Shane Gillis SNL firing? Now Lorne Michaels says it was NBC not Lorne!

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Caloroga Shark Media. Well, well, well, the Lorne Michael Shane Gillis SNL story keeps changing. Hi, I’m Johnny Mack with your Daily Comedy News. Lauren said it wasn’t his decision to kick Shane Gillis off the show. You may recall Shane Gillis was going to be in the cast and then wasn’t.

Lawren Michaels told The Wall Street Journal, Shane said something stupid, but it got blown up into the end of the world. I was angry. I thought, you haven’t seen what we’re gonna do and what I’m gonna try to bring out in him, because I thought he was the real thing. The Shane thing was twenty nineteen. It’s been five years, Lauren.

I don’t know now that he’s popular. Oh yeah, I always love Shae Gills. What’s going on here? According to Lauren, NBC made the call that was very strong from the people in charge, and obviously I was not on that side, but I understood it. Michael said he has stayed in touch with Gillis as Shane has now become one of the country’s top acts.

I don’t know if you know this SNL is turning fifty and we’re gonna talk about it every day. Rigular Vase has a news special. You know, I was tempted. I saw on Friday that he added a second show to Radio City, and I was like, maybe I should go see Ricky Gervas.

And then I was like, I’d have to go all the way into Manhattan.

It’s easier to get to LA from my house than Manhattan. Manhattan if from New Jersey is a nightmare. I’m serious. He gets somebody to drop you at Newark Airport, You get on a plane, you listen to podcasts for six hours, you’re in LA. You know how annoying it is to take a train or a bus or to drive heaven forbid to New York City.

And then once you get to Manhattan, there’s nothing to do with your car, even if you have one thousand dollars, there is nowhere to put it. Slight exaggeration. Don’t hass on minaj me. There I have digressed. Ricky Gervais has a new tour.

It is called Mortality. Lewis Chilton reviewed it for The Independent and didn’t like it. He writes, few comedians have been altered so drastically by the sickly mirror of social media than Ricky Gervais, the man who was once comedy’s great television innovator. What makes Jerves such a curious case is that little of his work feels particularly modern. There’s nothing really about any of his TV projects, brillantly Biting the office, sin extras, mawkish care home dramedy, Derek Warwick Davis fronted cringe sitcom Life’s Too Short, award winning grief comedy After Life that really situates it in the era of Twitter feeds and Instagram filters.

I don’t think we had those when the UK Office started, But again I digress. His stand up comedy Too, which has remateialized this week with the launch of a new UK tour, is in its choice of material almost doggedly at a vistic hope. I said the word right, and I don’t know what it means. I’m looking it up. Looks like I pronounced it correctly at a vistic relating to or characterized by reversion to, something ancient or ancestral.

If you go to a Ricky Gervas’s show, you will invariably see him fixate on age old subjects such as religion, science, or philosophy, his frames of reference would not be so very out of place half a century ago, and yet Gervase’s recent work is utterly immersed in the discourse churn of the Twitter sphere. His routines now devote considerable energy towards ridiculing those online dissenters who have called him out for ableism or transphobic comedy, and goading them with more of the same. The Telegraphs review says that Ricky seems like a man who used to be the funniest bloke in the pub, delivering material written after spending too much time online. It’s a damning assessment, perhaps because it feels so plainly true. Then this article gets into Ricky being on Twitter all the time, and Twitter being owned by Elon Musk, and some Elon Musk commentary that I think is for somebody who is digressing a lot today.

I think we’re a little far afield here. Let’s get back to the comedy part. Ricky has not been canceled, not even close. What value then, is there in molding his entire persona around opposition to a force that has no material power by aiming his munitions at a nebulous enemy online back lashty quote unquote ooke mob. He’s waging a battle that can never be won or lost, so he’s free to keep shooting again and again and again.

I was gonna talk in the second half of the podcast about Hasan Minhaj’s special, but I guess let me jump into that here. So I’m all over the place today, right, So now we’re talking about Hasan Minhaj’s special, which is fantastic. I’ll give you a review in the second But where my brain went is Hasson makes a good point about how he got, you know, hung out in the media for exaggerating things for comedic effect. Maybe Ricky is just crafty and realizes, oh, this persona works and people laugh at it, and I make money and then I go home and donate money to animal charities. Maybe he knows exactly what he’s doing, and maybe you’re thinking way too much about what the on stage persona is.

I’ve never met Ricky the man, but maybe it’s an act, you know, all right, Hasan Minhaj. While I brought it up, I really liked it. The first thirty minutes of Hassan is compelling but not funny, high energy speech giving. Then around the thirty minute mark the jokes start coming fast and furious and some laugh out loud stuff. He has at that point set the crowd up for a lot of pins that he knocks down on the second half of the special really strong.

I’ll come back to him in the second half of the podcast. Back to Ricky Gervais. The Daily Mails review said Ricky has admitted he may have finally gone too far the joke about Jimmy Seville Sir James Wilson Vincent’s vill was an English media personality and DJ. If you google Jimmy you will see words like sexual abuse and the most disgusting human being I’ve ever met and survivors, so you can get what’s going on there. I’m here to do a comedy podcast, so let’s not go there.

But Ricky Gervaise claims he may have gone too far with a joke about Jimmy. The Daily Mail tells us the hour long show includes some controversial gags, which is unsurprising given Jerva’s unapologetic attitude, with jokes about disabled children Gandhi and another about Pakistan’s sharial laws. Another approach to comedy is what Sebastian Manuscalco does, and Hulu likes it and they’ve added him to Hularious. Hey, Hulu publicists, get back to me. Man looks like whoever did this press release had a tap dance.

The special, which is not yet dated, is now listen to this. This is the most generic Sebastian Manuscaco description possible. Is expected to tackle what Manuscalco sess the absurdities of modern life, from non existent manners and wallet wins prices to the chaos of social media. Yeah, that’s what he does. It’ll be filmed during his current it Ain’t Right tour.

Sebastian gave a statement, how many times do you catch yourself thinking it ain’t right? This special is my way of uniting us. That’s so hacky. This special is my way of uniting us to laugh at the ridiculousness of the world around us. And I’m thrilled to share with my fans.

So get your sweats on, pop yourself some popcorn, and get ready to laugh. No date on this, but Hulu is not messing around. So now we have gaff again. Bill Burr, Sebastian, Christa Stefano, Alana Glazer Jessica Kurson, Mittel Lane, oscar At Kotska, and Roy Wood. They’re gonna do one of these a month, So let’s say that’s one, two, three for Isaac seven eight, so we’ve got four more to go.

Fortune Fimesir will get a Netflix special on December third. This one called Crushing It. Fortune shares hilarious stories from her life, including her romantic honeymoon with her wife and her reflections on no longer being her mom’s surrogate husband. The special will be packed with Fortune’s take on navigating relationships, personal growth, and the hilarities of everyday life. Sasha Baron Cohen was on The Tonight Show and dust it off both Borat and Allie g I’m not going to attempt either impression here, but Borat facetiously asked Donald Trump, you say in Ohio that people eat the cats and the dogs.

What at restaurant do they serve them? Matt? Can you get me a reservation? Please? In my country, we have KFC Kazakh fried cat.

He then made a joke about it being I don’t even know how to clean this up. Body part looking good? Think about it? Cats? You got it?

Move on? Fallon asked Borat what he would say to Kamala Harris. Borat not. Johnny Mack said, you are a woman, a person of colors, and married to a Jew. I advise you not to come to Kazakhstan.

You’ve already made three out of four crimes punishable death. Please do not tell me that you have also made sexy time with an underage bear. Borad added, mister Trump, sir, that remind me after your visit five years ago to the almighty beautiful Bear pageant. We paid the hush moneies to gather the grizzly problem solved. Thank you for your nuclear secrets.

In return, Fallon asked ali G what he would say to Trump again. No impressions out of me today, ali G said, Yo, mister Trump, you’ve been convicted of thirty two crimes, you still classified documents, You bone enough porn stars, and you never pay no taxes. Respect you, my hero. Alig to Harris, when me look at you on the television, me get a massive election, Olig assured both candidates. Whatever happened, me is just glad that the next president won’t have white skin.

Johnny Carson has rolled over in his grave. I do have one more, Sasha Baron Cohen item and I just wanted to get into the commercial break on the Johnny Carson line. Sasha pledged five hundred thousand dollars in donations to the International Rescue Committee and Save the Children USA to aid in airwork in war torn Sudan, where eleven million people have been displaced and estimated seven hundred and fifty five thousand people are living in feminine conditions there. Nice job by Sasha. The National Comedy Center has launched a special exhibit to honor Norman Lear’s legacy of civic engagement.

There’s an installation inside the Comedy Center in Jamestown, New York, and an online companion exhibit featuring rare archival materials and curated excerpts from Leader sitcoms. On Lear’s ninety ninth birthday in twenty twenty one, he reflected, the right to vote is foundational. It is the heart of everything I’ve fought for in war in peacetime. Protecting voting rights should not be today’s struggle, but it is, and that means it is our struggle, yours and mine, for as long as we have breath and strength. As I’ve been saying on recent episodes.

It’s going to be really hard not to talk about politics for these next ten days or so. I will strongly encourage you to vote. Vote for whoever you want, but vote. And this next story makes me sad. The Back to the Future musical is ending its Broadway run.

I immediately texted my daughter, who’s much more to the Broadway shows than I am, and I said, we got to go see this. You’re in charge, so she’s getting us tickets. Back to the Future the music will end its Broadway run on January fifth. The musical opened in August of twenty twenty three, will have been on Broadway for eighteen months when it closes. It has sold eighty million dollars in tickets, but received mixed critical reviews and as seen a gradual decline and engrosses and attendance.

But good news, producers plan open four productions in the next eighteen months, including Germany, Japan, and an eight year deal with Royal Caribbean to play the musical in its full physical form on the Star of the Seas Ship. That’s your comedy news for today. If you enjoy the program, tell a friend about it. They might like it too. If you would like the show without commercial interruption.

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If you’re not on Apple podcast link in the show notes, I’ll tell you how that works. See you tomorrow. Wait, don’t leave. I forgot, totally forgot. Don’t leave.

He’s still here. Think of all the people that heard me heading for the lockout and they like bailed on the podcast. They’re going to miss this part. Now. I could edit this into the middle, but I like doing these things like the way they actually transpired.

It’s more fun. Hasan Minhaj’s is special. It’s really good. Like I said, first thirty minutes, he’s kind of setting up the pins knocks him down in the final thirty. Liked it a lot, high energy, he looks good, and I was watching it going, you know this, I should probably just host the Daily Show.

I also watched Dez Bishops of all people, that was on YouTube. It’s really good. As soon as you hit play on it, the very first thing that happens in the special, you’ll be like, oh okay, it’s a really strong opener that immediately made me go, oh wow. I was going to watch Ali Wong, but I was tired and didn’t get it. I was falling asleep in the comfy chair.

What was I watching? I had something on and I passed out during it. I think it was just a YouTube video and I woke up and suddenly it was today. But I do want to watch Ali all right. Here’s my list right now.

Best of twenty twenty four rose to Tom Brady two A Tail three Triumph four, David Cross five James A Doomian Path of Most Resistance. Go find that on YouTube. Six, Dusty Sleigh seven, Kanaane eight, Matt Rife was Good, nine, Samurell ten, Dmitri Martin eleven, Dez Bishop. Okay, you paid attention. I have that at eleven, and right behind it Hasan Minhaj twelve, both better than Jimmy Carr, Phil Wang and Chad Daniels.

That’s the end of tier one. Some other things that I liked, but there’s a bit of a gap here down to these Ellen, Greg Fitzimmons, Kat Williams, Hannah Gatsby, Connor, O’Malley, Bryan Simpson, tiknataro Taylor, Tomlinson, Rachel Feinstein, Joe Rogan. Remember his Live special in August, And I even liked Adam Sandlers. Love you. I know right now, I already said goodbye, so I’m not gonna do that again.

I’m just gonna awkwardly leave