Ricky Gervais isn’t dumbing down his humor for the woke crowd.
The comedian is stirring the online cauldron yet again after claiming that “smart people” don’t get offended by jokes about AIDS, Hitler and other taboo topics. The 60-year-old UK comic dropped the anti-PC bombshell while promoting his new Netflix special, “SuperNature,” on “The Late Show With Stephen Colbert.”
“Smart people know you can deal with anything, particularly when dealing with something like irony,” “The Office” creator told Colbert, 58.
During the interview, Gervais explained that he’d added new material to the special, which he’d tried out prior to the coronavirus quarantine. Colbert then asked if the comedian had to switch up his material due to his two-year layoff from stand-up during the lockdown.
That’s when Gervais dropped the bombshell. “It [his comedy] was always evolving,” the funnyman replied. “There was a thought, ‘Will this be out of date?’ And then I realized that when you’re dealing with, you know, famine, AIDS, cancer, Hitler, those dudes are evergreen. Yeah, so they’re not going to, they don’t date.”
Colbert seemed to agree with his sentiment, saying, “There is no audience that isn’t going to love that.”
“Boo! Not Hitler! It was a long time ago,” Gervais replied facetiously, prompting the host to laughingly reply, “Like, you don’t go to a Ricky Gervais concert for just feel good.”
However, while the aforementioned topics are certainly sensitive to many, the “After Life” star insisted that audiences “do feel good” and that the ultimate goal “is to make them laugh.”
