KATHY GRIFFIN
It remains to be seen if things will ever get back to normal for comedian Kathy Griffin, whose gory attempt at political commentary has backfired in a huge way.
She has apologized, and she has been fired from her annual gig hosting a New Year’s Eve show on CNN. But she still lists five comedy gigs on her web site, kathygriffin.net, including two in New Jersey: Nov. 3 at the State Theatre in New Brunswick, and Nov. 4 at BergenPAC in Englewood. Tickets to both these shows have gone on sale already.
(Update: The two shows have now been cancelled.)
What will she do? It will be interesting to see.
She’s got to, at the very least, address the controversy at her shows. Her comedy is based on being brutally honest about everything, including her own life. She can’t just ignore it.
Maybe she will turn the shows into fundraisers for an anti-terrorism or anti-violence organization. Or maybe she will just cancel. I would imagine we’ll see her on television soon, doing an interview in which she apologizes further, and asks forgiveness. But she hasn’t done so, yet.
For what its worth, the show’s event page on the State Theatre’s web site has, as of this morning, 28 comments, all vehemently arguing that the show should be cancelled. (The BergenPAC web site’s event page does not have a comments section.)
There are also numerous calls for the show to be cancelled on the Facebook event page for the State Theatre show and the Facebook event page for the BergenPAC show.
Very few people, even on the left, are defending what Griffin did. But her apology was, I believe, sincere and uncategorical.
Was her offense so extreme that her career is going to be over? And does it matter that her fans realize, and have accepted so far, that she is a comedian who will often try to push the boundaries of what is acceptable?
Stay tuned. I have a feeling that this is an issue we’re going to be discussing for a while. The irony is that Kathy Griffin — who has, in her career so far, worked extremely hard to be someone that people are talking about — is now, I’m assuming, wishing that everyone would find another topic.
4 comments
I despise what she did and think her comedy is generally more about narcissism and nasty comments about celebrities than wit, but this will not kill her career.
This will certainly cost her many fans, but her fan base expects her to be nasty and outrageous and is unlikely to be largely Trump supporters. Did Ted Nugent lose any fans after his vile comments about Obama? Did any sexist or racist lyrics by a rap or country singer ever cost them significantly?
In addition, Trump’s actions towards Obama and recorded remarks towards women made him in the minds of many a bully who deserved being insulted.
I do not know what Michael Richards has been up to since his racist remarks, but Andrew Dice Clay still has a career and Chris Rock saying he “understood” why OJ did it cost him nothing.
A key question will be whether she made good enough friends among late night and talk show hosts that she will get airtime.
I think any talk show would be glad to have her right now. Huge ratings guaranteed.
Which one of the above copied the vile image of an ISIS beheading of our President. Where is the humor? She should be jailed, but the Secret Service are becoming snowflakes too.
Maybe Kathy Griffin and Jihadi John can hit the comedy circuit together. That would be a regular laugh riot.