Women Comedians

Lauren Turcotte
17 April 2015
Blog Post

Women in Comedy

          This week in class we focused on women in comedy and how it's not really seen as a women profession. While I watched the documentary I found that I really didn't know many of the female comedians in the film. It just goes to show that even though there are a lot of women comedians out there, most people are not aware of them. When it comes to female comedians, most say that that;s not a job for them. Women should be the mom,flight attendant, or school teacher. Comedy is the a man's job.  When we think of funny people our minds jump to  people like Kevin Heart,  Adam Sandlar, or Will Ferrell. When you hear these names you automatically think comedians but when your hear names like Melissa McCarthy or Judy gold, the name sounds familiar but you can't remember if their an actress, singer, or comedian.
          I feel that a majority of the time when there is a male dominated movie released that it gets a bigger following than an all female cat. For example the movie Grown Ups stars 5 male comedians and it was considered one of the funnier movies and it got great reviews, everyone knew what it was or wanted to see it. They all said the pairing up these men was a genius idea and it even resulted in a sequel because it was so funny. This is different for movies like The Heat or Bridesmaids which is an all female cast. Bridesmaids especially go a lot of hate just because there were no male comedians in it and the humor was considered not that funny and that only females would enjoy that type of humor that it was producing. I really liked the movie it was kind of refreshing to see an all female cast in a movie that actually had some sort of a story line. I liked how the comedy was not cheesy and the movie saved the jokes to place at the right spots so the whole movie wan;t just comedy. There are a lot of differences between male a female comedians. With male comedians a lot of their jokes are considered crude because most of them use the same boring jokes about girls and their body parts. Those types of jokes get old and I find that only the males really enjoy those jokes. With female comedians their jokes a re always new and more intelligent. You never know what you;re going to get when you go to see a female comedian.
          With female comedians they never try to impress anyone. Most of them are in it just because they love to make people laugh. In the Documentary Whoopi Goldberg says something along the lines of, she doesn't care what people think of her or if they like her comedy. They came to see her so if they don;t like it then leave. I think this is true because no one is making these people come and see these women comedy acts. They are not trying to please a certain group of people or trying to become well- known. As long as their doing what they love they don't care and I think that's a great thing to look up to. There needs to be a time in society when we stop referring to Man and Women comedians separately and just start calling them comedians.

Women In Comedy

Faith Beglane

April 17, 2015

            Over the past week we have read articles by Tina Fey, and Amy Poehler. While reading these articles the same themes appeared; women being insulted but using humor to fight back against these insults. Both Amy and Tina were in uncomfortable situations where they could have been easily offended or hurt, but instead they use their sense of comedy to come back and fight against these men. Later in the week, we watched the documentary ‘Why we Laugh: Funny women’, where Joan Rivers narrates a film about women in the comedy business. Most of these comedians felt that they were grouped together for the soul purpose of being women in comedy and having a similar sense of humor, when in reality these women were far from similar. These women did share one thing in common; men rule the comedy industry. This was a shock to me because when I think of comedy, I usually think of three or four famous comedians, all of which are women. They explained how men don’t find women in comedy funny, and how when women first entered the industry, there were a lot of sexist comments. I never thought that there was such discrimination in comedy. When I think of comedy, I usually think of people getting up on a stage being able to say just about whatever they want. They are allowed to be as ruthless, and offensive as they want without anyone being able to say anything. After these comedians described how they were treated, I saw how much judgment was placed on these women when they first entered. They also felt that to be in the industry, a women had to have tough skin and they had to be able to be able to enter a predominantly male ruled world. These women can’t have the luxury of having kids and being in the comedy industry. Men can do both because their wives will take care of the kids while they’re on the road. I think that these women shouldn’t have to face these boundaries, and that they should be able to enter in industry without facing discrimination. If people find a women funny, then who is a man to question her or put her down? Of course men feel threatened because maybe they don’t get that same reaction that women do. Of course there isn’t much that these women can change about whether or not they can have kids and be in the industry because of the fact that society has made it clear that a women should be the one to raise the children. Women in comedy have to endure a lot of stress, and discrimination which is why it takes someone with tough skin to enter the industry.   

Women in Comedy

Hannah Dickie

4/17/15

Blog post 11

Women in Comedy

            This week one of the topics we discussed was women in comedy. I had never really thought about women in comedy because I’m really not that interested in comedy, after watching the documentary “Why we Laugh: Funny Women” however I become more interested because of how funny the women actually wore. Some of the faces seemed familiar but some of the women I had no idea who they were. I think it’s because there are so few female comedians that you never really see them in the mainstream. When I think of comedy the first thing that pops into my head is the male comedians out there because you see them almost everywhere, on TV shows, commercials, movies. The female comedians might be on one or two but definitely not as many as their male counterparts are. I don’t know why this is because growing up the women in my family were always the funnier ones, the guys are probably the least humorous people out there. So the idea that women aren't funny was something I had never heard of until this class. I don’t agree with it at all because women are ten times funnier than men because the jokes make sense and aren't about just stupid things no one really cares about. Female comedians find a way to take a very uncomfortable situation and make you laugh about it and try to move on. I know for myself comedy is the best medicine whenever I’m down or stressed out or whatever is going on in my life if I just sit down and watch something funny I know that my mood will change drastically. I do think though that when I do try to feel better by watching comedians I would rather hear female comedians because I know they have been through a similar experience and felt the same way I did, while the male comedians haven’t been through a similar situation and feel the same way I do in different situations. Another thing I found interesting from the documentary was that pretty much all the women agreed on the fact that comedians are born funny, you can’t go to school to learn how to be funny it just doesn't happen. I completely agree with this to. My mom is a twin and out of the two of them she is definitely the funnier of the two. My aunt has a daughter a couple years younger than me and comparing her with me I would say I’m the funnier one because I can make more people laugh then she can. I think being funny is being able to relate to your audience and know what is going to make them laugh and what isn't. In my family almost anything is funny because we really don’t take anything seriously. I think as time goes on their will become more women in comedy because slowly movies like Bridesmaids is setting the path for others to follow. Hopefully it will become a female dominated profession because women are more relatable and can make a bigger impact on the lives of other girls. They show girls that you don’t always have to look a certain way and that’s okay there are other things in life you can do and that are more important such as being able to bring happiness to other people through laughter.    

Wanda Sykes and Physical Beauty

Emily Simski

April 17, 2015

Blog Post

 Wanda Sykes and Physical Beauty

            When people walk around the street, they notice that there are people who not very appealing to the eye. People always find a way to make fun of someone who doesn't look appealing to the eyes. Women are always judged on their looks if they’re not beautiful.

            According to Wanda Sykes in a section from her book “Yeah I Said It”, she talks about how men can have acne be unattractive but can still make it on top. An example of this would be Donald Trump. He’s not the most attractive man on the planet, but he’s got lots on money that girls find him attractive. However when a women, according to Sykes, she “can only be beautiful, average, or in need of an extreme makeover”. When it comes to their looks, women always get judged because society expects women to be beautiful in every way possible. That why when it comes to movie roles that ask for an ugly women, they take a beautiful actress and turn her ugly. The perfect example of this is Charlize Theron in Monster. Instead of casting an ugly person to play the role, they took Theron and turned her into an ugly person. Sykes then talks about how they’d rather make a beautiful person ugly instead of actually casting an ugly person to take on the role. She also discusses how Hollywood “feels better knowing that there’s a bombshell under all the ugly makeup”. Only to back it up by saying that Charlize was acting. Due to this, women feel the need to get plastic surgery in order to get rid of their ugliness. However this can be bad for the future because their kids would get the ugly body parts. For example two beautiful people would have a child who has ugly shaped ears.

            It’s upsetting nowadays to see women who are judged based on how they look. Ugly women just get pushed aside to make way for the beautiful women to step in. I hate the way ugly women are treated because they deserve to have as much credit as other women. I also loved the way that Wanda Sykes addressed this issue because she loves to tell it like it is as well as express her own views on women and physical beauty. 

Mindy Kaling

Chelsea Morganelli

Professor Mellissa Santos

EN 199-003

17 April 2015

Blog Entry 12

            This week in class we read two chapters from Mindy Kaling’s book. I have always been a huge fan of Mindy ever since she was on The Office as Kelly Kapoor. Now she has her own TV show and plays a doctor in it. Being a doctor can be a very empowering role for women because many think of a doctor as male not female. Mindy is hysterically funny and I enjoyed reading these two chapters very much.

            One of the chapters I related to is “When You’re Not Skinny This Is What People Want You To Wear”. In this chapter Mindy is at a photoshoot and all of the dresses are a size zero. First of all, the fact that the stylist only brought size zero dresses shocked me. It’s his job to know who he is dressing and what type of body they have. Mindy says in the chapter that she is “normal American woman size” and that stylists hate to dress her size. I think stylists may just be too used to dressing size zero celebrities. The media puts too much focus on body image and that’s not a good thing. I look up to Mindy because she isn’t a size zero, she’s a normal woman. Normal women aren’t size zeroes and that’s not a bad thing. At the photoshoot she took charge and made them cut open a dress she really liked so she could fit in it. I’m glad she stood up for herself and showed that she is strong.

Women Been Different

Even though I didn't get the chance to watch the movie but just watching the trialor was really interesting and surprising. Firstly, it was interesting to me because I never knew any of those women, and I never knew they were comedians. And secondly, when we think of comedy, most of us especially me, I think of men having the couage to talk to people without any assistance.  It was surprising for me to see this women been in comedies, doing the job that our society says it is for men. They actually inspired that a girl can be anything. A woman doesn't have to be sexy, be a doctor, lawyer and so on. You become the person that you want to be. One quote that inspired me most was " Fuck them if they can't take a joke. Don't come to my show and expect me to be anything but what I am, you came to me". Whoopi Goldberg. I liked the way Whoopi had the courage to say those words because most of the celebrities tries to impress us and expecially the media. Lets take Kevin Hart for example, he always wears a suit to impress the media and makes jokes out of nothing and still society finds  him as to be the most hilarious man on earth.
     They showed me that you  shouldn't be afraid to be who you are.  They showed me that you can choose to make an impression iof you want to. You do not have to be because of what people say.  You do not have to be someone different if it is not your choice. Honestly, it was eduactional for me to see these women becoming someone different.

Blog 12

Morgan Bilodeau

Blog 12

                                                                     Women In Comedy

             In class this week we had to watch the movie called “Why We Laugh”. It starred women such as Joan Rivers, Natasha Leggero, Kathy griffin, Whoopi Goldberg, and many more women. In the first part of the movie they were talking about their first time and how they became a comedian. A lot of the women were saying that their parents didn’t approve of them being comedians. Their parents wanted them to have a real job and to their parents being a comedian wasn’t a real job. To me, if those parents’ daughters were sons their parents would say go for it. I think this world has such a gender difference line and everything falls under your gender. Whether you’re capable of doing something or not. In the movie they were talking about how you can’t learn to be funny, you’re born with it. To me I completely agree with this I think that being funny runs in your blood, not having a desire to be funny. They then went on to saying they incorporated how they were brought up and how they were made fun of into their jokes. I absolutely loved this. I think its amazing that they have the confidence to get up on stage and make jokes about their “flaws” to everyone who’s there watching them. I wish I had the confidence to do that. Lastly they talked about how women and men are not treated equally in comedy. The men joke about dick and balls while women joke about real stuff in life like how I said before how they got bullied. Men are known as comedians and get a lot of fame for it but yet women do the exact same thing and are not treated equally. I don’t understand why man and women comedians don’t take part in the same funny movies. I think that the top women comedian and top male comedian should take part in making a movie together. I don’t understand why they wouldn’t make a movie together when they both have made it to the top of the comedian world. I believe that the gender differences need to stop and women and men should be treated equally.