2y ago

TIL that Robin Williams had gained a reputation within stand-up comedy circles for stealing jokes.

Robin Williams ‘used to steal jokes from a lot of people’, claims actor

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I learned this while listening to the podcast ‘Den hvide væg’ where comedian Anders Matthesen talks with his friend and co-comedian Thomas Hartmann about their careers, which touches on overlapping joke material. If you understand danish, I highly recommend this podcast. Otherwise you must make do with my subsequent research and link to The Independent ☺️
- Nice recommendation. How hard is it to learn enough danish to keep up?
  
  Can you juggle with one hand, chop vegetables with the other and gargle mouthwash while singing Amazing Grace?
His comedy was largely a stream of consciousness type of thing. I'm fairly sure that he only realized that some of the joke he told were stolen after they'd left his mouth. He wasn't the type of comedian who worked from a "tight 15" on a regular basis. It was more that he'd discover that an audience member was half German, half Japanese and would then go off on a spontaneous stream of WWII jokes about their ancestry.
I don't see it as theft if he paid them - albeit after the fact.
- He didn’t ask them permission nor ask what they felt the joke was worth. He just used it and then told them what they’d be getting in return.
  If I took your phone and then sent you a check for $500, you’d probably still consider it to be stolen. I didn’t “buy” your phone because you never agreed to give it to me.
  
  Considering my phone cost 150 bucks is be happy.
Is?

9 comments