Given Leary's high profile, it wouldn't suprise me that some of his fellow comics are finding anything they can throw at him that doesn't smack of sour grapes.
Ow. Is that a stab at human nature, or comedian nature? Sure, there are bitter people in every field, but a charge of material theft, especially from a high profile comic isn't to be bandied about without citation. In fact, that's why it raises my eyebrows. Should be easy enough to prove or to slam claims thereof.
There are Hicks jokes that lLeary has used. I'm not sure that's a rip-off.
Dennis Miller also used "What if you could blow yourself?" back when I liked him, too.
Oh, the things I know.
My car is FREE! I had to carve out the ice from all 4 tires. Broke an ice scraper in the process. Then I moved the car to a part of the lot they'd cleared out. Apparently tomorrow they're bringing in a backhoe to clear out as much of the ice as they can.
I also saw a guy who was clearing the ice from the sidewalk with a pickaxe.
Denis Leary's act was taken wholesale from Bill Hicks, and that's why comics hate him.
I thought this was common knowledge. Because, yeah. I liked Leary until I heard some Hicks albums.
Is that a stab at human nature, or comedian nature?
Human nature, definitely. Though I do think there's a connection between the the ego-driven nature of show business in general in conjunction with the failure to success ratio, and a level of bitterness, jealousy etc. that's above the mean. If that makes sense, which it may not since it's late in the day on a Friday.
Ben & Jerry's official Colbert page
I saw that in the Globe yesterday. It gives me the happies.
Hicks and Leary had been friends. Hicks thought he'd been ripped off, too, before he died; this isn't a recent thing that only started when Leary got famous.
A reporter once asked Hicks why he'd stopped smoking. His reply: "I wanted to see if Denis Leary would."
Hicks thought he'd been ripped off, too, before he died
This I hadn't heard before. Oh well, that's not cool. Hard to dismiss when it comes from the source.
I do think there's a connection between the the ego-driven nature of show business in general in conjunction with the failure to success ratio, and a level of bitterness, jealousy etc. that's above the mean.
How do you see it manifesting in other branches of show business?
Man, I obviously haven't seen enough Leary performance.
Given Leary's high profile, it wouldn't suprise me that some of his fellow comics are finding anything they can throw at him that doesn't smack of sour grapes.
The last person I heard this from was a posting on a message board by Brian Stack, who is a super nice guy and currently a writer for Conan. I doubt this characterization of his motives. This is what he wrote:
Every stand-up I've ever met that knows Joe Rogan has described him as an asshole, but if Mencia is a thief, I'm glad Rogan's going after him. It wouldn't surprise me one bit to find out that Mencia steals material.
I was pretty amazed when I saw some transcripts of how incredibly similar a lot of Dennis Leary's old routines were to Bill Hicks' stuff. Some of it was virtually word-for-word.
Now, I haven't seen the transcript, but if Stack says he saw it, they exist. That guy is solid.