(A version of this piece originally appeared in the newsletter Too Much TV)
On Monday, Netflix announced that they had made a deal to bring three episodes of the podcast Kill Tony to the streamer. And as part of the deal, it would also include a stand-up special by Kill Tony co-host Tony Hinchcliffe.
The deal might sound fairly mundane, especially if you read the coverage of the deal in industry trades such as The Hollywood Reporter:
Hinchcliffe is no stranger to Netflix viewers, he had a previous stand-up special for the streamer and has participated in some of its roast content, perhaps most notably last year’s roast of Tom Brady, where his set was among the most shared on social media. He also famously performed a set at then-candidate Trump’s rally at Madison Square Garden last year, where a joke about Puerto Rico angered some viewers.
The phrase "angered some viewers" is doing a lot of the work here, given that during the speech Hinchcliffe not only referred to Puerto Rico as "a floating island of garbage in the middle of the ocean," talked about how Latinos “love making babies....There’s no pulling out. They don’t do that. They come inside, just like they did to our country." And then there was the weird story where he claimed to be spending time with a "black buddy" in which they "carved watermelons" together.
And it's not as if these comments were a one-off. It's pretty much a typical performance for Hinchcliffe, who is one of the Austin-based comics who both claim they are free-speech proponents, but also block audience members from bringing in their phones to performances. Because it's much easier to be brave when you never have to worry about the consequences.
One of the few times a bit of one of his performances leaked out was in 2021, after being introduced at an Austin, Texas gig by fellow comedian Peng Dang. Footage of Hinchcliffe referring to Dang as a "chink" was leaked onto social media and it led to Hinchcliffe having a few shows canceled and being dropped by his talent agency, WME.
There has been some media reporting that suggests this deal is some sort of a nod to Donald Trump, which misreads the situation in a couple of important ways.
Firstly, there has been lots of reporting in recent months in the political press that Donald Trump was extremely unhappy with Hinchcliffe's Madison Square Garden rally and had expressed regret that the comic had been booked at all.
But more importantly, Hinchcliffe is just the latest in a series of comics with Netflix deals who have humor that is mostly just a bunch of racist and sexist jokes that are designed more to be "triggering" to what they consider to be the woke people.
Fox News host Greg Gutfeld was interviewed by NPR's Scott Simon last weekend, and as Latenighter reports, the interview quickly went sideways when Gutfeld was asked about a Nazi joke he told on his talks show. Gutfeld did the now-familiar hemming and hawing you often hear from comics who tell these jokes. Then he said the quiet part out loud:
“Some things you’re not going to like,” Gutfeld allowed. “In fact, I’m certain there are many things in my show you’re not going to like. That’s your right. And there are a lot of jokes that just aren’t funny to some people. But to other people, they are funny. Those make me laugh. And they make me laugh because I’m pointing out how upsetting it is to people like you. Even when I point it out, it’s still upsetting to you. I find that funny. It’s a meta joke, if you will.”
And that's the real goal. The joke itself wasn't especially funny. But Gutfeld thought the fact it would upset some people was incredibly hilarious.
And there is entire subset of modern comics whose entire careers are built around the premise of "watch me smirk while I say some racist thing I insist is just a joke."
Take Andrew Schulz, whose Andrew Schulz: Life Netflix special premiered a couple of weeks ago. Here is just a few snippets from his special:
"When your wife first gets pregnant, you have to go get a baby-specific doctor, called an OB-GYN, right? I didn't know what the fuck that was. I thought it was more gay letters. My wife's like, "We need an OB-GYN." I was like "Why do need a fuckin' gay guy to deliver the baby? What do they know about this? It's not their jurisdiction at all." I don't want some gay doctor to open my wife's legs, like (campy voice) "Ew, yucky. Vagina."
"Gross. I want to look at something hot, like a butt full of shit, you know?"
"Here's something you should know I wish I knew. Every two hours during labor, the doctor's going to walk in the room, finger your wife right in front of you. That's a pretty important piece of information, right?....yeah, you wife's gonna be a sock puppet for the next 24 hours, so get ready for this fuckin' illuminati humiliation ritual you just signed up for."
"Choose your OB-GYN wisely. Don't choose some 6'6" Viking with a baseball mitt as a hand. Your wife's not even dilating. He's scoopin' it out, Baskin Robbins. Thank God we had this little Filipina doctor. She looked like the chick that made the outfits for The Incredibles. She had the smallest little hands. They might have been chopsticks. They were so tiny."
"I'm Googling on the low, "dad C-section. It's just Tranny porn showing up on my phone."
"I go around the curtain. I see the baby. Now I don't know if any of y'all have ever seen a brand-new baby? You know how frogs start as tadpoles? Babies start as Puerto Rican. Did you guys know that? Every baby starts as Puerto Rican. This was the most Puerto Rican baby I've ever seen in my life. It had a Yankee fitted. It had a keychain with a frog on it. It was driving a Toyota Rav4 with a 4.7 Uber rating. It wasn't even 'goo-goo, ga-ga.' It was (makes trilling sound like a Freddie Prinze knock-off)."
"The second my baby turned white, I said 'They will not replace us.' I regret saying that out loud."
Or let's look at the Netflix comedy special Shane Gillis: Beautiful Dogs, who among other things had made so many ugly comments in podcasts that when Lorne Michaels hired him to join the cast of Saturday Night Live, NBC forced Michaels to fire him.
"What about all the mass shootings you guys have all the time? I say, "At least we're not gay. You know? There's really not a good comeback for that, 'cause it's a pretty serious problem. We're the only country that has that. We're not making any adjustments. None. What, we're gonna give up our guns like a bunch of fucking gay guys?"
"Australia also gave us 'Love On The Spectrum.' Thank you Australia. Incredible show. Actually incredible. How did this show get made? That's an insane show. Only Australia could have come up with this. Only Australians would be like (Australian accent). 'Allright. Know how autistic people are extremely uncomfortable in social settings? Stick a camera in these fuckin retards' face and watch them talk."
Netflix has a new season of Love On The Spectrum set to premiere and it is delightful. I'm happy the streamer is supporting the show, but I wonder how the cast feels about a comic on Netflix describing them as "retards."
And I could spend another 1,500 words recounting similar comments from other Netflix comedy specials. But I think I've provided a pretty clear sense of what is going on at the streamer.
To be fair, these specials only represent a small percentage of the Netflix comedy output and that includes specials from comics living across the globe. But Netflix has decided to give bandwidth to a group of comics who are certainly popular with their rabid podcast fans. But there is a reason why they don't especially want what they say in their Netflix specials to be publicized. Because they know that it's an approach that is not widely popular.
That's also why you'll hear these comics deliver relatively uncontroversial performances when they appear on late night TV or other mainstream platforms. They want to have it both ways. Build a revenue stream by sounding like a traditional comic, then wading into every trolling racist/sexist/insulting topic when they preform on their podcasts.
I think it says something about Netflix that they feel comfortable enough on that streamer to be more honest with their material and topics.
I'm not suggesting they should be boycotted or even that Netflix shouldn't stream their comedy specials. But I do want Netflix subscribers to know a bit more of what is on the streaming service, hiding between episodes of Cobra Kai and The Residence.
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As you know, I've been writing about some of the jokes you'll hear on a bunch of Netflix comedy specials and the biggest response I've received negatively all sound like variations of Gutfeld's explanation. "Oh, it was just a joke...I said I didn't believe it..." The eventually they admit it's mostly about triggering the Left. Or anyone who isn't especially impressed with jokes whose entire premise is "Look how big of a racist I am."
As I mentioned in my video, I'm not looking for Netflix to drop the deal or arguing anyone should boycott Netflix. But as you may have noticed from some of my recent reporting, the streamer has a soft spot for these racist-adjacent comics. Netflix executives will argue that they don't want to censor anyone. And that's their call. I just wish the industry made more of an effort to highlight who Netflix is deciding to promote globally.
