Then they Came for the Diceman. And I said… “GO (Copulate) YOURSELF!”

With all of the heavy subject matter we’ve been discussing lately, how about if we lighten things up a bit? If you think that garbage journalism is restricted to the political world let me give you a glimpse into what passes for entertainment journalism! If you’re younger than Gen X you’ve probably never heard of Andrew Dice Clay, which is a shame. Well grab a seat, because you are about to learn about an absolute cultural icon! First to back up a bit, on Hulu I noticed a TV series called “The Dark Side of Comedy”. and out of curiosity decided to watch. The first episode was about Chris Farley, of whom I’ve never been a fan. Yes he had a few moments that made me laugh out loud (like when he accidentally fell through and broke a table while David Spade and Christina Applegate struggled to not laugh. Overall though I was never a fan of most of his work, this series gave me a new appreciation for him. His humor still isn’t my flavor, but at least hearing his story gave me a new respect for his work. But Chris Farley’s story isn’t what drew me to the series – episode 2 was about Andrew “Dice” Clay, aka The Diceman. For some quick background, Dice hit the scenes in the late 80s as a Shock Comedian. His breakout moment came with an HBO comedy special, “The Diceman Cometh”. Sadly, only buyable on VHS, but his over the top offensive humor was a hit and he rode that wave. And you can watch the hour long show here, though.

The intro starts  the Hulu show attacking Dice, pointing out that he made fun of women, gays and minorities. Yes, he did. And he made fun of everybody else, for that matter. What, are your grievance groups above mockery? Are the only people acceptable to mock straight white men? I guess I just answered my own question. Then they get into typical Leftist dreck –

“Then it got into profiting from hate.”

“As a gay man I would never want to be in his audience”

“At some point it went from being a comedy show to being a rally – IT WAS LIKE NUREMBERG!”

And of course, there was Nota Dunn, basking in being able to paint herself as a victim again 30 years after she boycotted Dice’s Saturday Night Live appearance.

The biographical part starts out well enough, documenting Dice’s early career. The 80s had a bit of a 50s revival, and Dice patterned his pompadour hair & leather jacket look after a favorite movie of his, The Lords of Flatbush. They also started showing his celebrity impressions, another of Dice’s strong suits. He also used some creative tactics to get himself noticed, such as setting up a boom box with a mic in front of a movie screen before the show started and offering a standup routine for a soon to be starting movie. He moved up in the standup comedy circuit, And we start into the hand wringing of basing his comedy based on “sexism and homophobia.” And for as big as a part of his routine as it was, they spend less than a minute on his nursery rhymes. Because we can’t have him seen as anything but a boogeyman.

Then things get interesting – Dice signs his first movie deal, and it gets him booked to host Saturday Night Live. Cast member Nora Dunn and booked musical guest Sinead O’Conner decide to boycott the show over him. And Nora tried pinning some anti gay violence on Dice. So does this mean that The Radical Left is taking responsibility for the violence their hate generates? These are the new rules, after all. So Dunn felt that she could tell Lorne Michaels that she can dictate their casting, and somehow Hulu blames the cast for not joining her.

In a brilliant response, the show has a skit of “it’s a Wonderful Life”, with Jon Lovitz as The Devil showing Dice how the world would have been different. The big joke was finding two feet sticking out from under an amp – it was Nora Dunn crushed to death under one of O’Conner’s amps. Then they show Scott Thompson (Kids in the Hall – a show I tried to like because a number of my friends did, but always found howlingly unfunny, but obviously many others liked it. Whatever) whining that showing Nora Dunn being killed was not a good look. What? It’s called comedy you nimrod, and the writers found a clever way to handle an uncomfortable situation.

Next up is the beatification of Nora Dunn for her great impressions. Frankly, the only impression Dunn ever made of me was never being remotely funny. Seriously, for as long as she was there I don’t remember laughing at a single sketch she did. Sort of like AL Franken – I don’t remember him ever saying anything remotely funny, whether on SNL, Air America (Remember that? I used to listen as oppo research) or anywhere else. So now they’re upset that as Nora’s contract was ending and she was moving on she got undue flak. The cast was mad at her for her for bailing on them, the way you’d be annoyed at any stupid coworker who pulls a selfish boycott.

We get more hand wringing from several other comedians who were horrified that Dice had sold out arenas chanting his name. Spare me – like any comedian wouldn’t kill to have crowds coming out for you like that. And apparently somehow this encourages violence, or something like that. Call this a hunch, but while I have no interest in watching any of these comedians who tell us how horrible and dangerous Dice is I’m guessing that if I watched any of their comedy routines they’d be painfully unfunny. They also seem to try to pin any violence against women or gays on Dice. Like I said, if this is the new standard I’ve got two Presidential assassination attempts I’d like to discuss with you angry Lefties. Let me know who’s taking responsibility.

Next up was Dice’s 1990 movie, “The Adventure of Ford Fairlaine” (FF). And here The Radical Left launched a boycott campaign, which they considered successful for its limited release and quiet promotion. The night before the release, he went on The Arsenio Hall show, then the hot late night talk show, and Dice briefly choked up. The scolds hated it, but it came off to me as a good opening up to his audience. Of course the miserable scolds scolded. While the Lefties obviously weren’t his target audience for that monologue, it’s why you don’t bother ever trying to appease them. Of course, FF wound up bombing, his 3 movie deal got yanked, and he went back to doing some standup. But the crowds were diminished, so obviously The Radical Lefties thought they were successful in bringing him down. Mission accomplished! And they wrap up on a somewhat positive note, while continuing to condemn Dice they give him some props for still getting acting jobs today, if not as a movie star. And for some reason they give props to Nora Dunn. They somehow make the SNL cast members out as the bad guys for disliking a selfish coworker. And somehow Dunn is the hero of this story. And they close with our hosts sneering at us horrible people for laughing at his comedy. Now, let’s get to the garbage journalism that this special was:

First off, FF bombed because it was a bad movie. I say this as someone who was (and still is) a Dice fan, and still remember laughing my butt off the first time I saw his comedy special, The Diceman Cometh. And I personally still love the movie FF, but how much you like the movie is directly tied to how much you like Dice. The story itself was pretty bad and wouldn’t have much appeal outside of Dice’s fan base. And there were a few obnoxious jokes that just didn’t land, even by my crude standards – anyone remember the creative but gross way Dice got rid of a foul tasting hors d’ oeuvre at the reception? Even back then I never understood what that added to the movie. But this doesn’t make the movie irredeemable – for many years I referred to it as “The greatest bad movie I ever enjoyed”. It was a fun movie, and I liked the creative ways at the end of the movie how, with the exception of Dice’s main antagonists, everyone got some happy ending, even Sam the Sleazebag and Lieutenant Amos (It’s Booty Time, Booty Time, across the U-S-A). Sadly, FF is not streaming anywhere, but you get it on DVD from eBay.

Whatever movie Dice made would have always had trouble promoting it. First off, as a Shock Comedian he already had a headwind that would have made it tough to get booked on most of the mainstream media outlets, such as the morning talk shows. But the bigger piece of this puzzle that would explain a lot more was when a few months earlier Dice went on the MTV Video Music Awards, and he went blue on live TV. It got him banned for life on MTV (which for any non Gen-Xers reading this, was a huge deal at the time). He even made a joke about it in FF, but limiting your ability to promote your product will never help you. I’m assuming this got left out of the episode because a sane, rational explanation would have reduced Nora Dunn’s heroics.

And Nora Dunn? To the show’s credit, they mentioned that Dunn was in the final year of her contract and was ready to move on before hurrying past that point. I remember years later seeing an interview with then SNL fellow cast member Victoria Jackson. She talked Dice, and pointed out that Dunn knew that her contract wasn’t getting renewed and wanted to find ways to bring attention to herself. Yep, Dunn was woke before woke was “cool”. And this helps explain why the rest of the cast didn’t like her.

Back to Dice, his mockery was hardly restricted to various DIE groups. In 1991, hot off of the bombing of FF, he did an HBO standup special, “For Ladies Only”. He flipped his script, with a show was mostly ripping on straight men. And it was damned funny. Unfortunately, it’s not available for purchase on any physical medium, but you can find the hour long special on YouTube. It worked.

After a few years, Dice’s bright flame burned itself out. No disrespect, but a routine like his that’s so intense is hard to keep fresh. I remember having high hopes when I bought his double album “The Day the Laughter Died”. Sadly, it was aptly titled, as I don’t remember laughing once at it. And that was it for Dice, although he has spent the last few decades showing up in cool spots here and there. Such as his minor but significant role in the not great but good movie “One Night at McCool’s”. It’s not streaming anywhere but I recommend it if you see the DVD in somebody’s dumpster bin.

But speaking of dumpster bins, it’s not just the political press that’s beating the drums of the march towards their own extinction. And good riddance.

So I discovered this gay show Vice does called “Dark Side of Comedy” and I was expecting it to be about people like Andy Dick or Bill Cosby. But they instead talk about Andrew Dice Clay lol? They put horror movie music over his bits and have some HR shrill tell you why it’s bad pic.twitter.com/Ra1mp1rO8j

— trappy (@c1nnamonbunny) October 30, 2023

Well Before Trump Said #FakeNews Andrew Dice Clay Tells @CNN To Go F*** Themselves
⚠️Warning: Clay drops a few F-Bombs

(November 2003) pic.twitter.com/E4cxNiq7w3

— Wojciech Pawelczyk (@WojPawelczyk) November 27, 2018

Brother Bob is no longer on Facebook (although you can see his archives there), and is back on Twitter again, but is ramping up on Minds and Gab, and has his biggest presence on MeWe.

Cross posted at Flopping Aces
<!– Cross posted from Brother Bob’s Blog
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Brother Bob

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