Women in Comedy (part 2)

Here at Ithaca, I am a member of various clubs, two of which have to do with comedy. One is comedy club, we meet once a week, and we do stand up and improv. Another is Comedy Sauce where we write and shoot sketches and put them online. 

Let me start with Comedy Club. I remember the first meeting, and the first thing I realized was how male dominated the whole club is! Its gotten better throughout the year, more girls show up eventually, but none of them are really brave enough to do stand up, and if we do choose to sack up and do stand up, the guys tease us for not being funny. I even tried to stand up a few times and I found it so difficult to write stuff that would be funny to males AND females. So I took the easy way out and wrote a bit about breasts. 

In Comedy Sauce, the female to male ratio is much more balanced, but the skits we shoot and record mostly have male characters! That makes me so upset. I try my best to write sketches with female characters, but they have to be absolutely off-the-wall hilarious to be chosen to record (no luck yet, still trying). 

My dream is to work for (write for) Saturday Night Live one day. 

I was doing some research about various casts, and I mainly looked at the casts from 2000-2010, but I also skimmed through from 1975-1995. SNL started with 3 women in the cast, it went down to 2 women some years in the 80's and early 90's. In the 00's, there have been 4-5 women in the cast. 

And you have to realize, the total of cast members varies from 10-17 people. 

Seriously?? When I think about it, it makes me livid. 

I was watching the episode that Dana Carvey hosted a few weeks ago, it was pretty funny, I loved seeing the return of Wayne's World, but I noticed what a lack of female-driven sketches there were!! Many times men played women too, which is hilarious... But still! What the fuck SNL? 

I mean, at least we have Tina Fey, Amy Poehler, Kristen Wiig and among other hilarious females in the world of comedy but we need MORE WOMEN. And enough of this men playing women thing, it's gonna get old soon. 

Is There No Room for Women on Late Night TV?

I am a huge fan of late night talk shows. I watch them all the time with my dad. When I'm home we never miss Jay Leno, and I love Stephen Colbert and Jon Stewart. But here's the thing, where are the women on late night talk shows? It really bothers me. I mean, what would be so bad or different about having a woman hosting a late night talk show along side the big boys?

In this article, Linda Lowden discusses the issue. She asks the question, how long will we have to wait until there will be a female late night talk show host? I know that at one point, there weren't even female anchors on news networks, and that changed at some point, so when will the networks that show these late night talk shows follow suit?

The thing is, its more than just women not being on the screen as hosts on these late night talk shows. It's also behind the scenes, there is a huge lack of women. Ok. Maybe I can't say that for all talk shows, but I went to a live recording of the Colbert Report over break. I was appalled at the fact that I hardly any females on the set of the show! I was so surprised too! The only women I saw were the ones who touched up Colbert's makeup, showed the interviewees to the set, and there was one woman who was handing a lynx that was on the show too. That's it.

It made me so fucking angry because I am interested in television and movie production, and I love being behind a camera! There are women in the TV-R majors! Are they ALL going to be the makeup girls? What's the deal? Where are the female producers? Directors? Writers? where the fuck are they?

If by the time I'm 40 there isn't a late night talk show hosted by a female, I will do all that is in my power to make it happen.

Mother, Father

My mother majored in philosophy to get back at her dad for sending her to her safety school instead of one of the great colleges she got into.

She married and had kids pretty young (she was 27 when she had me) and was starting her career in marketing. At some point when I was maybe 8 or 9, she started her own company from the office at home. As far as I know, my father was supportive. 

Now, her company is extremely successful and she is an accomplished euntrepenuer.

But that’s not all she does. Besides having two kids and a full time job running her company, she is also an actively competing ball room dancer. That’s right. My mother has won the national pro/am (professional/ametuer) dance competition two years in a row.

My father grew up in Israel and is the oldest of six. Most of his family are males. Most of my cousins are males as well. I guess it just runs in the family. 

When my mother was pregnant with me, he was CONVINCED that I was going to be a boy (despite the fact that my sex was not a surprise…)

My dad is your typical Israeli misogynistic douche bag. I love him, but he’s extremely insensitive. Being an ex-army guy, he always has to be tough. And he always has to objectify and make assumptions about women. For  example, my dad, my younger brother and I were in car. Even though I was listening to music, I could clearly hear that they were discussing girls who work at Hooters. Then I heard my dad jokingly say that I should go work there. Needless to say, I didn’t think it was funny.

I think you get the picture.

My mother and father are now divorced for reasons which are pretty obvious to me. My mother followed her dreams, my father who did support her, wanted someone or something different. Also, he doesn’t respect women.

I feel bad for him though because the divorce did not help how he feels about women. If anything, it made him more of a misogynist.

Misogynist: hatred, dislike, or mistrust of women.

While watching the film, Who Does SHe Think She Is one of the interviewees mentioned something about household chores and how in her house it wasn’t split up like: the girls do the dishes and the boys do outdoor work. My house is the opposite. My little brother complains to this day about how my father never makes me carry anything heavy or do hardy handy work. If he delegates chores, I’m in the kitchen, I’m cooking, I’m weeding the backyard.

My father LOVES my brother. He loves me too, but when they are together it’s absolutely disgusting. My father will turn to my brother and say “hey didja see the tits on that girl?”. Whenever we’re out to dinner, my father flirts with the waitress, and my brother follows suit. 

My father and I have had plenty of struggles in the past, but things are better now that I demand respect from him. For awhile I felt that I had to prove myself to him. 

I’m happy that I grew up with both sides. On one side I have my mother who is a career woman, definitely doesn’t need a man, and always supported me and my creative abilities, and on the other side I have my poor father who goes through women like a hormonal teenage girl goes through tissues, objectifies and disrespects women and definitely doesn’t see much potential in me or my future in the film industry. That situation has made me a very strong person.

Anything You Can Do, I Can Do Better

Just a side-note,
I was in the gym today and I overheard these guys talking about what sounded like a track meet.
The conversation went like this.

Guy #1: I've never seen a chick run so fast.
Guy #2: Yeah I remember the first time I got beat by a girl.

I almost started laughing. Is it any different than being beat buy a guy? Oh jeez.

Who gets to pay?

I've been dating since I was 16 years old, and the same thing happens at the end of every date. You know, it's that awkward interaction, you each pull out your wallet but you don't really know who's paying for what and then you have to discuss it.. It's strange.

Does the person who set up the date pay? Should I always expect the guy to pay? Should we split? Maybe I should pay?

I remember my first date with my high school sweetheart. I paid for it, and he HATED that. Even to this day I still make fun of him for shvitzing about it. But what's the big deal? I get the tradition, it's like the guy being a gentleman, taking the girl out yadda yadda. But isn't that a little outdated? Then, that was just something I did to make the point that I didn't expect him or want him to pay for everything. We were kids, we didn't work and we didn't have a lot of money to spend. So why not take turns paying, why not split?

Even the guy I'm dating now at college 90% of the time refuses to let me pay for anything. I think that's really sweet of him, but it still irks me a little bit.

At this point, I always expect to just split it. I don't need a man to pay for my food.

On the other side, my best friend just had a huge fight with her boyfriend because she expected him to pay for the whole meal, but he assumed they were splitting it. She was mad because she wanted him to be all gentleman-like.

I was reading this article about the same issue. A lot of things that author said I agree with. One interesting thing that she brought up was that "if you like a guy you let him pay". That correlates to the whole idea of a guy winning a girl over until she gives in and they start dating or whatever.

But why can't I express my interest by paying? Why can't I take him out? (Well I can and do, but my friends think I'm nuts) And really, it's not just about who gets to pay; it's the whole game. Usually the girl is supposed to play hard to get and the guy has to chase her. But I was never good at hard to get, and I love the chase.

There really needs to be more balance in the world of dating.

Mirror, Mirror on the Wall...

While reading the selection for class in Feminism is for Everybody by Bell Hooks, I found the chapter about body image particularly interesting. At one point Hooks says that in some of today's fashion magazines, there will be an article about how bad eating disorders are but right next to it could be an ad for Victoria's Secret with a half naked Adriana Lima in all of her rail-thin Brazilian glory.

It's so true, so many fashion/beauty advertisements feature photoshopped and airbrushed women. I will admit, like many other girls my age I have anxiety about my body when I really shouldn't. I mean, I can't say that I work out to look good for the opposite sex. I work out to maintain my healthy body. If I didn't go to the gym at all but continued to eat campus food a few times a day, I don't think my body would appreciate that. Then again, I grew up in my mother's house. She's a health nut, and she's a slave to the gym so I guess I got it from her.

I'm rambling. The point is, is that trying to be at a healthy weight, working out and caring about your body isn't exactly always a response to body image anxiety or how women are portrayed in the media.

As for makeup? Form fitting clothes? High heels? What if I just like wearing them to feel pretty? I love Victoria's Secret, whenever  I go in one of those stores it makes me so happy. Could be all the bright colors and perfume.

But really, can feminine feminists exist?