What does a rude barista or stuttering have to do with politics?
When these sorts of things happen, we normally discuss them in the politics thread. It sorta has to do with with bigotry and discrimination, and that sorta gets into politics.
Fair enough.
I no longer want to be a white male, I don’t want to be blamed for everything wrong in the world: I tell the world now I’m a black lesbian… My name is Loretta and I’m a BLT, a black lesbian in transition.
What a baby.
Speaking at a press conference at the Karlovy Vary film festival, where he was presenting his new film The Man Who Killed Don Quixote, Gilliam said: “It made me cry: the idea that … no longer six white Oxbridge men can make a comedy show. Now we need one of this, one of that, everybody represented… this is bullshit. I no longer want to be a white male, I don’t want to be blamed for everything wrong in the world: I tell the world now I’m a black lesbian… My name is Loretta and I’m a BLT, a black lesbian in transition.”
He added: “[Allen’s] statement made me so angry, all of us so angry. Comedy is not assembled, it’s not like putting together a boy band where you put together one of this, one of that everyone is represented.”
It’s not about picking one of each. It’s about giving all voices a chance to sit at the table. Comedy has been closed off to all but white males the majority of the time for way too long.
I think Gilliam may be voicing his thoughts and concerns in that… Python wouldn’t exist if done today - because the group may have been split up by the Head of BBC Entertainment/Comedy to make it more diverse (from their experience a management-level box-ticker with likely not much interest in comedy itself). Which is problem in itself and he is correct in that context; they were a tight unit who’d grown together - why do have to include someone to tick a box that we don’t know and may not likely ‘get’ us? (maybe at the expense of one of the group, even?) He’s seemingly invoking a bit of Dustin Hoffman’s Tootsie in his claim (for me, anyway).
The problem Gilliam may be not giving much consideration to in that… is at that time when they were starting out… the BBC weren’t doing much comedy for differing cultures at all, and it wasn’t diverse. The Pythons also did a lot of the work themselves, writing, acting, style, content, and had a large say in direction input (for timing, and effect) etc - not a lot of modern comedians seemingly do that - usually they seem to be comedians who may write/act a little.
Thankfully, since then comedy has evolved in who it is trying to appeal to… from having a young black scouser as a main role in Red Dwarf in the 80’s, which appealed and was aimed at younger and more diverse audiences - all the way through to having comedies mainly aimed to appeal for ethnic/cultural audiences. People behind the scenes coming from differing backgrounds, culture and classes - more diverse than ever - writers included, which may have not been the case 40/50 years ago. (it certainly wasn’t the done thing at the BBC; accents were frowned upon, and often you usually had to be from a certain ‘class’ or ‘standard’ to work there in a creative/management role.