black man fries an onion like this.. and a white man fries an onion like that; how great is Richard Pryor

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I've laways hated most black american comedy as it seemed to ludicrously racist. the on reccomendation i listened to some richard pryor, and now i understand; these comedians i have an issue with are, more importantly than being racist, talentless hacks. pryor, on the other hand, has an incredible sense of time, an amazine variety of voices. he's also barely racist, just has an uncany ability to recognise the components of group behavious.

― matthew james, Tuesday, 19 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

racist? expand!

― Sterling Clover, Tuesday, 19 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I don't know much Pryor (I'd like to) but agree that lots of black stand-up is unfunny and rascist (although I could just not be gtting the joke). Or at least has been, I haven't really watched any recently.

― Ally C, Tuesday, 19 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

?!?! i can think of twenty considerably 'offensive' black comics who most people would find a fuck of a lot less racist than pryor, not that he's even 'racist' at all so much as race-conscious. what is this world of racist black comedians you live in? like sterling said, expand!!

― ethan, Tuesday, 19 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I really would like to hear which black comedians you find racist as well, if only so that I can compare them to Richard Pryor.

― Dan Perry, Tuesday, 19 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

the worst is when white racist fuckwits take bits from black comedians to justify their racism, like practically half the rednecks i went to high school with who all hear chris rock's black people vs. niggas bit and decide they also like quiet well-behaved 'black people' but can't stand 'niggas', just like he says, dude!, and it's 'not racist' because 'a black guy said it'!! see also: 'it's not racist' because 'i have black friends'.

― ethan, Tuesday, 19 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Pryor's first concert movie is still the funniest stand-up performance I've ever seen. Shit, I even like 'Brewster's Millions' and 'Stir Crazy'! I'd love to hear that recent Rhino Box Set of his Warner Bros comedy albs. Does anyone know if he was influenced by ppl like Red Foxx or Dick Gregory? Are they anywhere near as funny?

FWIW, on one of those 'Celebrities At Their Worst' CDs there's a snippet of a massively wasted Pryor making some pretty inexcusable anti-semitic gags.

― Andrew L, Tuesday, 19 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

oh come on, it was the seventies!

― ethan, Tuesday, 19 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Dick Gregory wrote a book called nigge radn dedicated it to his mother so "when ever she heard that ugly word, she would think of her sons book" , it is a v. v. funny book as well .

― anthony, Tuesday, 19 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

i wasn't suggesting for a minuite pryor was rasict! that's what i was meandering around with the "group behaviour" - it comes through in his dissections of family life, it comes through in his reference to white people interacting with black people. even when he's talking about chinese people, he gets down to a tee their enthusiasm as a mass to adopt aspects of their settled culture to make money, the beautifully subtle way of insulting people whilst remaining entirely subtle. that's some of his appeal to me, as a still half-guilty white liberal. he knows the differences between societal groups and makes sometyhing crazy but charming out of it.

as far as the racist black comedians, i have no names but surely you must have seen them? i'm sure there's a hugely popular trio in black america today peddling the same plain old "you see a black guy, a black guy drives a car like this.... but a white guy. a white guy drives more like.... this." jokes.

re: chris rocks "i love black people... but i hate niggers" sketch; that's a black take on the difference in all groups between decent people and wankers. easy to manipulate by semi-racists, but true nonetheless.

― matthew james, Tuesday, 19 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

well yeah i love chris rock, i think that was obvious. anyway explain how the car- driving thing is different from pryor's racial observational humor please?

― ethan, Tuesday, 19 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

I just hope you aren't talking about the ORIGINAL KINGS OF COMEDY.

― Dan Perry, Tuesday, 19 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

bernie mac once made me spit out my coke twice, like, i spit it out but there was still some in my mouth and i was moving to clean it off my hand and then he made another joke and i spit out the rest.

― ethan, Tuesday, 19 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

the difference is in Pryor's flights of fantasy. One the man has started talking about a wino dealing with dracula and improbably behaviour like how black guys just walk round town holding their dicks all "'sup, jus' hangin' on, jack..." then there's this established silliness. so his mocking of white people at the dinner table is set in this wierd space of improbability and fondness. the car driving thing, though, is on the same level as bernard manning, just cheap racism.

― matthew james, Tuesday, 19 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

and i might be talking about the original kings of comedy, i can't quite remember. plus the fundamental difference with pryor; the man is funny.

― matthew james, Tuesday, 19 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

Ick, all this talk reminds me of Eddie Murphy. I never made myself listen to any humor based on race. I couldn't get beyond his homophobia. Did he ever say anything funny? Movies don't count- because I say so.

― Lindsey B, Thursday, 21 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

imagine, if mr. T ....

― p barclay, Thursday, 21 March 2002 01:00 (twenty-four years ago)

two months pass...

Expand? Are you people living in a cave? Watch the Chris Rock show or even worse, waste two hours of your life and watch the "kings" of comedy. They are horribly racist. Chris Rock is clever, I'll give him that. But by definition, his show is anti-white and pro- black. the kings of comedy is pure excrement in terms of creativity, class, or comedy. And guess what! they make fun of white people!

― Mark Minton, Thursday, 30 May 2002 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

by definition, his show is anti-white and pro- black

I'm hung up on the "by definition" here. If a show featuring a black comedian targeted toward a multiracial but significantly black audience = "by definition ... anti-white and pro-black," wouldn't the reverse be that like the nationalists are right and basically every show ever is "anti-black and pro-white?"

Or is that just careless phrasing wherein "by definition" means something other than what it actually means?

― nabisco%%, Thursday, 30 May 2002 00:00 (twenty-four years ago)

five years pass...

how does a black person fry onions?

― moonship journey to baja, Tuesday, 19 June 2007 00:44 (eighteen years ago)

i'm sure it's better than a white person

― cutty, Tuesday, 19 June 2007 00:46 (eighteen years ago)

i've been trying to figure this joke out for a while now

― moonship journey to baja, Tuesday, 19 June 2007 00:49 (eighteen years ago)

― BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Tuesday, 19 June 2007 00:59 (eighteen years ago)

*chortle*

― Trayce, Tuesday, 19 June 2007 01:04 (eighteen years ago)

lol Hoos

― Curt1s Stephens, Tuesday, 19 June 2007 02:15 (eighteen years ago)

Big HOOS with a comeback for the ages

― sanskrit, Tuesday, 19 June 2007 02:29 (eighteen years ago)

why are so many people struggling to spell 'racist' here? why the hate-on for Original Kings Of Comedy?

― stevie, Tuesday, 19 June 2007 12:18 (eighteen years ago)

stevie, the answer to both of your questions is "lol internets".

― HI DERE, Tuesday, 19 June 2007 13:08 (eighteen years ago)

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