Recently, one of our terrestrial channels, Channel 4, decided to make a series of three "roasts" - Bruce Forsyth, Sharon Osborne and Chris Tarrant. As a fan of the Dean Martin roasts - still watching many clips on YouTube - I was quite looking forward to seeing how these would turn out.
I suppose I was being a little naïve to think they would - in any way - approach the style and sublety of the Dean Martin era, but I had no idea how far wrong I'd be.
The UK "roasters" consisted of many hardly-heard-of so-called comedians, hosted by Jimmy Carr, who all went about the tasteless business of making outrageous, snide and disgusting comments, through which the "guest of honor" was supposed and expected to sit graciously.
I was quite appalled at how the UK had - I thought - trashed the format, until, that is, we were "treated" to some of the more recent roasts from Comedy Central as a "follow-on."
I've now seen William Shatner's and Joan Rivers' roasts and now I understand where the UK production team got the idea from. Even Carl Reiner thought it funny to use both "f" and "c" words and several others were disgustingly racist to some participants as well. As you may guess, I'm no prude and I'm well up there on the profanity usage scale, but there is a line in the sand and these "entertainments" didn't even start on the right side of it.
Good grief, is there NO class left in "comedy" today?
Ray
I suppose I was being a little naïve to think they would - in any way - approach the style and sublety of the Dean Martin era, but I had no idea how far wrong I'd be.
The UK "roasters" consisted of many hardly-heard-of so-called comedians, hosted by Jimmy Carr, who all went about the tasteless business of making outrageous, snide and disgusting comments, through which the "guest of honor" was supposed and expected to sit graciously.
I was quite appalled at how the UK had - I thought - trashed the format, until, that is, we were "treated" to some of the more recent roasts from Comedy Central as a "follow-on."
I've now seen William Shatner's and Joan Rivers' roasts and now I understand where the UK production team got the idea from. Even Carl Reiner thought it funny to use both "f" and "c" words and several others were disgustingly racist to some participants as well. As you may guess, I'm no prude and I'm well up there on the profanity usage scale, but there is a line in the sand and these "entertainments" didn't even start on the right side of it.
Good grief, is there NO class left in "comedy" today?
Ray
LCHIEN
Loring in Katy, TX USA
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