Comedian Iliza Shlesinger doesn’t jot down her jokes — she stores them in her head until showtime. Even her setlists are just single-word prompts, like “giraffe” (for her baby giraffe impression) or “armpit” (she has joked that no man has ever dumped a woman over armpit stubble).
But that doesn’t mean her routine is mostly impromptu, or “unfiltered,” a label Shlesinger told a Paine Hall audience last Wednesday is overused for female comedians. In reality, she said, most audiences don’t realize how much stand-up material is edited and refined before it’s delivered.
“When you do stand-up, it’s a polished piece of art,” said Shlesinger, a national headliner who has starred in six of her own stand-up comedy specials on Netflix (considered a top-notch venue for comedians) and has toured internationally to sold-out theaters. “Every laugh that is elicited is purposefully placed. I know where the tension is. It’s a symphony.”
“As women we are constantly having to justify everything and make sure that you know that ‘I don’t mean to offend.’”
Iliza Shlesinger
At the Hauser Forum for the Arts talk hosted by the Mahindra Humanities Center, Shlesinger spoke with comedy writer Bess Kalb about self-censoring, comedy in the age of social media, and double standards for female comedians.
Shlesinger said that when it comes to the balancing act between not offending and not allowing public opinion to ruin a good joke, female comedians are always judged more harshly for their choices. She believes this could discourage them from wanting to make art.
“As women we are constantly having to justify everything and make sure that you know that ‘I don’t mean to offend,’” Shlesinger said. “We love to pick apart people and women. We do it deliciously. We love the schadenfreude of ‘I know that all she said was she loves fluffy clouds, but she didn’t say she loved rain clouds also, which means you hate the rain, which means you love climate change.’”
Kalb, an Emmy-nominated comedy writer who has written for “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” and The New Yorker, said she’s witnessed this double standard firsthand while writing for an all-female comedy special.
“It was at the same network where there were men who had their own specials, and the notes that we got about what all these women could and couldn’t say were astounding,” Kalb said.
Part of the reason behind the nitpicking, Shlesinger believes, is that social media algorithms have normalized content tailored to individual tastes.
“We all have our own personalized channels on Netflix, and we all have our own personalized comedians because we have so much to pick from on social media,” Schlesinger said. “That’s just not the way the human brain works. How could I tailor something that 100 percent speaks to you?”
Female comedians are often disproportionately expected to pull out anecdotes about trauma onstage to be relatable, said Shlesinger, who added that she speaks about her own experience with miscarriage during stand-ups. Kalb dubbed these moments “trauma gems.” Still, Shlesinger said, vulnerability onstage is important for engaging an audience.
“I always think if I’m feeling this, particularly when it comes to the experiences of being a woman, everybody else is feeling this,” Shlesinger said.
Though she knows her jokes won’t land with everyone, Shlesinger said she works to find the common denominator for her audience in whatever venue she’s in.
“At the end of the day, we are all people, and we do all go through the same things,” Shlesinger said. “When you can tap into that, which I always strive to do, that’s how you’re able to play Kuala Lumpur and also Ireland and also Tokyo. You’re reaching a very human thing.”
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