From the Guardian:
>Leslie Jones is sick of smart comics. She can’t bear the sort of standups who tell stories rather than jokes, the kind who make audiences think rather than belly laugh. “They fucking suck. If I wanna learn, I’ll go to school. Don’t teach me, make me fucking laugh. I’m tired of clapping and saying: ‘Ha ha, that’s so clever.’”
>>71751082
>Jones, 49 years old and 6ft tall, is immovable. Her big break didn’t come from the club circuit she faithfully plugged away on for 25 years, but from US comedy institution Saturday Night Live. She was originally hired as a writer by SNL creator Lorne Michaels in 2014 and promoted to cast member within a year, with the words: “You’re everything we weren’t looking for.”
>Michaels is ranked the most powerful figure in US comedy and Jones, say her fellow cast members, is a pretty good litmus test for what America will think is funny. Six months after making her debut, she landed the hottest job in Hollywood: a ghostbuster in Paul Feig’s intensely anticipated all-female reboot.
Yes, yes well done Leslie Jones, well done.
HOWEVER
>>71751082
What would you learn from a comedic story? also humor is subjective and she should be happy that these people exists, after all if she is right than people will love her comedy and ignore there comedy which means less completion
>>71751118
>“Paul told me that when he saw me do Weekend Update, he jumped out of his chair and was, ‘Who is that? That’s my girl!’ I think it might be the first one I did – and it was a controversial one.” Jones had crassly joked that she would have had a better love life “back in the slave days”, because her strength and size would have put her in demand. After that, “Paul called up Lorne Michaels and said: ‘If you don’t make her a cast member, you’ve lost your mind.’”
>Hair spiked and heels on, Jones packs energy into the small room we are holed up in. She asks how I am, tells me I smell nice, gives good warm, inconsequential chit-chat while we both pretend to ignore how nerve-racking it all is. There’s a lot riding on the new Ghostbusters film, partly because it has generated such frenzied hype, partly because the animosity towards the all-female cast gives it much to prove. But Jones stays breezy, and performs our conversation as comedy, with big, expressive, palm-punching laughter breaking up her sentences.
>Has she seen the finished film yet? “I haven’t seen it. I’m the type of person who is very real, and I don’t wanna see it before it’s time. ’Cos I’ll be like: ‘Hey, yo! You need to … that’s not how … can we …?’ And I don’t wanna be that way. I wanna be the only one at the premiere going crazy-wild-big laughs.” She laughs. “Have you seen it?”
>Once.
>“Is it good?”
>Well, now I can’t tell you.
>She claps and cracks up. “I like that! You’re funny. Don’t tell me!”
If she means a comedian like Janene Garofolo, sure I agree.
If she means a comedian that's act doesn't consist of "Y'all mothafuckas ever nut on yo girl and she say 'damn you got my children on my face' and you think dayum girl you nasty" then fuck her the stupid cunt
>>71751118
>“You’re everything we weren’t looking for.”
kek
>promoted
that implies that writers are lesser beings in this dynamic while in truth they are equals
>>71751118
>say her fellow cast members, is a pretty good litmus test for what America will think is funny.
That is like saying my elitist rich friends are a good litmus test of what the country wants and needs.
>>71751118
>She was originally hired as a writer
I imagine this is similar to the Norm MacDonald story about the black guy that wrote for Roseanne yet had no idea who the characters where.
>>71751082
No way, she comes across as so intellectual
I agree we need more comedians yelling out random swear words while jumping up and down
>>71751165
>Feig’s film already has the difficult bit out of the way, which is the original premise for the script: a gang of four saving New York City from ghosts and bad guys. Building layers of jokes around the certain chemistry between the four women – Melissa McCarthy, Kristen Wiig, Kate McKinnon and Jones – has to have been the fun bit.
>“We didn’t really audition,” says Jones. “Paul is one of the best comics I know that doesn’t do standup, so he already had a roadmap of the kind of characters he wanted and he already knew what he wanted to work with.” She says the script would go unchanged with no ad libbing among the four of them, until Feig would opt for a final take – “the dealer’s choice”. This was where Jones was able to argue about lines in the script. “I’d be like: ‘Paul. I wouldn’t say that, so can I say it how I would say it?’ And he be like: ‘Do it like I asked you to say it. Then do it like you want to so I can see both.’ And I would see the take and surprise myself sometimes – it worked.”
>Jones filmed her standup special, Problem Child, in 2009, back when she was performing to mostly black audiences. It is bawdy and derivative, and she revels in shouting “nigga, bitch, hell naw” throughout, playing it physical but dumb. “I always thought I was fun to be around,” she says. “People always invited me to parties, like: ‘When you come to parties, girl, it is on.’ I was always getting invited places, but until I won a college contest, I never thought of myself as a comedian.”
>Jones abandoned her degree at Colorado State University in the mid-80s to become a comedian. She had arrived on a basketball scholarship, won the campus standup competition, and then called her dad to tell him she was dropping out with: “I’m going to be the next Eddie Murphy!” She delivers a cartoon skit at this point.
>>71751165
>” Jones had crassly joked that she would have had a better love life “back in the slave days”, because her strength and size would have put her in demand.
How is this a joke? even if you say all masters raped their slaves, they still would rape the good looking ones. being sold is not the same as having a love life. is this just a shit joke or would you have had to have seen it to get it?
>>71751165
>new Ghostbusters
I think its clear she should not expect more from it than what they got from macgruber
>>71751152
Yeah, this bitch just sucks, regardless of her skin color and looks. That's all. Richard Pryor's routines and Eddie Murphy's first special are easily among the best of all time. And they mostly just told stories in an entertaining way. Fuck this cunt.
>>71751327
It's just a shit joke
>>71751327
Some slave owners would breed their slaves, choosing the best slaves to breed. It's one of the possible origins of "Motherfucker", the male slave that would impregnate the female slaves.
She's saying that if she was a slave the slave owners would breed her with other strong slaves so they would create slave babies that would grow up strong.
>>71751281
>“There was a long silence and he was like: ‘What? Who told you you could be a comedian? You’ve lost your damn mind. Wait a minute – the next Eddie Murphy? Eddie Murphy’s not fucking Eddie Murphy! You’re not fucking funny! You’ve never made me laugh! I’ve known you since you were a baby and you’ve never even made me giggle.’”
>But she was determined. “I was so fricking cocky. But my dad was the one who would let me listen to all the comedy albums – Richard Pryor and Millie Jackson – I think he thought he created a monster. But he would tell me every day growing up: ‘You can do anything you want. Don’t let them tell you you can’t because you’re black, because you’re female. You can do anything you want to, but you have to work hard."
>It was a slog. There were a good six months back home in Memphis where she and her father didn’t speak, followed by years working three to four jobs at a time trying to make it as a jobbing comic. She remembers one night at a Def Comedy Jam night, where she hit her lowest: “All I could think was, I got three standing O’s and I can’t believe no one’s here talking to me. Do I quit? Then, something in me was: ‘No bitch, go grab your DVDs and go out and sell them because you need some gas money.’ Real talk, that’s exactly what I did and I sold 20 DVDs that night. I don’t know if that was the lowest point, but the hustle is no option and you’ve got to have it – like, you’ll die if you don’t do this.”
>It’s a bittersweet moment for Jones. Her parents are no longer alive to witness her success. Her army father died towards the end of 2000; her mother followed six months later. “My parents were together since high school. When they passed, I was like: ‘It’s no holds barred now, I have nobody to whoop me or punish me if I do this wrong. I’m going for it.’” Does she have any other family? “I had a brother, he passed away, too, in 2009.”
>>71751165
>‘Hey, yo! You need to … that’s not how … can we …?’ And I don’t wanna be that way. I wanna be the only one at the premiere going crazy-wild-big laughs.”
is she saying that she will ask for changes if she sees it beforehand but will just enjoy it during the premiere because it will be too late to do anything? I don't get the thinking
>I like that! You’re funny. Don’t tell me!”
does she find jingling keys funny?she seems ok in her tweets and her old pics but whenever she is in public she seems insufferable
Norm MacDonald has been saying the same thing for years & y'all love the fuck out of him.
All this backlash is getting to be too much.
>black female doesn't like thinking
That's unusual.
oh it shows
>>71751476
>I exhale too loudly. Resetting the atmosphere, Jones forces another big laugh.
>"Yep. It makes you tougher, and it also makes you appreciate your life and family. Oh wow, it makes me appreciate how strong I am, too.”
>It wasn’t until last year, with a Ghostbusters cheque, that Jones finally paid off her last credit card and became debt-free for the first time in her adult life. When I ask who the greatest support of her career has been, it’s her turn to let out a sad oooosh. “No one in the beginning.”
>Chris Rock comes up a lot, I say. He put her in his film Top Five and recommended her to Michaels. “He’s known me for ever,” she says. “He could have blew me up a long time ago but I wasn’t ready and he told me that. I remember being at a comedy gig and saying to him: ‘I’m not going to make it unless someone like you puts me on.’ And I hate to say that about this game, but women don’t just get love like that unless a dude vouches for them, which sucks. It really sucks. I would tell him every time I saw him and he’d say: ‘You’re not ready yet, you’re not ready yet.’ Then he saw me at the Comedy Store one night and I was doing that slave joke, and he was like: ‘That’s next level. You’ve next-levelled.’”
>Had she ever aspired to make it to SNL? “No. Never! When Chris Rock called me to tell me he’d told Lorne Michaels I was great and he should let me audition, I went off at Chris: ‘Why would you do that? Why would you put me in that situation? I’m not an impressionist, I don’t do impressions.’”
>>71751082
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2009/10/cheap-laughs/307650/
She's right, though.
>>71751183
>Janene Garofolo
Why is her stuff so situational? I have never been to wizzar (or whatever) how should I get the joke. I have seen some female comedians tell a whole story about their brothers in the army and I got all of it because they did not use any specific elements (I have not been in the army)
>>71751498
No.
Norm MacDonald refers to Bill Hicks and Carl Sagan.
She's referring to any comedian whose act isn't 2 hamburgers away from Alonzo Jones.
>>71751527
>Jones is firm that SNL’s esoteric flavour was not her type of comedy. “It’s not even funny. I [didn’t] even watch Saturday Night Live. Real talk, I told Lorne, too: I’m in the club on Saturday night, I don’t watch that and he said: ‘Shuttup and go be funny.’” Her role now, she says, is the cast rookie who comes in every day and reminds everyone of their huge privilege: “It’s like, ‘Dude! We are literally ON. TV. EVERY. WEEK to make people laugh. Why are y’all not excited about this?!’ On table reads I would laugh – I mean, the others would too, but I’d be like: ‘Ahahaha, that’s hilarious, hil-aaar-ious.’ The head writers appreciated it. People just needed to be woken up.”
>But her real frustration as a standup still performing regularly in clubs is what she sees as the failure of comedians. “People don’t really understand how important comedians are, comedy is part of what we need in our life, like movies and art and water and air. We have to have the release of laughter, and when we do it as a community … Oh my God, have you ever been in a club and laughed at once on a joke? Do you know how long you feel that joy? That joy is contagious. That is not something that is a privilege, sweetheart. That is a need. And we’re not releasing community any more. Have you noticed? We’re not.”
>Jones sees her role as that of a jester – mugging and clowning, pratfalling her way to distract us from the gloom. She performs, even when she is preaching. It’s convincing, even though we don’t both agree – her heroes Richard Pryor, Eddie Murphy, Chris Rock were all smart and funny. Clever, and hilarious. Jones shakes her head.
>>71751281
>has to have been the fun bit.
Does it? Im no expert but instead of banking everything on it you could have some situational comedy based on people that call the ghost busters or some locations they go to (of the top of my head a sexshop or a senator who is hunted by his mistress. yeah I know its meh idea but it took me less than 10 seconds)
>>71751630
>“We’re sad, [the US is] the most depressed nation in the world and I blame comedians for that. I blame the industry for that, because it is so politically correct. Back in the day, everyone thought the king had the jester to entertain him. No he did not: he had the jester to entertain everybody else, because he’s about to raise taxes and it’s: ‘Off with your head, jester, if you don’t make people laugh about that.’ That’s a community release. You need that, that’s our job to do that. You got people dying, walking into clubs and shooting folks, with so much anger. We are not releasing laughter because we’re so busy trying to be serious, teaching each other instead of just living.”
>It’s a loud, passionate speech, and Jones leans in closer and closer throughout. Which makes it no less awkward, given that my next question is everything she’s been railing against: can we talk about the racial politics of her Ghostbusters character?
>“Ugh.”
>I know, I know.
>“Ugh!”
>Jones plays Ghostbuster No 4, Patty Tolan, a city train worker. Plenty has been written about her character relying fairly heavily on a racial stereotype – the buffoonish, sassy black female – that feels outmoded, especially because she is also the only one of the gang who isn’t a physicist, and who contributes lines such as: “You guys know a lot about this science stuff, but I know New York.”
>“Ugh, it’s so stoopid.”
>Tell me.
>“I mean, come on. Stop it. I’m the regular person you want me to be in this role. You wouldn’t want no one else to play this role but me, because this role is the person that’s representing the people. I’m representing the people that’s sitting in the seats that goes: ‘There’s ghostbusters?’ Melissa and Kristen and Kate already know there are ghosts; I’m the audience. I’m becoming a ghostbuster, representing the people becoming a ghostbuster. How would you not want me?”
>>71751550
The victory of Stewart in the race for anointment as the new Cronkite surprised me less perhaps than it will have surprised some of you. Not long ago, I was teaching a class on Mark Twain at the New School in New York and someone asked me who, if anybody, would be the equivalent figure for today. I was replying that I didn’t think there was one, though the younger Gore Vidal might once have conceivably been in contention, when someone broke in to say: “What about Jon Stewart?” I was thunderstruck at how many heads nodded, and I replied that I would know better next week, after my upcoming appearance on the show. I recall this now as winning me the most respect I have ever had from any class. The day after my appearance, I was at West Point to lecture to the cadets and was stopped everywhere I walked by young trainee warriors for America who had caught my act. This sort of thing can become heady.
WE WUZ GHOSTBUSTERS N SHEIT
>>71751281
>“We didn’t really audition,”
so nepotism? seriously with so many directors just casting their wives and friends (sandler,nolan,whedon,bay,anderson,etc) are the extras the only people getting a fair shot?
>>71751630
>SNL
>quite literally the lowest common denominator of "comedy"
>esoteric
>>71751697
>Sure. But you see it’s problematic, that there are certain roles black actors have been afforded in history that have now become tropes in the history of Hollywood. And, for now, in 2016, to still be writing those parts could feel lazy …
>“Just because I’m a black woman doing it? Well, it’s just one role, people. Give me a scientist next, I promise the next role I play then will be some kind of brain.”
>Right.
>“I celebrate it. It’s just like, does she not exist? Are you saying I don’t exist? Why shouldn’t she, this character, be in the movie?” she asks. “Why even look at it like that? Back in the day, when I was coming up, the last page of Jet magazine was a guide to all the times black people were going to be on TV, because we were hardly on TV and we needed to see and support our people when we were. So my thing is, my parents and grandparents would have been, ‘Woah! She is in a Big Movie! A superhero in a BLOCKbuster.’ Why wouldn’t you be dancing in the street?”
>She lets out a sigh, then laughs again.
>“It’s everyone else’s hangup, it can’t be my hangup. Even if I had stood up in the middle of that movie and said ‘Fight the power, I don’t want to be the MTA [underground] worker’, what does that prove? They’d just get someone else to play the role, then you’d be bitching about them and they probably wouldn’t play it as good as me. Hellooooo!”
>She cackles this time and swipes the air with her arms, forcing me to laugh with her. Jones’s presence is a genuine force; she gets up to hug me as she leaves and cheerfully tells me she’s enjoyed herself, isn’t London dope and what is that perfume? The energy entirely evaporates, ghost-like, the second she exits the room.
>Ghostbusters is released in the UK on Monday 11 July. Leslie Jones will not be attending the premiere because she says that "driving is too smart for her."
>>71751281
>Do it like I asked you to say it. Then do it like you want to so I can see both.
That is what my father often says. I hate when he does it since it means twice the work.Im not some 5 year old so if we are not using my idea than lets hammer it out beforehand.
>unchanged
at least he is honest. my dad asks for input but instantly gets defensive
>>71751625
Hicks is fucking hilarious and tells it like it is. Go kill yourself you god damn retard.
>>71751911
How dare you try to bait me.
>>71751475
>Some slave owners would breed their slaves, choosing the best slaves to breed. It's one of the possible origins of "Motherfucker",
That is false on all levels. farm people knew how genetics worked even if they did not know word genetics. also the story is that slaves called owners motherfuckers because the owners fucked the mothers of the slaves but that too is false.
>She's saying that if she was a slave the slave owners would breed her with other strong slaves so they would create slave babies that would grow up strong.
makes more sense. the joke is that she would have more sex partners if the other party had no choice,eh.
>>71751965
None of what I said is false you fucking retard
Kill yourself
>>71751281
>She had arrived on a basketball scholarship
I can believe it
>degree at Colorado State University
in what?
>her dad to tell him she
having myself almost dropped out Im inexplicably annoyed by people who do 2 years in engineering only to drop out and be a cook.Im sure her dad had hopes, 1.8 million dollars net worth must make him feel better
>>71751476
>Eddie Murphy’s not fucking Eddie Murphy!
Does he mean that eddie had not made it yet so there was no need for next eddie?
>You’ve never made me laugh! I’ve known you since you were a baby and you’ve never even made me giggle
harsh. Why not just focus on how very few people actually make it as comedians and how shit the pay is?
>>71751697
ugh I can't even can you just like not
>>71751476
>I got three standing O’s and I can’t believe no one’s here talking to me
O's are ovations!? taking to her about what? Do comedy talent scouts exist?
>>71751476
>Her army father died towards the end of 2000; her mother followed six months later. “My parents were together since high school. When they passed, I was like: ‘It’s no holds barred now, I have nobody to whoop me or punish me if I do this wrong. I’m going for it.’” Does she have any other family? “I had a brother, he passed away, too, in 2009
dang
>>71751527
>I exhale too loudly. Resetting the atmosphere, Jones forces another big laugh.
>>71752292
Her family lucked out
>>71752252
Yes
Opportunities
Yes
>>71751527
>women don’t just get love like that unless a dude vouches
so why did not she go to another woman?
>>71752381
KEK
...:(
>>71751630
>Her role now, she says, is the cast rookie who comes in every day and reminds everyone of their huge privilege:
Im sure they are trilled.
>>71751630
>distract us from the gloom.
is not the weekend update focused on current events, mocking the gloom and being political instead of distracting from anything?
>>71751697
>the most depressed nation in the world
What is it called when you start an argument from a falls primes
>so politically correct
I have found that people only hate PC when its stops them from mocking the other side but they themselves are very thin skinned
>>71751697
>trying to be serious, teaching each other
more people should try that and maybe teach something other than privilege levels
>>71751082
>this is an acceptable statement in the year of 1990+26
Fuck this, I'm gonna watch an Eddie Izzard show to purge my brain
>>71751165
>25 years doing comedy
>takes her nowhere because she is not funny
>manages to get a writing gig in a shitty show
>goes to executives
>makes a little nigger dance in front of an old rich asshole
>promoted
>6 months later working on a movie
this doesnt surprise me at all
>>71751118
American """"""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""humour""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""
>>71751697
>I’m the audience. I’m becoming a ghostbuster, representing the people becoming a ghostbuster. How would you not want me?”
ghostbusters does not need an audience surrogate and there is also nothing stopping the surrogate from being a well educated skeptic, a doctor or anyone else. I don't mind her being a city worker but the reasoning given is flawed
>>71751911
Preachers are boring. I want to be surprised and entertained, I don't want someone who's just going to reaffirm my world view
>>71751630
i have both seen amazing and terrible comedians do stand up, both regarded as some of the funniest people, i didnt drink either time but i could tell it wasnt the comedian making the people laugh with the bad one
>>71752292
Damn, I didn't come here to feel.
>>71751082
>tfw she's probably never even seen Monty Python but "is a litmus test for what people think is funny"
>>71751082
While I don't find her comedy to be that funny, I'm at a point in my life where I can't get angry about stuff like this anymore. If she's happy, then good for her. She's handling her success and haters much better than I would.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OG83qBuQ_A8
>>71751118
>Jones, say her fellow cast members, is a pretty good litmus test for what America will think is funny.
Is that really how low celebrities think of Americans at large? That's pretty fucking insulting.
>>71751802
>"Even if I had stood up in the middle of that movie and said ‘Fight the power, I don’t want to be the MTA [underground] worker’, what does that prove? They’d just get someone else to play the role, then you’d be bitching about them and they probably wouldn’t play it as good as me. Hellooooo!”
Literally a House Negro.
>>71751118
>intensely anticipated
I don't find her funny. Barely chuckled at a couple of her SNL skits. But I do like her as a person and I respect her. She seems authentic.
I would definitely have a beer with her, she's real. Olivia Wilde tweeting black lives matter is not.
she's correct though.
laughter>>>>>clapter
>>71753300
Dub dubs of truth
