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Thursday, April 21st, 2011
HBO
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Louis CK Talks About Why He Ditches Funny Jokes on HBO's Talking Funny

by | April 21st, 2011

Alan Sepinwall got a chance to check out HBO's Talking Funny before it debuts tomorrow night, and, well, it sounds like it's going to meet the already-high expectations folks have for it:

There's a fascinating discussion, for instance, of profanity on stage and why Seinfeld has refused to curse in his act. At one point, Seinfeld performs a bit from C.K.'s act, and C.K. marvels at how much Seinfeld's more polished delivery changed the nature of the joke. At one point, the men get into an argument about how easy it is to just go on stage and make people laugh, regardless of material, and C.K. surprises the others by saying that he frequently drops jokes from his act that get big laughs because he believes the laughs aren't coming from their quality, but because he knows how to deliver them after so many years on stage.

So can we make this a series? Please? It sounds incredible.

Tags:

HBO, talking funny, tv

  • HerooftheBeach

    Ricky Gervais and Jon Stewart did discuss a follow up the Daily Show promoting this and Stewart suggested getting Conan for it, too.

    Really, Ricky Gervais running a biannual or so chat show where he has cream of the crop comedians on and they just talk would be the perfect fusion of the television talk show and the comedy podcast. I hope he does it!

  • archbishop

    I really want this to be a weekly series.

    In concept it reminds me a lot of Jon Favreau's "Dinner for Five," but hosted by Ricky Gervais.

    I would love to see more episodes on different themes. The talk show episode he mentioned with Jon Stewart, a sitcom episode, an improv episode and so on.

  • http://www.twitter.com/becca_oneal Rebecca O'Neal

    DVRing this for sure. And yea, this would be amazing as a recurring thing.

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Daniel-Hall/1605914261 Daniel Hall

    Have to watch this now! Louis dropping jokes isn't new he drops most of his material from his act every time it gets filmed for specials to force himself to write new material and not rely on crowd pleasing bits.

  • ChipSuey

    Seems like a semi-similar concept to "The Green Room", which I've liked some episodes of. I'll have to see if I can check this out somehow. I don't have HBO. I'll have to do some digging.

  • ChipSuey

    So after watching this, the one weak link was Gervais. I liked him in his episodic stuff, but he was just so out of sync at times when put in a room with stand up comics that it was painfully obvious. I was hating him by the end, and wondering who's dumb idea it was to invite him. Then I saw the production credit and realized it was him who put it together. I kept trying to imagine what it would have been like with just Rock, Seinfeld and C.K. chatting instead.

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