways of living that are different to his own because they threaten his tiny, shell-shaped worldview.
Steve Merchant is by far the quietest of the three on the podcast and I realise now that in between getting Karl to say weird shit and Ricky screaming at Karl for saying weird shit, Steve could barely get a word in
Yep, it’s utterly insane to listen to a guy with a degree in philosophy shout someone down (ie Karl) when they question things like mind-body dualism and imply that there is only one way of looking at things. The entire practice of philosophy is to question and debate things which are normally taken for granted, like did he retain anything at all from university? Love the podcast with all my heart but good lord it’s as annoying as it is baffling.
He literally morphs into David Brent when he's interacting with people that he wants respect and admiration from, it's uncanny
No wonder he played David Brent in the UK version of the Office.
@@marychouvarda6875 David Brent is only IN the uk version of the office
This is so accurate
There was never much difference between Ricky's and David Brent's personalities
The bit when he said "Do you know who I'm trying to impress?" and then silently pointed to each of them in turn instead of just saying "you guys" was 100% a Brentism.
The thing I notice is that the golden points of Ricky's career; The Office, Extras, and XFM (which is seriously my favourite piece of media ever made, I doubt anything will ever top that for me) is that Stephen Merchant was always involved. Always a much quieter partner, to the point you question how much he adds, until he's removed and it becomes starkly apparent how much weight he was pulling.
Karl obviously does a lot during XFM as well, it really was his show, but the episodes without him (usually with Claire) are still great and again, it becomes clear how much Steve is doing there.
I actually thought of Ricky Gervais the other day and in many ways I feel like he’s is the antithesis of Conan O’Brien and everything I love about him. Conan is a smart guy who proudly owns his stupid jokes. He uses his intelligence to elevate and play off his guests and co-hosts without ever feeling desperate to prove himself. Ricky always feels very insecure and like he has to prove his own brilliance by ascribing meaning to, and overanalyzing everything he says. “Something can’t just be funny, it has to be funny because Ricky Gervais was smart and innovative enough to come up with it.” Ricky’s main concern is to be the funniest guy in the room whereas a comedian like Conan just wants everyone in the room to have fun.
At this point I think that Ricky's main concern is to be the smartest guy in the room, instead of the funniest.
I would have paid to see Norm Macdonald and Ricky Gervais interact. Just two comedians who could not be any more polar opposite.
Also, Conan seems like a really nice guy who has no need to punch down.
Ricky's jokes seem to boil down to
"Religious people are dumb"
"Fat people are lazy"
"Trans people are crazy"
Conan wouldn't stoop that low. Also he couldn't, man is way too tall
Not to be a party pooper but... Conan isn't that smart. Of course he's a comedy genius! And a joy to listen to. But when it comes to understanding the world, he's just an average lib
@@hayk3000 don't associate "lib" with not being smart, makes you sound dumber actually. people dismiss how easy it is to succumb to the liberal mentality and discard all the rest
Finally Big Joel getting close to matching Little Joel's output
The joel singularity is coming
@@notrod5341 soon we will reach Joel Joel and the circle will finally be complete
This should honestly be a Medium Joel video.
Do you think they’re ever gonna meet?
I remember seeing this segment ages ago and at the time it really stood out to me how naturally the other three comedians banter and joke with eachother and Ricky is off to the side awkwardly trying to enter the conversation as if he has no idea how to interact with his peers at joke school.
well the whole thing was organized by ricky as a way to get to talk to comedians he looks up to, so its kinda sad in that way
I’ve always felt that Ricky’s weirdness in this conversation is due to him being nervous because he is PROFOUNDLY out of his league in this room and knows it.
This is 3 of the best 7-ish stand ups of all time and the dude who co-wrote the Office.
yeah his standup has never been particularly good
Yikes. You’re probably right.
I don't even consider him a standup comic tbh
Howmlow are your standards of comedy if you think Jerry Seinfeld and Louis CK are anywhere close to the top of best stand ups?
One hundred percent
Gervais is basically occupying the seat of someone like Bill Burr, Dave Chapelle or George Carlin
Honestly though props to Ricky Gervais for sitting next to Jerry Seinfeld and Louis CK and still managing be the weirdest, cringiest guy in the room. That actually does take a weird kind of talent.
No Louis CK slander
@@NYGJMAP yeah Louis CK isn't awkward, he's just kind of a perv
Right? 😂
@@70sman I would argue that requesting to whack it in front of somebody is pretty awkward behavior. A bit of a yank on your collar moment, a bit of a “yikes” as the kids say
@@70sman "kind of" doing a lot of work there
I used to be a huge standup comedy nerd so its so surreal hearing someone reference this special lol. Like the "does he do the whistle" thing has also been burned into my brain for a decade.
Even when it came out I thought Ricky was out of place in this. Like we have Rock and Seinfeld, two standup legends, Louis CK, who was the hottest comic at the time, and... Ricky.
I don't get the whistle joke :/
@@gracie1312 Sitting on the Dock of the Bay has a bridge in the tune which is whistled.
Imagining someone singing the "Sitting on a Cock 'cos I'm Gay" version COMPLETE with the whistle... just compounds the (funny) stupidity of the joke :)
Dude "does he do the whistle" has been echoing in my head for YEARS and it's crazy to just find out now that I'm not the only one
In my memory, I assumed it was Rock, Seinfeld, and Louis CK as the comedians, and Ricky was the host.
I think what made me realize how much Ricky saw himself as something more than just a funnyman, was his entire relationship with Karl Pilkington. Karl would often say baffling, bizarre and yet often oddly profound things, and Ricky would crack up before calling Karl an idiot and moving on. It was like he saw himself laughing at a simple moron, and that must be why everyone else laughed too. Yet Karl Pilkington carried both Ricky's podcast and "An Idiot Abroad", because the audience found themselves laughing along with his strange, often uneducated but poignant observations; they found Karl endearing, not simply the bald simple fella Ricky would sometimes make him out to be.
Ricky Gervais was a great comedy writer, especially when paired with Steven Merchant. He is obviously a quick witted man. But lord jesus does he have one strong little egotistical personality.
You might have missed the dynamic there. Ricky was clearly aware of everything you just pointed out. That's why it was a thing in the first place.
@@lw8882 Nah he's right in that Ricky often missed the point in making it about himself. Listen to a compilation of Monkey news segments, Ricky is often actively making it less funny by shouting over Karl to call him an idiot, predict the story in advance or repeating what he just said instead of sitting back, laughing and making the odd joke.
@@lw8882yes and no. Ricky would often show himself to be very closed minded and would shoot Karl's points down instead of listening to them. Which was funny because a few times, it would turn out Karl was accidentally/actually right.
I will never forget the fact that they had read "scientists predicted that in x years, gender as we understand it today will not exist and more and more people will have an androgynous expression". It stuck with me because they've read it like, what, 20 years ago? And now Ricky is/seems firmly anti-trans.
I honestly forgot Ricky was even in An Idiot Abroad...
Something that always sticks with me is the part of An Idiot Abroad 2 when Karl meets some trans women in Thailand, and easily shifts his own world-view to accommodate them. Ricky was so keen to play himself as the smart guy and Karl as the fool, but throughout the series Karl constantly proved his own ability to learn in ways Ricky still hasn't managed after several years.
I think the issue with Ricky Gervais is that he's just not made for being the face to his own words. He can *write* great comedy (when he's not trying too hard to be clever and/or a contrarian) but he himself is just a charisma vacuum. I feel like there's something worth unpacking in the fact that every film & TV character he writes for himself is some variety of miserable, horrible person who's desperate to be liked and thought highly of while being completely unlikeable, and yet he's clearly still the one the audience is supposed to be rooting for.
In his more recent stuff (AfterLife) I find Ricky writes himself in TV/movies to be like the 'truth teller' like the most profound and brilliant lines have to come from his mouth. I feel like he's the epitome of 'nah comedy isnt about being funny it's about SpEaKiNg ThE TrUtH'
THATS where I've seen him, I just remembered his stupid scene about the barista with vocal fry.
@@danielkhan1 I'm imagining Dave Bautista playing a himbo barista now so thanks.
It's like how when Ricky made After Life he wrote parts for several very funny and talented women and then got them to do all the heavy lifting
It’s so important to Ricky that he’s “intelligent educated people” and that the people around him know this
Ricky Gervais is the only entertainer I knew that could ever be a third wheel on his own show named after him.
He's clearly deeply insecure about his place in comedy. He strikes me as someone who wanted to be a comedian rather than someone who wants to make people laugh. He looked at all his favorite cemedians and decided that he too wanted to be a Comedy Genius but took the phrase smart comedy way too literally
That’s a really good way of putting it,he wanted to be who they were but didn’t love to do what they do
he wanted the upper hand on morality, being able to say anything but hide it in a comedy curtain, so he can be both serious about what he says but hide it under a curtain. you see that with plenty of comedians from time to time but its normal, I bet all comedians have dealt with those dilemmas plenty of times, with Ricky that's almost like his staple and his legacy.
Good points but also you have such a charming pfp!
@@picahudsoniaunflocked5426 lol it's the first pfp Ive ever had, I made it on my iPod touch like 15 years ago. You're the first person to ever say anything about it, thanks
Gervais is clearly very insecure but he's managed to convince lots of people that he isn't. He's managed to convince lots of people that he's edgy, but he's not doing anything that his contemporaries haven't already done. The fact that people genuinely believe his hosting of the Golden Globes was some defiant act of rebellion against Hollywood despite the fact they paid him to be there several times and he didn't actually get into any trouble with anyone is baffling.
Exactly! Especially the Golden Globes speech as if he wasn’t one of the celebrities that he’s making fun of
One of my favorite words is 'sprezzatura,' from Italian. It's originally defined as the ability to make your words and actions look effortless and cool even when it takes a lot of effort. Trying hard to make it look like you're not trying hard, as it were. More recently it's also meant a defensive kind of irony, pretending that you don't care about anything by acting like nothing matters and it's all just a game to you. I think Gervais perfectly embodies every sense of sprezzatura. He really goes after that image the "cool guy who doesn't care what anyone thinks." The irony of course being that he cares a ton about coming off that way.
Cool! I need to find out how to pronounce it lol
@@talonhammer it's like 'sprets-uh-toor-uh" haha
His best moments are his reversals, where he takes on a genuine air of humility- the starting point of any great thing.
I think the closest English word would be steeze lol
Wait. U think gervais succeeds in this goal?
Amazing that his issue with easy jokes is not "if they're based on bigotry they might harm a maginalized community" because clearly he doesn't actually give a shit about that.
His issue with them is "Jerry Seinfeld won't think I'm smarter than him"
Very nice Ricky, good stuff
No one in marginalised communities should get mad at jokes, jokes are jokes
@@07W I think you're taking it too seriously if you think you can dictate how people feel about jokes lmao. go outside
@@wackywally69420 stop projecting 🤷♂️
@@07W So people can just say outrageously racist stuff, then just go "it was a joke, you're not allowed to be mad!"?
I don't think you understand how jokes work. Jokes aren't harmless just because they are jokes, it depends entirely on what the point of the joke is.
@@avon8794 well if they say "outrageous racist" stuff it aint a joke is it 🤦♂️
@ 2:12 I actually understood Ricky's philosophy or rather point of view. Ricky is expressing an important element that both the audience and sometimes creatives don't understand. Ricky just doesn't want his jokes to be just funny, he wants them to be interesting, and most of the time, the artist (In this case Ricky) wants the joke to have the same sensibility on perception of art to be seen as something worthwhile. Most of the time the people who can understand or grasp this aspect or element of art are essentially critics and creatives who share the same art form. Sometimes the audience will never grasp it because essentially their focus (80-90%) of the time is just (In this case comedy) to laugh and have a good time.
But at the same time, Seinfeld's argument is also correct and that making the joke to make people just laugh and the comic making it their own is also worthwhile and actually very fulfilling. He as a fellow artistic colleague who shares the craft understands the feeling and the importance of the audience appreciating the joke and the artist owning it, rather than feeling shy and missing out on a very cool joke that will laugh and have a good time.
Essentially Both Comics have a different point of view and both comics' arguments or perceptions are equally important. I don't think Jarvis disagrees with Seinfiled's viewpoint he just wants more from his craft and this leads to pressure and the self-judgements he keeps talking about which leads to artistic anxiety which clearly either Seinfield never had, or overcome while Jarvis is clearly still struggling with it. I disagree with Big Joel making the argument that Jarvis's philosophy is out of place.
oh man something about this resonated in my bones. i always feel like I'm trying to prove something about myself with my art and. oh man. what a cautionary tale. i think i wanna be as little like ricky gervais as possible
He was Ricky Gervais so that we may not be
Is it possible to separate our art from our neuroticism? Would we even wanna do it anymore if we didn't have these hang ups?
I think you're fine, dude. Everyone has these insecurities and hangups about thier art. Gervais's mistake is internalizing them and using them as the entire basis to do his craft.
@@09daniscool Yes, absolutely! It's very important for your own sanity to do art because you're chasing something you enjoy, not because you're running away from something that hurts.
We grow roots, and sometimes the water is poison. It's a starting point, though, and we can always grow roots elsewhere.
There is a moment where Chris Rock says something like "I do standup for a living. I don't have The Office." Chris Rock does not try as hard to hide his contempt for Ricky Gervais. Gervais has the shortest standup career of the crew, yet he is actually the producer of Talking Funny. It is really outrageous that he lumped himself in with 3 icons, "the funniest people in the world." You can tell the 3 other guys vibe and he's left out.
thats like sandler, cruise, gordon-levitt etc. who write and produce their own movie to star in, and cast the hottest woman on earth as their wife/love interest
I was wondering who put Gervais alongside the others and whether there was some kind of sponsorship involved! I guess Ricky's ego is the only sponsor needed!
@@daltonbedore8396 Tom Cruise?
@@seanmatthewking one example: vanilla sky. a remake he produced almost shot for shot and cast the same actress: penelope cruz. changed almost nothing about the movie except put himself in the lead role
@@daltonbedore8396 when I saw Don Jon had Scarlett Johansson, Julianne Moore and Marisa Tomei, all of whom I had a crush on at some point, I knew the movie was just a means to an end and I couldn't help but clap in hatred.
I used to love the old XFM shows with Steven Merchant and Karl Pilkington, and the animated series they based off of them. However, I realized years ago that despite being titled “The Ricky Gervais Show”, the comedy was entirely carried by Merchant and Pilkington. Pilkington is so naturally funny and entertaining without even trying, and his uneducated Everyman character was super endearing. Despite him being an “idiot”, I often found him much more likeable than Gervais.
I’m 21 and British, my dad absolutely adores Ricky gervais and everything he does, and my mum loves the show Extras, so my childhood was pretty much dominated by Ricky. It took me so, so long to realise that all this time, I have greatly disliked pretty much everything he’s done, and even longer to admit it to myself, but oh my god I could rant for hours about my disdain for this man and how he has impacted my life, ESPECIALLY my relationship with and how I view my dad, who pretty much shaped himself in Ricky’s image, HEAVY on the atheist narcissist ‘self-aware’ ‘intellectual’ stuff. He dunks on people for idolising celebrities and ignoring/forgiving their terrible behaviour but I can’t criticise Ricky’s blatantly transphobic show without waging a war on him. I liked the Ricky Gervais show for Karl Pilkington but I can’t watch it anymore, it just makes me feel bad for Karl. I have too much to say, this hit a nerve with me ig, really good video Joel, as always!
Sitting in a tree cuz I'm rat
Tbh I liked a lot of Extras but I would've liked it way more without Gervais being the dominant character or in it at all. If he'd just produced it & focused on the other main actor, I think it would've been a good show. He's this derailing presence in every scene he's in, detracting from everyone else.
I really liked Karl too, and the podcast they did with Karl. Especially the fact that a lot of what Karl said back then WAS right, or well informed, he just misquoted it, or didn’t explain it the best way.
Karl is a lot smarter than people have him credit for, I think it’s just the way he spoke, or the way he viewed the world, that Ricky and the other guy (I wanna say Steve or Stephen? Sorry I wasn’t very familiar with him) constantly laughed at or made fun of him for.
Karl was even right about the increase in non-binary/trans/gender non-conforming people in the modern day, which Ricky laughed at him over for believing the article he read.
Looking stupid now, aren’t you Ricky?
your story touches my soul in ways i wouldnt consent
i feel sorry for your situation and wish for a positive development
I like The Office and Extras because it seemed like Gervais was writing those characters to usually be the butt of the jokes, which in hindsight is kind of weird considering how badly he needs to be better than everyone else now.
I got to have a conversation about comedy with Chris Rock before he was on SNL. He was just another up-and-coming New York area comedian and we met at an audition. I never forgot it. He was a pro even then.
Oh god that failed high five at 8:10
It's subtle but it's painful
Funnily enough, later in that special (I think it was later, it's been a while since I've seen it) Jerry talks about cutting a bit from his act early on because he realised that it only got a laugh because of an f-bomb he dropped. That was apparently the whole reason he became such a famously clean comic. So it sounded like he had something of a similar mindset to Ricky when he started, albeit not necessarily so snobbish.
Also a nice companion piece to this special (that Ricky set up) is the interview he did around the same time with Garry Shandling, where Garry deliberately went into his shell and was as low-energy and deadpan as possible to leave Ricky hanging with everything he said. There was this remarkable mini era where Ricky was going around, meeting his comedy heroes and being effortlessly humiliated by them in public.
Well I can get Jerry's point. He realized when he left the f-bomb out of the joke it didn't work and he didn't understand why back then. So trying to build a similar joke without cursing was a challenge. Has nothing to do with Ricky's ego issues of being the smartest guy in the room.
I think that's different, since often laughing at swear words is more of a nervous laugh about the taboo being broken rather than actually finding something funny. Ricky seemed to be claiming that being funny on its own wasn't enough and he had to have some kind of intangible intellectual element to the joke. Jerry wants to make the audience laugh because they find the idea behind the joke funny, whereas Ricky wants them to laugh and think he's very smart at the same time.
@Sad Panda Seinfeld explains it futher. he days that the swearing was channeling his anger at that point but he couldn't figure out how to translate the anger without swearing so he cut the joke out.
Although I appreciated many of his sketches, recently I have found in Ricky Gervais the same problem I have found in Dave Chappelle: the desire to be seen as someone more than a comedian, someone akin to a crusader on a moral quest for truth.
Also, is it me or does Ricky's last laugh sound like those Mariachi's screams when they start playing?
hahahah. I think it's an ego thing too. The whole "comedians are the modern day philosophers" thing is so cringe. Just do your damn job, you aren't that important..
It's funny because that is normally something also thrown at 'woke' comedians like Hannah Gadsby, a comparison which would immensely annoy Gervais but would fit. People don't look to comedians for moral lessons!
I’m not sure I agree. Chappelle definitely didn’t use to be that way and tbh I don’t think either of them are crusaders the closest either gets to thar his when chappelle did a show about George Floyd
I think what they both have in common is they don’t seem to really care about anyone other than themselves and this quality has become magnified due to their money and prestige and now they have just become the establishment and are very defensive and jealous of their power and happy to punch down on people
That’s why it’s so hard to take their “it’s just a joke” shit seriously. Like obviously it’s NOT “just” a joke to YOU ya big baby crying about cancel culture and trans ppl you make up in your head to be angry at.
@@idontwantahandlethough I think comedians can be important, but I also believe that the medium through which they communicate important ideas should be comedy.
you can't just say that your ideas are important, spend an hour making people uncomfortable, and then insist that you're a good comedian
I watched the first series of afterlife with my parents and he basically wrote arguments for himself to win against other characters about things he believes. It felt like fanfiction about himself, but with added tragedy. Terminal illness is used in a lot of media and it can be done so well so I'm not bashing that, I just wasn't a fan of it. There were lots of tropes I found quite boring. I feel he could've benefitted from speaking to people who've lost loved ones to the disease or who have depression, and maybe he did but it felt like someone trying to portray something they didn't know enough about to do it in a compelling way. Maybe it would've been more impactful if the main character was likeable or had anything redeemable about him. I'm glad the show helped some people but yeah it wasn't for me. Also as an autistic guy I felt weird watching his show Derek, again watched that with my parents who watch a lot of sitcom type things. I did like Karl's character but then I like Karl a lot, he's very open-minded despite not being the most well-informed person. And I wouldn't be surprised if he was autistic because the way he describes the world is unique, albeit rather bleak at times.
Also, I'm an atheist too and there are ways of talking about it without just shitting on entire cultures or religions that they find comfort in. I'm against fundamentalism and religion being used as an excuse to hurt others (like abortion bans etc), that should go without saying, and I have had bad experiences with religion due to being queer, but I think RG comes across as really cocky with his 'takedowns' of religion. Like I said you can do it well, I watch Emma Thorne who does it well for example, but she doesn't act like she's a fuckin genius and deserves a medal for it lol
But yeah if you enjoy his shows or he's helped you get through something then I'm glad, just not a fan personally. My parents liked idiot abroad and the office so I remember parts of that from it being on the telly when I was a kid, and I remember liking those but I think that's cos of Karl and Merchant mostly lol, seeing as I like their individual work a lot more
I completely agree about After Life. The whole thing felt super lazy and self indulgent. Merchant was such an integral part of their early sitcoms. Ricky is a brilliant comic actor but he massively lacks discipline in his writing.
This is actually such an interesting look into what motivates Ricky, not just as a comedian but as a person. He is only interested about what he considers "the elite" thinks of him. He needs that validation in order to be able to count himself among them. He considers himself so above the common people that the reactions and praise of people who're specifically fans of his work doesn't matter. He's a status chaser, and he's isn't as much climbing towards the highest status imaginable knowing he started from the bottom, instead before he reaches that level he thinks of himself as a "temporarily embarrassed member of the elite", much in the same way many who believe in the meritocracy fully, thinks of themselves as temporarily embarrassed millionaire.
In that way he's very similar to people like Tucker Carlson. Both are clearly part of theelite socioeconomic elite, but both are equally unsatisfied because they hunger for the approval of the very few at the absolute top.
Now I kinda want to see Ricky Gervais interviewed by Tucker Carlson - two egos that manage to be both arrogant and fragile, together in the same room. It would be a lab experiment from hell.🍿
Tucker Carlson gloated about being in his words “Rupert Murdocks bitch.” I don’t think he cares about anything other than money.
Aaaaannd both he and Tucker have annoying as shit fake laughs
Unwashed plebian here. I think Ricky is funny.
@@kylebookout1789 yeah, but whats crazy is that Ricky does not care that you, a genuine fan, finds him funny. he only cares that the perceived elites think he is smart
It’s so strange (good strange) to see this dissected, it’s always rankled me but I’d totally forgotten about it. I remember discussing it with other buddies as obsessively into comedy as me and we all just couldn’t understand now he was even in the same room. And although I don’t think he’s on their level, I still appreciate some things he does…but this is a sure fire way to make yourself look like an absolute awkward tool.
I think he was in the room because they were all more generous than he was
The problem with the dissection of the discussion is that the best comedians love him and get what he is saying and admire his comedy.
@@jonathand6952 Stewart Lee isn't a fan. Frankie Boyle isn't a fan. Lots of good comedians aren't impressed by his lazy recycling of the same tired old jokes
@@dzonbrodi514 his source is “dude, trust me” don’t bother mate
@@dzonbrodi514 A lot of the best comedians love him though. There will be though who don't like him. There are people who don't like the best comedians. There are people who like what I would called average comedians.
I bet that what you think is recycled has a connection to religion and politics that don't match yours. Am I correct?
I can't find it anywhere, but there's an old Ricky Gervais and Karl Pilkington bit where Ricky basically introduces Karl to the concept of improv comedy and they do a scene together, and it's an absolute masterclass in bad improv versus good improv. Ricky assumes the character of some kind of weird creepy troglodytic neighbour who talks about his balls hanging too low and that he keeps pissing himself in a kind of exaggerated Grima Wormtongue voice, and it's just utterly DOA because Ricky Gervais cannot play a character to save his life. He asks Karl what it was he wanted to talk about as the setup, and then Karl just responds in his normal voice that Ricky keeps forgetting to take the bins out and it's ruining the scenery, getting increasingly frustrated, and completely resuscitates the bit just by incorporating a genuine human interaction into Ricky's ridiculously overacted piece of misanthropy.
Ricky having a "I'm wasted in comedy" moment is half his act. The other half is showing why he is not wasted in comedy.
What does "I'm wasted in comedy" mean?
@@pepijnstreng4643 I think what he means is that Ricky implies his true potential is wasted by being a comedian when really he could be doing something much more meaningful and important
He’s wasted in comedy in the sense that he isn’t funny. Dunno what else he’d be good for though. Probably nothing. 😆
@@hopefullyhelping6664 he could probably be a decent janitor.
This really explains why Ricky has relied on Karl Pilkington for laughs for years now. He can always be the smart one but still get “dumb” laughs.
Karl Pilkington has the comedic timing that even the greatest in the craft would KILL to have. He's one of the funniest people around whether that's intentional or not.
@@ali14chahrour very true. I think about, “did I tell you about the immune system” every day.
This is one of those situations where someone already made my comment for me. Maybe this is baseless, but I've seen a lot of dumb people in my life, and Karl doesn't seem dumb at all. He just has a very downbeat, unusual personality that average people might interpret as dumb, but intelligent people might see as simply unique and interesting.
I say this every time Ricky comes up, the last time I watched him host the golden globes, he gave an opening speech with a sentiment at the end that summed up to “don’t get up here and try to be righteous about some cause during your acceptance speech cuz you’re a rich arsehole at a televised awards show” Which was already a dubious sentiment around MeToo activism, but then the immediate first award went to Russell Crowe who couldn’t be in attendance because his house was under threat of climate catastrophe, forest fire in Australia so he was “home” with his family. And I hope if nothing else that it made Ricky feel insecure and want to take back what he had just said because oh yeah some problems we all face no matter how wealthy/privileged
I've never seen a comic who didn't appticiate how hard it is to get a good laugh. This is like saying "It's not funny bc its a good joke, it funny bc I am smart."
Ricky Jervais kinda reminds me of that one friend we all have who tries to be the funniest person in the room and keeps looking at each person to see if they laughed, instead of just relaxing snd having fun with friends. Oy vey
The only time I see people saying "Oy vey" on the internet is when they're being anti-semitic, but since this is a leftist space... is there something I'm missing here?
But ricky is actually funny
Had a friend like that. He would INSIST on having his joke acknowledged, even when it would have been funnier to drop one dryly in passing and move on.
He also had this habit where he'd get competitive about jokes. If someone else got a big laugh he'd try to top it instead of letting the joke land and letting someone else have their own moment.
It never really worked, of course, because you can't spontaneously be funnier than an organic joke if you're that focused on your ego.
A real Michael Scott one might say. Others, David Brent.
@@raxino774 Eh, debatable.
This was a very elaborate setup for your Ricky Gervais impression but the payoff was worth the price of admission.
The moment I expected this video to end with:
Louis CK drops the hard R and Chris Rock laughs and says it back to him. Seinfeld says "I don't think he should be allowed to say that" and they have a brief back and forth about it. RICKY drops the hard R and Chris Rock and Louis look at him like "woah bro what the fuck, calm down dude Jesus Christ"
Yeah, definitely expected this video to discuss that moment. Kinda weird to leave out.
Wow, I thought you were joking but nope.
Ricky strikes me as a middle-aged guy who never got over his edgy atheist teenage years. You know, the kind of guy who still laughs at the "I identify as a helicopter" joke... unironically.
Ben: Why don't you identify as 60?
Ricky: I am 60
Ben: Okay now even I feel sorry for you
@@morbidsearch Wait, he's 60? 🤨👀
He actually does do the unironic attack helicopter joke....in his show Animals, I think it was.
@@jdprettynails Gonna watch it, 'cause my cringe levels are low. Thanks.
Yes! 100%
I have fond memories of seeing Ricky Gervais first popping up on a British comedy show called the 11 o'clock show which i used to watch religiously during the late 90s (also the lauch point for Ali G & Bruno etc.). A while after that i was excited to see a stand up show of his screened on the tv. When i watched it, i remember being so disappointed to find that so much of it was just making fun of disabled people in really cheap and unfunny ways for shock value. From that moment on, the only thing about him that surprised me was how good the office was (although this could be down to the many other great talents involved, including Makenzie Crook who was one of the original presenters of the 11 o'clock show).
All his lame athiest takes, attention seeking, and needing to have Karl Pilkington as a foil to talk down to and patronise, came as absolutely no surprise after watching even that one crappy standup show...
I think Ricky Gervais is a comic genius as a component of a team and unbearable chore when he's solo. When he's in a writer's room where others can curb his worst instincts, his comedy shines. But in his stand-up, he just comes off as condescending, trite, and painfully edgy.
100%
Genius? Jeez that word has lost all meaning, lol
@@inigo137 hyperbole exists, my dude
@@gentlemandemon I mean... yeah? But hyperbole is usually used with intention behind it? And this just sounded completely genuine
@@inigo137 the purpose was intentional overstatement for greater contrast between my praise and my criticism. it was rhetorical hyperbole. but yes, I do think some of Ricky Gervais's work (like the original office) took genuine talent and insight, and just because I think he can be an absolute wanker doesn't necessarily take away form that.
There's a stand up set by Ricky Gervais about homophobia and how it's not the same as fat-phobia. I think it's really worth a watch because of how it doesn't work, it's one of the most confused stand-up bits I've ever seen. If I was a video essayist I would definitely make a video unpacking why that particular joke doesn't work because I think it's really really interesting.
Do you remember which special it's from?
Take a shot at it!
I’d watch a video essay on that even if it was your first
sexual assault mention tw
just searched it up and wow. this is so bizarre …. love how he specifically says that if they were the same thing, you’d have to deliberately “wean yourself on cock” and then enacts a bizarre incident of like. domestic sexual abuse? it’s so gross and so bizarre ???
@@bonestartapes where did you find the bit?
i know this sounds really depressing, but i literally cant remember the last time i genuinely laughed but joel suddenly doing that Ricky Gervais impression at the end really caught me off guard and somehow made me cry laugh😅😂
I hope you’re alright! 🙏🏾
I think part of the awkwardness comes from the fact Rock, Seinfeld and CK are stand-ups first, and Gervais is primarily a writer and comic actor. I can sort of see his train of thought in the "sitting on a cock cause Im gay" section because if you were writing a scene with that joke you would probably be thinking about what the subtext is, and what the character motivations of somebody laughing would be, and what sort of pathos you can extract etc - it is exactly the sort of David Brent fuck up you get in The Office; but a stand-up has a whole different set of skills.
I was absolutely obsessed with the Ricky Gervais show with Pilkington and Merchant as a high schooler. I decided to look into his other work and liked The Office and Extras quite a bit. once I got into the deeper stuff, like his stand up and interviews and his social media presence, I had this moment like "Oh. He is ACTUALLY miserable and annoying, it's not a character. It's not ironic." I started seeing how utterly desperate he is for a laugh to the point that it is painful to watch. I have never seen this clip, but I am also going to be quoting, "DOES HE DO THE WHISTLE?!" from now on. Its..... incredible.
I have to admit that show was hilarious. They just ragged on Karl and his perfectly round head so hard the whole time
@@stdesyKarl's fucking hilarious in it, too.
i liked the office uk and made the mistake of watching his stand up and even as a dumbass 20 something in 2008 it was just painfully unfunny. seeing that his standup material hasn't progressed past edgy shock humor and just complaining about people being mean to him on twitter while he scrolls throug his twitter is really telling.
last thing i remember sitting through with him in it was when he was trying to talk to garry shandling and seeing that same kind of desperation and need to be liked right down to the uncomfortably loud fake laughing and shandling's utter contempt for him in response was probably the funniest thing about it
If you haven't seen Life's Too Short that's really good too.
It's possible you didn't clock this because of your age at the time @bigjoel , but it's an important fact that may shed some illumination on the entire 'talking funny' special. The setup of the show APPEARS like 4 comics sitting in equal standing, but in reality, it was an interview. One man (Ricky) interviewing three other men. The project was set up by Ricky, and the other 3 were his guests.
In a sense it was a genius move, because by putting himself in the same room as these others, it created the optical perception that he belonged in that room with them.
You are right. Ricky is the executive producer of Talking Funny. It does make sense.
It's not a secret, it's just been obscured by the veil of time.
All he had to do is offer the right amount of money to get those appearances, and thanks to the success of his (then) two TV series, 'The Office', and 'Extras', combined with the residuals he was still receiving for the US version of 'The Office' meant that his pockets would have been plenty deep enough to accommodate that.@@Krokrodyl
I absolutely _love_ the level of disdain you can see in Louie and Jerry's eyes. It's amazing.
edit: the really dumb thing about all of this is that honestly, Ricky Gervais *DOES* know what's funny. Better than almost anyone else I can think of. If it's funny, he will laugh that dumb laugh. If you've seen An Idiot Abroad (and you should, it's an experience) or anything else he's produced or written, it's abundantly clear that the dude has a genuine knack for knowing when something is funny. That _is_ a super worthwhile skill, he's really good at it, has even made a solid career out of it.. but unfortunately his ego is so ridiculously overinflated that he'll never allow himself to not be the center of attention. He wants to be the funny guy so badly.. and he's just not that guy. He's the guy who says "omg, that's hilarious. Let's keep doing that!" and then everyone makes a ton of money. He should have stuck with that.
[one of] The issue[s] in this clip is that he's trying to intellectualize it. Sometimes shit is just funny, and dissecting the frog kills it.
The other issue is, obviously, his gigantic ego. It's not his philosophy that makes him unfunny, it's his ego. It's just that his ego has also informed his weird philosophy and basically everything else about him. It's hard to be funny when you see your audience as unwashed plebians.
It's easy to tell he's faking it because real artists seem to not really see themselves as important as their art, and their art comes from so many different observations of things. Things outside of themselves. Ricky is that threatened ego talking, most of the time, and his best moments are when he can shelve it away and take the pain of humiliation with grace. Like a true court jester. We are what we eat, and if we're dissecting the frog we're also kinda eating it in a way. Let's not be Fwog men, let's be human beans (they look like tasty morsels for the fwog men, unfortunately)
Total tangent, but it’s always bothered me: I completely disagree with the “dissecting the frog kills it” mentality. Dissecting a joke will make it stop being funny… **to you**. If your objective is to laugh, never dissect a joke. If your objective is to make other people laugh, you need to dissect jokes all the time, because you need to understand how they work in order to make more.
I disagree with your diagnosis of the problem. The problem isn’t that trying to intellectualize it is bad inherently, the problem is that Ricky, despite his best efforts and inflated self importance, is bad at intellectualizing it. He’s not half as smart as he’d like the world to believe.
God he’s so awkward, he just can’t have anyone think he’s not an ‘intellectual’ for even a single second. This man fills me with rage
The ironic thing about Gervais' definition of irony is that his entire career has been built on everyone thinking that him being a grating, smug asshole was an act when in fact it was just his personality.
I get the impression that the last piece of media Ricky Gervais consumed was an ‘Athiest DESTROYS Creationist’ video in 2007, and thought it was so funny that it informed his entire routine for the next 15+ years
I actually love this joke, kudos - but it also makes it look like a cope. Are you religious? ^^
@@colinreynolds01 no, I’m an atheist as well. But the reddit core ‘I’m so smart because I’m an atheist’ shit was cringe in 2007 and it’s definitely cringe now
@@yaketysaks It seems to me that his stand up these days tends to revolve around ‘fat people are lazy’ and ‘trans people are weird’ moreso than his atheist takes.
Every now and then one of those clips will do the rounds but that’s just people re-sharing old shit.
@@colinreynolds01 I can smell the Reddit atheist on you
@@JohnM-sw4sc then I suggest you change up your brand of toothpaste. Wrong era entirely.
I think the common thread through a lot of modern stand up is the attempt to launder it into being an intellectual or a pundit. There's a big element of this in Chris Rock and Seinfeld's work too, but I think they are better at handling it than Gervais. Gervais was basically trying to get them to break kayfabe and admit "No, a lot of this is my actual views and I'm being serious about what I say and do. I care deeply that people think I'm smart" but the others know better than to ever do that.
I love George Carlin specifically for his political jokes, and what makes it work is that.. He's not just fucking making fun of marginalized and oppressed people.
It's weird that this is something comedians need pointed out to them, but like, it's not funny to joke about people whose lives are made miserable for no good reason, but it is absolutely fucking hilarious to make fun of people who are terrible and persist in being terrible despite being given ample chances to stop doing so.
I remember reading or watching something about how the right wing simply cannot comprehend how humor works, and they seem intent on proving that sentiment correct.
@@swedneck Reductionism and literalism 'literally' structure our modern technological and diverse world... it always had, to some extent. Ghosts and goblins were shortcuts to explain things that made no sense to our eyes, I guess.
It's no wonder there are sycophants, after all, any void is a vacuum that pulls all matter nearby into it. Power vacuums. There will always be a Ricky or a Trump or a Russel to be pulled in (by lack of barrier?) to be a workhorse that can't see (any good reason to venture) outside the confines of a space, of self.
Great artists and comedians are analytical and curious by nature of their mature self-awareness and able to unpack the general unconscious, the shadows that we tend to bat away into our periphery. Or you can take a shortcut, and try to maneuver your mask towards the audience at all times, a dimly lit façade, begging silently to not be put back on the shelf of normality where you started, and will eventually end your journey. Trick is? We're all on that shelf, all the time, and the quicker we are to accept it, the better shot we have of changing our hearts and minds OH MY GOD I'M PRETENTIOUSSSNOOOOO
Thank you for this. It encapsulates how I feel about Gervais. His special "animals" years ago where he discusses Noah's Ark made me laugh so hard but his latest where he just spews transphobia made me so mad. He not only thinks his audience is beneath him but pretty much everyone in the world is.
i think its nice that people can sustain a successful comedy career off of being the equivalent of the guy on twitter who follows up spewing any old dumb shit with "hahaha lots of triggered people in the replies!!", while still somehow managing to make that dumb shit the most boring string of words imaginable. a talent, really
How did you comment on this three days before it was uploaded
ikr
he made the office tho
@@JjJj-kv7wu With Stephen Merchant, and he was really the creator of the show, though Ricky created the David Brent character. Looking at the stuff Ricky has done without Merchant it's starting to look like Merchant was the really funny one, at least when it came to the slightly more sophisticated humor that is completely lacking from Ricky's other works.
@@Halfendymion time travel + patreon
I appreciate that Ricky can be so open and honest with the other comedians in this conversation. It's clear his views don't come from a place of malice, but from a place of insecurity. I'd like to say I hope he took something away from what the other comedians said in that conversation, but it's been 10 years now..
I agree. "The funny" is actually serious business. Comedians know that there are underlying rules to comedy and that there has to be an element of truth for something to be funny; when a joke resonates with me it lands so smoothly. So Indont begrudge him trying to dissecr the craft. But he also views his opinions as gospel (ironically?) And thinks he has gotten to where he is through merit. He hasn't. He's ridden on the shoulders of giants straight in to illusions of grandeur and a god complex. As dogmatic and intransigent as the "religious fanatics" he derides. He may have had good intentions at one point but now he is sour. His fat phobia and edge is just his insecurity, hypocricy and narcissism manifested.
@@steamedhamlet"he views his opinions as gospel" thats like every comedian? have you watched George Carlin?
Thr difference is carlin is funny @@MorbiusBlueBalls
@@Ulubai that's the most 🤓 response I've ever seen. you know what subjectivity is?
@@MorbiusBlueBalls objectively Gervais is trying to ingratiate himself into a friendgroup by being obnoxiously unfunny. Subjectively Carlin is funnier
I heard an interview with Steve Carrell once where he said Gervais had told him (paraphrasing) "Everyone knows a person like David Brent [Michael Scott] in real life, and if you can't think of someone, you are that person." and ever since I heard that I can't help but think Ricky Gervais and David Brent really are the same.
It's like having Einstein, Newton, and Curie in a room, and then the 4th person is a Redditor
Or Elon Musk
I would pay to see Elon Musk go back in time and meet the real Tesla
True. Einstein also liked to play with his peepee when talking to people.
The story of Gervais being criticised on twitter for his casual use of the word mong (a derogatory british slang for someone with Down's Syndrome), and how he then went on to make the series Derek (patronising the kindness of an autistic/schizoid man) is something
really, it was the origin of Derek ???
Hahahahah don’t take the mong away from us you sped
Comedians have to reckon with the fact that they are descended from jesters and clowns. Wearing a tight black shirt doesn't make you an artisan. Ricky is constantly running away from this realization.
Continuing to love Medium Joel
@@Hatris
Thank you blowing fresh life into the Medium Joel meme
Hearing Gervais say the purpose of his comedy isn't to make people laugh, but to impress comedians he loves gives me a better insight into why his comedy is the way it is. I honestly think many of the shitty "don't censor my comedy" comedians are also trying to be a comedian's comedian like him, but just won't admit it. When a good comedian tells a joke that bombs, whether it's just not funny or most of the audience finds it offensive, the comedian simply won't tell that joke anymore. But Gervais and others see comedy as a religion & have to vehemently defend their jokes like they're dogma.
Amazing how literally every single person in that room has since been embroiled in some kind of controversy
that little delay before he absolutely erupted into laughter like that at the whistle joke, it was almost like he was looking at everyone else in the room first to see if he should laugh too, then when he got up and almost seemed to go in for a high five from chris rock before sitting back down without getting one while simultaneously being the loudest one in the room.... it's so embarrassing, he wasn't lying, he is DESPERATE for approval
Except I’ve seen Ricky be the only one laughing like that on talk shows and such many times. He might have been a little self conscious with these heavy hitters, but I think he’s funny as hell.
Idk this feels like when people over analyze body language, we don’t know what’s going on in someone’s head just from some edited clip of a conversation
@@ataraxia7439 yeah maybe you're right about this, still i couldn't help but like..... recede into myself watching that part of the clip. it gave me the same icky feeling as when i think of something embarrassing i did in like 8th grade. but you're right, speculating on the intent behind a display of human joy even if the guy displaying it is someone i think is both unfunny and unlikeable is maybe a little fucky. apologies to ricky
@@ratfromsewer6683Yeah that's super fair. I think the big elephant in the room is that Ricky Gervais holds deeply transphobic views and has expressed them in public as well as his act regularly. It's deeply disappointing and sad to see as well as something that at best, isn't doing any good for the world. It's hard not to let that color our perception of him but I do worry we might fall into a trap of taking a negative aspect of someone and letting that lead us to see them in an inaccurate way. Like I think if you took the average person that didn't know much about any of these four guys and had them say what they thought about them in the documentary, they'd just say RIcky was a guy who was laughing and talking with the rest.
I think my favorite bizarre Ricky gervais moment is the absolute disaster of an interview he gave to Gary Shandling where throughout the entire interview it seems like Gary could not possibly want to be further away from another human being than he did in that moment.
I just looked this up and wow. That was surreal.
I loved it. Shandling could barely disguise his disdain for Gervais. It was wonderful to watch.
That was the most cringe thing ever.
Yeah that went bad though Gary Shandling was attempting to be difficult like the guy did often.
Ricky’s Bizarre Moment
Great vid. Gervais's behaviour in that video always gave me extreme second hand embarrassment. It's clear the other comedians do not respect him at all.
But they're American comedians which means they are by default not funny at all and that particular joke - it's not funny and I didn't laugh. British comedy is just superior
One of my favorite comedy shows was An Idiot Abroad. When I was young I thought "Wow, Ricky and Stephen really outdid themselves, this is great!"
But in hindsight the show was entirely carried by Karl himself, and basically anyone could've played Ricky and co's parts. They were mostly laughing with us at Karl bumbling around like an idiot, but not really doing anything funny themselves. They were the straight men at best, and even then their performance was just something your average person could do, especially since it was over a phone.
Watching this I had another realization, he was mostly doing that show so he could feel better about himself and how smart he was over Karl, someone who was deliberately playing an idiot