Quote: Tony Cowards @ December 16 2009, 10:38 AM GMTI agree but when your job is to make jokes on a topical show and the makers of said show give you a picture of Rebecca Adlington to work with what can you do?
It's more a fault of the shows producer than of Frankie Boyle IMHO.
I know what you mean, but I would have refused to go for the obvious and done something harmless (I like to think...) 
Quote: john lucas 101 @ December 16 2009, 10:19 AM GMTMy favourite comedians over the years have been Alexei Sayle, Jasper Carrott, Jerry Sadowitz and Stewart Lee. I dare say some of those may be considered for their edginess, but it isn't what specifcally attracts me to them.
Interesting. I've loved all those comics over the years.
I would say that some of Sayle's and Sadowitz's material could be considered the same style as Boyle.
Eg, Sayle: "A lot of people come up to me on the street and ask me where I get my ideas, and I say to them 'Sod off!'"
Sadowitz: "The Pope, what a c**t."
(As an aside, I'm sure you'll agree the reason why Lee is a genius is that his "I vomited into the gaping anus of Christ" wasn't the joke, the joke was that he told it "in context")
My problem with F. Boyle is people finding him somehow outrageous, but his humour is really quite cheap, with cheap obvious targets,like Rebecca Adlington. Where is the value of 'satirising' somebody like that? There's no thought process or moral centre to it. Just knee-jerk, pack driven school boy humour.
I'd have to agree, given that example. The first part of the Adlington joke was rubbish. Not only that, but it's as old as spoons themselves. The second part, about her being able to hold her breath quite well, almost but not quite justified it.
Not Boyle's finest hour, but hardly a typical target, I would say.
He's built a reputation for joking about shocking topics like paedophilia, but he's usually got an original take on them.
On his new beard: "What is it about this look that small children find so attractive?"
I'd class him as "edgy" precisely because his topics are those on the "edge" of what is considered acceptable. There's something unnerving about his material.
Quote: Dolly Dagger @ December 16 2009, 10:40 AM GMTI know what you mean, but I would have refused to go for the obvious and done something harmless (I like to think...)
I think the trouble is, and like I said before I not a big fan of Frankie Boyle, is that his schtick is to say fairly nasty things, to say the unsayable, so his comedic brain is geared to saying something fairly unpleasant (it's become his default setting), so when presented with a picture of someone who's innocuous he can't help himself but say something that comes across as quite nasty and vitriolic.
As a comedian you are quite often standing on the boundary of taste and if pushed, of course, you are going to cross that boundary, personally I think it's down to the programme makers to channel Frankie's acerbic viciousness at targets that are worthy of his scorn, rather than egg him on like the bully's best mate who says "Go on, hit him! Go on!".
Quote: john lucas 101 @ December 16 2009, 10:19 AM GMTMy problem with F. Boyle is people finding him somehow outrageous, but his humour is really quite cheap, with cheap obvious targets,like Rebecca Adlington. Where is the value of 'satirising' somebody like that? There's no thought process or moral centre to it. Just knee-jerk, pack driven school boy humour.
Schoolboy humour? No.
Schoolboy humour would have been 'She's got nice tits (snigger, snigger)'.
The 'back of a spoon' joke was in fact a brilliant bit of comedy because it contained an undeniable and embarrassing truth beautifully expressed, it was outrageously unkind, and it was what everyone was thinking but too ashamed to say.
Should it have been broadcast?
Perhaps not. Ms Adlington does not deserve national (or even local) ridicule.
But it was very funny.
Quote: Ming the Mirthless @ December 16 2009, 11:01 AM GMTThe 'back of a spoon' joke was in fact a brilliant bit of comedy because it contained an undeniable and embarrassing truth beautifully expressed, it was outrageously unkind, and it was what everyone was thinking but too ashamed to say.
It's a joke that's been told many times before though - I've heard it many times said about Pete Townsend, so to me it wasn't even funny becuase there was absolutely no surprise.
Quote: Dolly Dagger @ December 16 2009, 11:08 AM GMTIt's a joke that's been told many times before though - I've heard it many times said about Pete Townsend, so to me it wasn't even funny becuase there was absolutely no surprise.
It's only mildly funny when said about Pete Townsend because men are, quite rightly, allowed by society to have strange faces.
Women, quite wrongly, are not.
The surprise therefore was that FB flew in the face of convention by daring to say it not only about a woman but about a totally innocent and undeserving young girl who had recently brought great kudos upon herself and her country.
If he'd made the joke to me in private, I'd have laughed out loud but if he'd asked if she should say it on the Mock The Week, I wouldn't have had a ready answer.
There are some very interesting points being made on this thread!
I'd like to know what Frankie and Rebecca think about it.
Quote: zooo @ December 16 2009, 11:44 AM GMTThere are some very interesting points being made on this thread!
I'd like to know what Frankie and Rebecca think about it.
As far as I recall, he refused to apologise and shifted the blame to the MTW producers and she had a good long cry.
I hope not!!
Adlington filed a complaint to the BBC after the Trust slapped Boyle's wrist.
This is what he said:
"We're fighting two wars, there's swine flu and the global economy is going down the toilet. People expect you to talk about this - and what do the production team send us? A picture of Rebecca Adlington.
"Our top story was the British team returning home from the Olympics. We'd talked about them for five weeks and yet still had to joke about them getting off a plane.
"I mean, what are you going to write about, apart from the fact that she looks like a beagle in the photo?"
Interesting slip in that last sentence. Surely they don't "write" their jokes in advance?
Quote: Kevin Murphy @ December 16 2009, 11:45 AM GMT. . . and she had a good long cry.
I didn't know that but it was always the danger, and a very real one to boot.
With the benefit of hindsight, therefore, he should have kept his mouth tightly shut.
Quote: Ming the Mirthless @ December 16 2009, 11:55 AM GMTI didn't know that but it was always the danger, and a very real one to boot.
With benefit of hindsight, therefore, he should have kept his mouth tightly shut.
Well, obviously I've no idea if she cried or not. But I think I'd be on pretty safe ground saying she was either angry or upset.
Quote: zooo @ December 16 2009, 11:44 AM GMTThere are some very interesting points being made on this thread!
On a BCG thread? Surely some mistake.
I don't think of Boyle as edgy, because he doesn't seem to have anything behind the comedy other than a desire to shock and say the so called unsayable. Someone like Stewart Lee or Bill Hicks had something to say, they weren't just doing rape gags. That's not to say Boyle can't be very funny though.
As always, I'm confused by the BCG reaction to a comedian's jokes. Week in, week out, the telly jesters make fun of people's looks - HIGNFY, Buzzcocks, Argumental, etc. and you all seem to lap it up.
But just like Sachs-gate, no one seems to give a shit until a newspaper tells them what to think. Then it's 'Oh no, how terribly shocking. Ban them!'
Frankie Boyle was the highlight of the Comedy Awards - not so much for what he said but the attitude in which he said it.