Merrill Markoe's Blog, page 2

(Originally published Nov. 21, 2017 in REFINERY29)
Inside the DNA of the average joke is usually a story about an underdog seeking to level the playing field; someone trying to right a wrong by pointing out the holes in its logic, so everyone stops accepting it and starts making fun of it instead. When you think about it that way, comedy is a woman’s art, ripe territory for people who are 50.8% of the population and somehow still living with minority status.
[image error]Which brings us to the irony-laced dilemma that only the women pursuing careers in comedy face: Even though comedy is supposed to be the art form where the outcasts and underdogs go to expose the lies inside of unfairness, women have been regularly expected to overlook the poor treatment we receive, lest we be called humorless and viewed as bad sports. In other words, we’re the one group asked not to use our “minority” status as a way to rise comedically. This is why we’re regularly labeled as unfunny.

[image error]Comedy in all of its various mutations has been my home for the past 40 years. Luckily for me, my idea of home has always been a place where I expected to be treated rudely which is why I was not knocked that far off balance when I heard about Louis C.K., whose meteoric rise to success as someone with deep insights into the human condition now seems pretty suspect.
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In 1978 when I first went rushing headlong toward the professional comedy lightbulb like a medicated moth, it never occurred to me that it was a male-dominated field, because I didn’t imagine that anyone smart thought laughter had a gender bias. I was aware that historically speaking most of my comedic heroes were men: Ernie Kovacs, W.C. Fields., The Marx Brothers, Monty Python. But also there was George Burns and Gracie Allen. Mae West and Lily Tomlin had their own empires. In the midst of all those guys at the Algonquin Round Table, there sat Dorothy Parker.
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And things looked to me like they were really opening up for women in comedy because there was this brand new show called Saturday Night Live, which was introducing more contemporary parody and satire onto the mostly corny TV landscape. Not only were half of the cast members women, there were three female names on the writing staff! That meant a grand total of six women creatives, a big leap forward from the usual token one.

 (PHOTO: ME when I was starting out.)

 

[image error]So I got in my car, which had only one functioning door, and drove from my home in San Francisco to Los Angeles with no way of knowing that 23 years later, in 2011, Jane Curtin, one of my favorite Not Ready for Prime Time Players and the one who anchored Weekend Update, would appear on Oprah and say the following about the women on the show’s writing staff back in the beginning: “Their battle was constant. They were working against John [Belushi] who said women are just fundamentally not funny. So you’d go to a table read and if a woman writer had written a piece for John, he would not read it in his full voice. He felt as if it was his duty to sabotage pieces written by women.” I also couldn’t have imagined that even five years after the world began a whole new century, I would pitch a sitcom idea to ABC only to be told “Well, the truth is we aren’t looking for any female character driven shows this season.”
[image error]But in the beginning, I didn’t know how heavily things were weighted (against women. So just a few years out
of art school, I went racing full steam ahead. At 27, I checked into a scary hotel in Burbank where they charged for the room by the hour and began seeking employment as a TV writer and stage time as a stand-up comedian, completely unaware that the very underpinnings of the comedy establishment had been constructed on a foundation designed to work against women from day one. I had no idea that straight through to the end of the 1960s, a mere ten years prior, all the clubs that hired stand-up comedians were owned and run by the mafia — not exactly a group known for its even-handed treatment of women and their career dreams. Says Kliph Nesteroff, comedy historian, “it didn’t matter if these clubs were in Cleveland, Portland, Corpus Christi or Baton Rouge — if it was a nightclub — the owners were the Mob. For a good forty years the Mob controlled American show business.” For those who now fret about how comedy club owners and festival directors are misogynistic, imagine waiting around for a guy in the mafia to give you a time slot.
[image error]Looking back, I have to laugh at the view I have of myself in my twenties, trotting cheerfully into a mob-run patriarchy where even the women on the most progressive show in television were being shunted to the back of the comedy bus. But the truth is that none of that occurred to me because, okay, I was young and stupid but also: It made no sense. Comedy was one of the things I loved most in the world. I saw it as a tool used by people intelligent enough to have figured out how to elevate the human condition by transforming dark, hidden, appalling truths into something over which we gained power via laughter.
[image error]I had yet to learn the most commonly repeated tropes used as an excuse not to hire women, which were the equivalent of the 16th century sink or swim method of identifying a witch. Back then the set of excuses went something like: “Having women in the room makes men feel inhibited. If they can’t swear and talk about their dicks, it gets in the way of being creative and funny.” The newer version of that describes the exact opposite: “Having women in the room causes men to become so hormonally imbalanced that the overwhelming fatigue caused by trying to exercise dick control gets in the way of being creative and funny.”
[image error]To which I would say: Hmm. Interesting. Maybe it’s the gender with so many roadblocks to being creative and funny who are bad hires.
 
[image error]Meanwhile, there in the middle of it all, are the women, expected to exhibit both empathy and support, to be accepting and non reactive to a firestorm of freeform sexual innuendo, while also helping construct an invisible barrier capable of helping these poor guys resist their own worst impulses. And at the same time be creative and funny.
[image error]Actually, I would argue that this very situation gives women the comedy advantage because there’s no better starting place for joke writing than the awareness that you’ve been trapped in the middle of someone else’s inescapable, neurotic behavioral limitations. Hey comedy! It’s 2017. Don’t keep breaking my heart by allowing yourself to become just another tier in the looming monolith full of dim bulb thinkers who degrade women and stand in their way.
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This very situation gives women the comedy advantage because there’s no better starting place for joke writing than the awareness that you’ve been trapped in the middle of someone else’s inescapable, neurotic behavioral limitations.

[image error]Okay yes, throughout your history, your most powerful players have overwhelmingly been rage filled, frustrated narcissistic men. But now we’ve got a president for that!
[image error]Come on! It’s time to join the modern world. (By which I mean the better one I envision after the Trump administration leaves the building.) And while we’re at it, how about if maybe we can also teach heterosexual men how to play a useful part in the promise of a better humanity. Or at least how to stop acting like assholes.

 

 

[image error]There are apologies and there will be more. Which brings us to the only one on the list of shamed public men currently under discussion that I know personally: Al Franken, who I’ve always thought of as one of the good guys. Unfortunately the omnipresent and casually demeaning treatment of women appears to be bi-partisan, which I guess is something every woman has always known.
[image error]Whether Al or Louis or anyone else has actually learned anything from the women they stunned into submission remains to be seen. A few people try and learn something from big moments like this one. Most do not. Time will tell if the culture of infuriating, insensitive, quasi-legal male behavior improves because of any of this, or if everything just cycles back to ground zero, as I have seen feminist progress do before. After all, the rest of these guys, (Harvey Weinstein, that creepy Roy Moore, our awful president, Bill Cosby, even Bill Clinton) have continued to call their accusers liars. If there is one thing life has taught me, it’s that there is no hope for redemption if powerful men don’t acknowledge that they did anything wrong.
[image error]Meanwhile, the women I know are no longer into holding our breath while we wait. We have had it with this shit. Notice has been served. The answer to these problems seems to be the same one that is being suggested in politics: Women need to run. We need to own the shows. We need to own the clubs. For too long men have been allowed to justify their behavior by selectively using statistics. For example, the way they claim to be the best most innovative high end chefs, while at the same time being unable to help out in a regular kitchen.
[image error]It’s our turn now. Time to relegate men to the minority status they so richly deserve. After all, they are only 49.2% of the population.
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  By now, we have all seen women laughing with salad. But yesterday, quite by accident during a google search, I stumbled upon something equally disturbing. The truth should come as no shock, since many professionally beautiful women are under a lot of pressure to maintain a very low body weight. Thus they may have little or no practical experience as cake consumers. Yet I was surprised and saddened to see how many of them had absolutely no idea how to direct a piece of cake into their mouths without unfortunate incident. I present the facts here but can offer no solution.

700-02038099
© Picup Pictures
Model Release: Yes
Property Release: No
Model Release
Woman With Chocolate on Her Face
Eating Cake

I wrote a piece about the evolution of the ever changing sex-bot.  You can read it HERE. If you DARE.

    

Well, I may be losing my mind but I thought the Democratic Convention Day 1 was pretty exciting. Passionate diverse looking people! Warring factions! Actual issues!

Having sat through the entire 4 days of the GOP convention last week, the differences between the two parties are now glaringly apparent in just the language used at today’s event alone. Gone was obsessive talk about ISIS, guns and walls. In their place were phrases rarely heard last week: Civil rights! Voting rights! Affordable health insurance! Labor unions! A woman’s right to choose! There were even mentions of raising the minimum wage and two little words I was worrying I might never hear again: CLIMATE CHANGE! What a relief to realize that everyone who spoke was from the public service sector or a union or a committee of some kind…not just the relatives or employees of the candidate. Yes, there were obvious short-comings, like the notable lack of discussion of golf courses or the building of luxury hotels. But they couldn’t get to everything. It was only day 1.

Day One started off strong and positive with a black gospel choir, followed by a montage about Philadelphia: a city full of clapping and jumping people. An appearance by Boys 2 Men immediately set a better standard for dancing. Taking in the high spirits, I thought to myself, “Go team! Hooray for my vision of the family of man!” But by the time the distinctively named Marcia Fudge, a woman of great dignity who chaired the event, began to be rudely overtaken by the Bernie chanters, I was back to remembering why I learned at a young age to be suspicious of anything reminiscent of family. Whenever things appear to be going great, somebody in the family always has to start in.

The minor chords of the chanting and the booing from the disillusioned Bernie contingent continued to be heard behind the next few speakers. They especially exhibited displeasure at the idea of Bernie being subsumed into the unified field, as seen in the signs that said “Stronger Together.”

As they continued to bleat, that mosquito like BOO tone began filling me with the same nervous apprehension I feel when I realize the people sitting behind me are planning to talk through the whole movie. Eventually the task became figuring out how to pay attention in class when the boys in the back of the room refused to stop pushing over desks.

It took an appearance by the fearless Sarah Silverman, a former Bernie campaigner, to finally address it. I have never admired her more. She later referred to Hilary “as the first person actually over qualified for the job of President. ‘

I was relieved to hear a repeated mentions of the specific pathologies of the terrifying Presidential candidate Mr. Trump, his misogyny and his bullying, his dishonesty and scams and obsession with personal aggrandizement. These included both a video about Trump university, and a live appearance by a Trump U. victim.

Act two started with Al Franken, who was smart and funny. And encouraged people to go to work for Hilary.

Then peaked with a great inspiring speech by Elizabeth Warren,. in which she referred to Trump’s entire campaign as an infomercial, and countered a lot of other Trump rhetoric.“America isn’t going broke.” She said, “ CEOs make tens of millions of dollars…Washington works great for those at the top but try to do something anything for working people and you have a fight on your hands.”

Though, for me some of the evening’s most amusing moments were provided by the cutaways to Bill Clinton, who appeared to be feeling flu-ish or peevish or peckish. Here he is after Elizabeth Warren’s rousing speech.

ACT THREE was totally owned by the electric, brilliant and graceful Michelle Obama who actually made me tear up…and I only cry twice a year. Maybe it was when she spoke about teaching her daughters to ignore the ignorant things being said about their father. “When they go low, we go high.” she said. But it was probably when she spoke of “Leaders like Hilary Clinton who keep coming back and putting cracks in that highest and hardest glass ceiling, lifting all of us along with her”

But ACT THREE was always building to the headliner, Bernie Sanders, who received about 8 minutes of cheering from supporters so emotional that they reminded me of old timey Beatle fans. Bernie loved their adoration for quite a while before he went on to assure them that he and Hilary had a “a significant coming together and we produced the most progressive political platform in the history of the Democratic party”

Now the downside: this week’s camera pool was provided by CNN who seem to be asleep at the switch. Though there was a live band playing, there were relatively few shots of the band or of audience dancing. My thoughts and prayers are with the camera crew that they can find their way down to the convention floor and right this terrible wrong. Here is all I could find.

 

 

I tried to cover the stuff everyone else was ignoring. I kind of succeeded.

Day One: Everything worth knowing PLUS  milennial dorks AND Exciting footage of G.O.P. DANCING!

Day Two: An actress pushes her resume AND The weakest joke of the entire day.

Day Three: Circus Woman, Trump’s rambling partner and okay,yes,..more dancing.

Day Four: A farewell to G.O.P. dancing AND a farewell to the RNC convention in general.

Obviously you have noticed, as I have, that emojis are now omni-present. The writing is on the wall. Its just a matter of time until the whole idea of carefully selected words becomes an interesting relic of  our cultural past, like the silent movie. Why bother with having a vocabulary when you can easily define your every emotion via a whole alphabet of ready made reactions provided for you by Japanese designers?

Anyway, its just a matter of time until song lyrics follow suit and all pop songs are reduced to their pure emojian essence. Everyone will embrace it. Everyone will demand it.

Here is a love song from the near future.

I didn’t intend to write this piece this year.  I felt like last year I was so thorough, everything had been said. Then VICE asked me if I would reconsider. And thus did I drive past his house and see that he or someone had added some NEW LIGHTS.
So….. HERE WE GO AGAIN.

 

In 1986 I worked in Los Angeles at KCOP, a local TV news station. I was given free reign, relatively speaking, to do pieces about Los Angeles. It was very exciting. It marked the first time I got to appear on camera and speak my own voice. My previous experiences had been writing/producing/editing pieces for Late Night with David Letterman. He always got to be the one behind the mic, because after all, it was HIS SHOW!  But it was a thrill for me to get the chance now.

Anyway, I did about 35-40 pieces and recently began digitizing them. They were recorded on 3/4 inch video tape. Then I started posting them on You Tube because, why not. Today a site called The LAist wrote a nice piece about them and I am very thrilled and happy to find out, thirty years later, that someone likes them.

Guess what I’m saying is: Sometimes these things take a long time!

If you want to see more of this stuff, I now have a lot of it up on a You Tube Channel I opened.

This one is a tour of the beaches of So.Cal. but I did it for something called RealLife magazine in the mid nineties. It contains two things I’ve never seen in one of these reports before. 1) a look at the restricted public access area in Broad Beach, north of Malibu. And 2) a chat with The World’s Best Wino.

People say to me “Merrill, didn’t you make three TV pilots between 1987 and 1991 that you were kind of proud of?”
Okay, no…No one ever said that to me.

But because I have spent the week digitizing my old VHS tapes, I offer them to you now because: why not?

1. From 1987: This Week Indoors. Written and directed by and starring Merrill Markoe and Harry Shearer. with guest appearances by Fred Willard and Harry Shearer as Dick Clark, Laurie Anderson, Jerry Falwell and Ronald Reagan.

2. From 1988: Merrill Markoe’s Guide to Glamorous Living: Written and directed by Merrill Markoe with special guest appearances by Andrea Martin, Elayne Boosler, Martin Mull, Fred Willard, Harry Shearer and David Letterman.

and

3. From 1991: NEWS 2 Us; a personal newscast written by and starring Merrill Markoe and Richard Rosen.

with guest star Harry Shearer.

and also:

4. The Lewis Lectures. From 1999/2000. Originally for Adult Swim.

I have been digitizing all my old VHS tapes and decided to make a page for them on You Tube.

They are:HERE and HERE and they date back to the eighties. And I am still digitizing. Its a sickness.

But now, through the magic of digitized video, you can join me at The Republican Natl. conventions of 92 and 96.  Or in Alaska for the Talkeetna Bachelor Auction.  Or in Las Vegas for the Nite Club and Bar Expo, or the Pet Industry Convention. And more!  Here’s some love advice (from the 90s) and a food technology convention (from the 80s.) Thank you for your time and good night.