Jim Jeffries is a Cunt
Last night, my friend Jennifer kindly provided an excuse for me to leave the house and took me to a comedy show administered by offensive mastermind Jim Jeffries at The Grove in Anaheim. Jim uses the word "cunt" a lot. I don't care about what words people use, but I don't like hearing the same thing over and over. However, he feels that Americans need to use that word all the time. I guess we'll have to agree to disagree.
The Grove is a pleasantly small venue. The seats were individual seats such as you might find at a wedding or a buffet rather than the usual cinema-style stadium seating. We were very close to the stage. There was a microphone and two stools, which led me to wander if he was going to interview someone, "maybe Mariah Carey". Before the performance, someone removed the second stool, probably because Mariah Carey didn't show. You know what she's like.
There was a warm-up act, Jacob Sirof, who seemed like he was just slightly, slightly off the mark of being a good comedian. For instance, he took drinks from his beer bottle in-between his jokes, whereas Jim Jeffries always went for a drink in the middle of a sentence. One looks like you're smugly waiting for the laughter to die down, and the other creates a sort of tension. Little things like that.
Sample Jacob Sirof joke: "What is it about watching cars drive in a goddamn circle (pause) that makes you hate black people?" Which is moderately amusing, but I had noticed earlier in the night that there wasn't a single black person at this gig. I'm not sure why. I've never heard Jim Jeffries make fun of black people, but there wasn't even one. I know; I looked hard. So for me the joke fell a little flat because it sounded like he was comparing his own gig to a NASCAR race, which made no sense to me at all.
Twenty minutes later, Jim Jeffries came out to an obviously receptive audience who started shouting up requests for specific jokes almost immediately. He was having none of that. Like most new media-savvy comedians, he understands that once you've committed a routine to DVD for sale, you can never do that again. It was all new material, and it was great.
He did a (non-racist) bit about sending a black guy to the back of the airplane. He did a bit about paedophiles who are probably better off molesting terminally ill children, the logic being that they can't carry the psychological damage into later life, "so in many ways, it's a victimless crime". He did a bit about actors pretending to be disabled (to the point of hiring "carers") so they can get disabled parts. He did a bit about parents of dead babies, who were probably bad parents, "and that's why God took your baby away". You know, all top-quality, five-star material.
When someone got offended by something, he tried to explain freedom of speech in a new way: "Freedom of speech doesn't mean you can say whatever you like; it means you have to listen to things you don't want to hear."
At one point a drunk girl approached the stage and started abusing him, so he was forced to deliver a string of quick responses, mostly revolving around her presumed sexual promiscuity and how it may be linked to a lack of paternal attention. Eventually she became so obstreperous that he had her and her instigating friend thrown out, to the delight of all.
Even someone like me, who's only standing upright because the molecules of cynical hatred are holding hands, felt that some of it was a bit "Maybe he shouldn't have said that."
And that's a very good sign.
The Grove is a pleasantly small venue. The seats were individual seats such as you might find at a wedding or a buffet rather than the usual cinema-style stadium seating. We were very close to the stage. There was a microphone and two stools, which led me to wander if he was going to interview someone, "maybe Mariah Carey". Before the performance, someone removed the second stool, probably because Mariah Carey didn't show. You know what she's like.
There was a warm-up act, Jacob Sirof, who seemed like he was just slightly, slightly off the mark of being a good comedian. For instance, he took drinks from his beer bottle in-between his jokes, whereas Jim Jeffries always went for a drink in the middle of a sentence. One looks like you're smugly waiting for the laughter to die down, and the other creates a sort of tension. Little things like that.
Sample Jacob Sirof joke: "What is it about watching cars drive in a goddamn circle (pause) that makes you hate black people?" Which is moderately amusing, but I had noticed earlier in the night that there wasn't a single black person at this gig. I'm not sure why. I've never heard Jim Jeffries make fun of black people, but there wasn't even one. I know; I looked hard. So for me the joke fell a little flat because it sounded like he was comparing his own gig to a NASCAR race, which made no sense to me at all.
Twenty minutes later, Jim Jeffries came out to an obviously receptive audience who started shouting up requests for specific jokes almost immediately. He was having none of that. Like most new media-savvy comedians, he understands that once you've committed a routine to DVD for sale, you can never do that again. It was all new material, and it was great.
He did a (non-racist) bit about sending a black guy to the back of the airplane. He did a bit about paedophiles who are probably better off molesting terminally ill children, the logic being that they can't carry the psychological damage into later life, "so in many ways, it's a victimless crime". He did a bit about actors pretending to be disabled (to the point of hiring "carers") so they can get disabled parts. He did a bit about parents of dead babies, who were probably bad parents, "and that's why God took your baby away". You know, all top-quality, five-star material.
When someone got offended by something, he tried to explain freedom of speech in a new way: "Freedom of speech doesn't mean you can say whatever you like; it means you have to listen to things you don't want to hear."
At one point a drunk girl approached the stage and started abusing him, so he was forced to deliver a string of quick responses, mostly revolving around her presumed sexual promiscuity and how it may be linked to a lack of paternal attention. Eventually she became so obstreperous that he had her and her instigating friend thrown out, to the delight of all.
Even someone like me, who's only standing upright because the molecules of cynical hatred are holding hands, felt that some of it was a bit "Maybe he shouldn't have said that."
And that's a very good sign.