Women in Comedy

Tina Fey, Amy Pohler, Melissa McCarthy, and Kristen Wiig are all women yes, but they’re all hilarious as well. Today’s discussion in class was about women in comedy. Personally, I think some female comediennes are funnier than male comedians. If a woman and a man told the same joke, I believe the woman would be funnier. There is just something empowering and just flat out funny when a woman does stand up comedy. But does the woman have to be attractive to be a successful comedienne? In some way I believe the answer is yes, but most things are funny no matter who says the joke.There were some aspects of the article by Christopher Hitchens that were disturbing in many ways. He was clearly against women comediennes, basically saying they had to be butch in order to be funny. Yes come female comediennes such as Ellen DeGeneres and Sarah Silverman do not display today’s image of a female they are still knee-slapping hilarious. I watched Bridesmaids for the fist time last year and I have absolutely fell in love with Melissa McCarthy. I had been a fan of Kristen Wiig from SNL before the Bridesmaids movie. She is absolutely hilarious both on the big screen and SNL. Honestly I think the fact that Melissa McCarthy isn’t the drop-dead gorgeous type of woman; that is what makes her even funnier. She plays the types of characters in which her looks and weight are an important factor to her character. Wiig on the other hand is a beautiful woman yet she pulls off the weird kind of quirky characters on SNL perfectly.