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Matthew Wrather faces hostile interlocutors Peter Fenzel and Matt Belinkie, who want to know why he’s so crazy about the so-called “comedian” Stewart Lee. Wrather takes them back to the first time he saw anything by Lee, a simpler time for streaming rights when Stewart Lee’s Comedy Vehicle Series 3 was streaming on Netflix. He sets them to watch S3E2 (“England”), S4E6 (“Childhood”), and S3E1 (“Shilbottle”). Belinkie likes all the comedies except stand-up, and Pete wonders why Wrather is even so into this guy. The answer? The death of the post war social-democratic ideal and concomitant decline in the stature of the liberal public intellectual. Sometimes comedy is tough going. But I suppose it made me who I am today.
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Liked Lee but he overstretched his remit telling people to have jabs.. different story now eh.
Not a lot of comics do the “what’s the deal with airline food” bit anymore, but what you do hear more of is bits about ASPCA commercials.
In all the talk about comedians who aspire to more than telling jokes one after the other, I was surprised not to hear anything about Hannah Gadsby, given that she’s known for going out on an emotional limb and giving her shows a very crafty structure. Netflix has put out several specials that deal with more somber subjects, like Patton Oswalt’s Annihilation and John Mulaney’s Baby J. I think there’s a lot to be said about these specials and how they may have been tailored for streaming. The relationship between streaming service and comedian would also be an interesting way to look at Hannah Gadsby’s Gender Agenda, which is sort of a variety show of smaller queer comics; the show came about as a result of Gadsby’s criticism of Dave Chappelle’s controversial special.
(also good job plugging the Discord again this week but I cannot for the life of me find a server invite link that works, all say they’re invalid)