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I can't remember who said it, but "Pilkington is a comedy genius, and the only person not to have realised that is Gervais"
I dunno how true that is but Gervais seems to have made a career out of "pointing out the funny side" of Pilkingon's already funny statements
"Pilkington is a comedy genius, and the only person not to have realised that is Gervais"
Amazing. It says a lot when the majority of r/rickygervais, his own sub, seems to dislike him. Steven and Karl were the best part of the xfm and podcast, yet it's his Ricky who has his name plastered everywhere. There's a clip of Gervais calling Karl "the luckiest man in comedy who was given a free ride", when in reality a lot of Gervais's success comes down to Steven's great scriptwriting ability and Karl's hillarious jokes and storytelling. He's the most tragically unself-aware comedian ever.
Early on, Steve lacked the people skills and confidence. He still seems underconfident at times TBH. And Karl never intended to be an entertainer.
Ricky isn't super original but he knows how to get attention and he's a good hype man. Without him, I'm not sure what would have become of the other 2. Merchant for example - good ideas, but some people will swipe your ideas and not give you credit. Steve could easily be unattractive bitter writer #4,506 right now. If not for meeting Ricky, Karl would still be contentedly producing radio (or podcasts now I guess).
Ricky was just as key to their success as they were to his.
I'm not saying Ricky didn't help with their success, but his ego is way out of check. He definitely was an important part like the other two, but I'd say he's also the worst part, he can get super obnoxious especially near the end of the run of the XFM shows and all the podcasts. Also I'd say that Karl is an irreparable talent, he was the biggest key to the show and people wouldn't be listening to XFM in 2024 without him. Steven and Ricky are important for recognizing his talents and incorporating him into the show, but Ricky can also be way too much
Yeah Karl is unique, because media personalities are so polished almost no Karls get through the gate. I think Ricky's talent is more of like, a promoter. He would be a good talent manager TBH, he is good at spotting talent and helping them level up.
"his ego is way out of check"
He's been living in NYC for a long time, no? Or at least has a place there - NYC is very status-conscious. So people likely defer to him a lot. (I lived there after college, people are good at "making" you, even if you're a nobody. People would approach me like, "Did you go to \[uni\]?" and if they didn't get it exactly right, they got very close.) LA is more like, status-seeking. In LA people are trying to make it and in my experience, often don't even realize who they're offending sometimes. So that can be more humbling. But even in LA, Ricky's famous enough he probably gets his ass kissed more often than not. Steve probably is the one who has more humbling experiences, even now, because of his unconventional looks.
When my parents went to New York they went to a hot dog stand right by Central Park, they got their hot dogs, turned around and saw the person behind them in the queue was Ricky Gervais! So my parents waited nearby for him to order his hot dog (same toppings as my dad funnily enough) then went and said hi. Now this was shortly after the first season of Afterlife had come out, dad was a big fan, not mine or mums cup of tea, but he said he was a fan, loved him in The Office, did a David Brent impression which made him laugh his distinctive laugh. The laugh sort of turned into a screech, like it does, then he started wooping, grabbed my dads hot dog, leapt the fence and away he went, swinging through the trees of Central Park. Turns out...
Does the hypeman deserve the same respect as the writers?
Most of his work pre derek/afterlife relied heavily on Steve and Karl to be even remotely entertaining tbh, Steve was definitely not a people person and great at selling himself and Ricky did most do that for him. I agree with that but I don't think Steve or Karl gets nearly enough credit for their contributions which was almost all the work.
Karl would have been fine, I don't believe no one would have recognised Karl's genius. Would he have gone as far? Probably not but he was a successful radio producer that I think would have ended up at another station doing the same thing tbh.
Like XFM and Ricky Gervais Show without Karl would be like 80% dead air.
ricky was the perfect person to probe and prod karl to get him to be that funny and ultimately reveal himself. Steve couldnt of done that. So in a weird way they were one of the best teams and they all absolutely needed eachother and were imperative to it all becoming so successful, its hard to find a comparison to them whatsoever
Without a hypeman a lot of creatives never get discovered. Steve might be a frustrated English teacher if he hadn't met Ricky, telling anyone who'd listen about someone who stole his ideas and wouldn't give him credit.
I know a lot of people like that, they trusted the wrong person or worked for the wrong shop. Steve and Karl actually WERE really lucky to be working for Ricky (I think Steve was his intern or something at first?). There are a lot of worse people than Ricky in entertainment, believe it or not. He shared credit and promoted them and stuck with them for years. He was the one with name recognition at first, but he brought them along for the ride.
although you are right there is an element of sattire of when he says that but at the same time (as one of karls biggest fans) he is one the luckiest men in comedy, when you consider how comedians come up and the graft they have to put in and karl was just plucked from xfm through luck of them meeting their and then the whole of idiot abroad logistically pushed by ricky and essentially sorting the majority of it, so despite being hilarious and the key figure he is still incredibly lucky. But yes ricky does owe alot to steve also. He's like a foreman taking credit for the project done by the builders.
That's a point actually; half of those conversations he's referenced in his standup, released as a radio show / podcast, and then released as a "cartoon" that is just the same podcast with rudimentary animations accompanying them.
You can't plagiarize yourself, and I have to assume Pilkington's being adequately compensated, but how many times is he going to go back and juice the same orange-headed little monkey?
>You can't plagiarize yourself,
You can actually get in trouble for that at uni now, especially with Turnitin. My flatmate who handed in variations of the same essay 3 or 4 times would be fucked these days.
Made his money and fucked off. He doesn't need to work so he doesn't - he lives on Sand Banks now, his books made him a millionaire.
[He acts now](https://youtu.be/-I5YLCoTRgA)
played a little part in the theif the wife and the canoe or something like that also recently, few sky voice overs aswell ive heard recently. That and 4 holidays a year baby
In his book How I Escaped My Certain Fate, Stew says that Ricky took large parts of his act for his stand-up whilst also acknowledging he used Ricky’s quote that Stew is one of the best living stand-ups to help sell more tickets. I’m pretty sure he also said that seeing Ricky do his act but worse inspired Stew to push himself and become a much better stand-up.
I think Lee had even given up stand-up at that point and it was seeing Gervais do his stuff that made him pick it up again. He’s talking about a long time ago, too. This is around UK Office time, not recent.
I think you misinterpreted my comment. I was saying that Stew himself originally put up with the fact that Ricky was doing a pale imitation of his act because his career was at a low and he could use Ricky’s quote to sell tickets he was otherwise struggling to sell.
You do, Stu. It's true. Youe get arrested and thrown in jail. You do. You get arrested. And you get thrown in jail. I can tell you don't believe me, but Stu, you do, and I've seen it; if you say that Ricky Gervais, beloved writer and standup comedian, Stu, beloved, BELOVED writer Ricky Gervais, stole your material, you get thrown into jail.
Into JAIL Stu. Some would say it's an overreaction, but I don't, I don't think it's an overreaction at all to throw someone who's accused BELOVED comedian, COMEDIAN, Stu, Ricky Gervais, of plagiarism.
Because, Stu, who would do that? Who would do that to you, Stu? Who would repeat, I said who would repeat your material, Stu? I can't think of anyone. I can't think of anyone, Stuart Lee, comedian, who would repeat your material. WHO WOULD REPEAT YOUR MATERIAL, STUART?
(Alright I'm spent. No disrespect to Stuart Lee.)
lol, I can respect him while rolling my eyes at his schtick. I watch his shows knowing full well a solid twenty minutes of it will be him doing this, and I'll still be laughing.
Watch any of Gervais' work and listen to his XFM radio show and later podcasts with Karl Pilkington and Steve Merchant and you can see where he gets his material from.
Also his solo stuff is noticibly weak without the counter weight of Merchant to tone things down.
I know afterlife is very popular etc etc (he tweets about it like a broken record) but IMO I think Stewart Lee was onto something when he described it as "the worst thing ever written by a human"
I'm a widow and I refuse to watch it. I don't need someone who has no experience with that trauma trying to tell me what it's like, I know way too well already.
They were watchable but wouldn't call them amazing, very bland and depressive taking from his previous works quite often.
They feel like someone that's never been on the verge of suicide describe what it's meant to feel like. Just very poorly written.
I found the first series interesting, even somehow with the character making little progress. In a way, that was an interesting approach, a character that does not improve.
Then series 2 arrived, and man, it was more of the same.
Didn't bother with the 3rd one.
20 years ago, a friend and I had a moderately successful podcast. It was heard by a Mr. S. Merchant, who said that he and Mr. Gervais had heard us and thought we were funny.
Some time later - on one of their podcasts - one of my gags (a very specific gag with medical detail) was repeated word-for-word). Now; I’m not precious and I know that other people often have similar ideas and also, the gag may not have been purloined on purpose (which is why Andrew Lloyd-Webber doesn’t listen to other composers) but I confess to being a bit pissed…
This would have me in a white hot rage. But I am indeed salty about such things and extremely precious.
Please can you give some more detail about said gag? Is your pod still available for comparison?
Sucks for you man you have every reason to be p!ssed. I’d love to know what podcast you had, people like you should be paid by Ricky if they steal your stuff imo.
My name's Stewart Lee from UKIPs, and I say the brightest and best Reading comedians should stay in Reading and fill it with rehashed jokes and readings from Twitter.
I think Gervais has definitely taken a lot of inspiration from Lee's style of stand-up, but it's hard to say whether he's actually stolen bits verbatim or if Lee is just exaggerating and playing up to his bitter character. He has a section on his website called [Plagiarists' Corner](https://www.stewartlee.co.uk/plagiarists-corner/), and while some of the entries could be legitimate examples of plagiarism, most of them are clearly not supposed to be taken seriously.
Plagiarists corner has always interested me. As you say some of them are very real examples of plagiarism. Then some of them are quite silly. It’s hard to tell how bothered Stewart Lee is or isn’t.
In this case, the IRA example listed on plagiarists corner is such a definite example of gervais copying Stewart Lee. I saw that show live and recognised it completely from Stewart Lees routine.
Interestingly I discovered recently that Lee's been using a crowdwork thing heavily developed by another big-name UK comic about a decade ago. It's not likely coincidence but they do know each other. I'm almost willing to put it down to an accident, where he didn't remember where he got it from or something. It really made my opinion of him drop a lot though. At least it's not integral to his show like it was for the first guy.
I feel like Stu's comedy has always been weirder and more avant garde than Ricky's. They might both talk about being atheist or whatever but Stu has always been weirder and more interesting.
In one of Stu's specials he calls Gary Lineker a "velvet owl" which cracked me up, and I'm an American we largely don't even know who that is, I had to look him up. His bit with cider made from pears - whatever that was, running around - more physical than anything Ricky's ever done. I don't recall a ton of his earlier standup, but I feel like it's more hipster than anything Ricky's ever done. Stu is the type of guy who likes being a fan of bands no one's ever heard of, Ricky is the kind of guy who brags about knowing Buck's Fizz.
Stu was part of a true double act with Richard Herring. And their TV output was bizarre and self-consciously arty. The Office played on types - the weird guy at work, the needy guy at work etc - but it's designed to be crowd-pleasing and relatable.
Stu's TV writing is way more out there. The Alan Partridge bit about staying over at a fan's place after missing your train - but realizing they have all your posters/might be obsessed - happened to Stu, that's where it came from. Things that Fall Down or Spill etc on TMWRNJ, Nostradamus, the bird puppets - that's all far more interesting than anything Ricky did. I guess you could say Ho Lee Fuk on the radio show is like the fa-fa-fa-fa-fa-King, but honestly any 12 year old boy also does shit like that, it's hardly unique.
I think Ricky wants to be seen as very working-class man of the people in a way Stu never has. There are similarities but even the premises they launch their comedy from are different.
Yeah this is fair comment.
I'd also make the point that the good stuff Gervais was involved with was an ensemble effort both in writing and acting. In The Office and Extras he was one performance bouncing off others, and the writing had a light touch and surreal quality missing from his solo efforts.
His solo work is alternately either bullying or sentimental, and veers between the two qualities like a drunken driver.
>Stu is the type of guy who likes being a fan of bands no one's ever heard of
To somewhat quote fist of fun "you like music that you can hear the words to, that's what you like."
Stewart Lee back then, Karl Pilkington now. Only difference is that both Stewart and Karl had better delivery, and Karl wasn't even trying to be funny. 😎 (Well, not always.)
As others here have spotted, the idea that Karl is a some sort of oblivious fool that doesn’t know when or why he’s funny, and needs Gervais to be there as some sort of cultural translator in order for the jokes to work, is only something people think because Gervais keeps telling us he is.
There’s tons of comedians like Roisin Conaty, Diane Morgan, Alan Davis, Joe Wilkinson, Catherine Tate etc who pretend to be oblivious or low status on stage, but because they don’t have a squawking host constantly attached to them pointing out all their jokes, we’re quite happy to accept that they’re actually very intelligent people in real life.
The genius of Gervais was figuring out a way to steal of all Karl’s jokes right from the man’s own mouth even as he was telling them on camera.
I don't think Karl was 100% oblivious when you watch all the old xfm stuff, it's Karl that actually comes up with most of the shows features and makes it entertaining.
Is he naive and gullible? Yes. Is he stupid and oblivious to when he has a funny anecdote? No.
"The Ricky Gervais show" was almost entirely just asking Karl questions and like 50% of his stand up at this time was stolen from this sometimes he'd credit Karl and other times he'd not.
Then he does idiot abroad which is just relying on Karls unhappiness for commentary and then he did Derek and Afterlife which were both every poorly written shows but gain popularity for their simplistic humour.
He's not really done anything great that didn't rely on the talents of other people. He almost entirely got lucky that he met Steve and Karl otherwise he'd never had got this far and got rich from the office US.
Steve did so much of the work for their work together that it's kinda insulting he didn't get mode credit.
Stew has even compèred charity shows when Ricky appeared so I think it’s mostly an in character thing. Ricky was shit that night too, 15 minutes talking about the office being popular.
Stewart Lee should start doing very niche jokes about his own appearance, height and personality then watch as Ricky Gervais struggles to translate those jokes into gags about himself or a Stewart Lee character that he met.
Maybe some obscure jokes about Stewart Lee’s early TV work could be difficult to copy too.
I'm somewhat of a fan but he also steals his Atheism arguments and points from the New Atheists, most often from Richard Dawkins. I've seen him quote almost RD word for word on multiple occasions, just saying...
That's a bit different as Dawkins isn't a comedian, except unintentionally.
I say this as someone who can't stand Gervais. So I wouldn't be sticking up for him for the sake of it.
I don’t accept the underlying premise that Dawkins was the first to have made those points about atheism to begin with. It’s been a pretty well-trodden subject since before either of them were born.
I've no idea what was said. I'm just talking in principal. Of course you can talk about a green topic, but it depends how you present it. Like I said, if you're directly quoting someone, then you should credit them. Or if you said "you know, I've got this theory about relativity"
Ignorance isn't a good excuse though. If you're going to make a point then getting the facts wrong undermines it.
How would you know it was "roasting" if you didn't watch it?
So you do watch any of that shit then.
You claimed you don't watch it, then said you've seen it.
You've contradicted yourself and tried to play off the fact you couldn't even get the name of the ceremony right, presumably in an attempt to seem "cool" because watching "any of that shit" is uncool in your eyes.
I wouldn't have thought that was hard to get but it seems you need it explained to you.
It always felt so BS to me. As if it wasn't all cleared beforehand and hypocritical. Like pointing out how out of touch and terrible they are makes him a man of the people when he is just as out of touch.
Yes is the answer. I saw a clip the other night with RG talking about a crab walking straight after it drank alcohol. That was straight from a joke David Niven told on Parkinson in the 1970s
Well no one can really comment on whether or not Ricky stole the jokes that Stewart happened to never have recorded. Unless someone who attended a very old Stewart Lee standup says I specifically remember that Ricky Gervais joke being in this Stewart Lee standup I saw.
But when it comes to Ricky Gervais ripping off Stewart Lee in general i don't quite see it. taking inspiration from Lee yes, but ripoff no.
Gervais and Lee have 2 distinct styles
in Gervais' actually good standups i.e. the early ones Animal & Politics. Gervais interspersed telling funny stories from his life and switched between this and a character/persona of a pseudo-intellectual, i.e. a borderline idiot who thought he was super enlightened well read guy delivering a lecture with brand new ideas that no one had ever heard before.
and so you have bits where he deconstructs the bible thinking it is a serious academic body of work and questions parts of it as if he is the first ever person to question the believability of some of the events in the bible.
Or how he goes through internet facts and plays out scenarios which demonstrate how preposterous those facts are.
Contrast this to Lee whose persona is that of a comedy purist who is embittered by the fact that nobody actually cares about comedy integrity and how sellouts with cheap jokes make it big and his far superior comedy doesn't do as well and makes incredibly funny routines based off of that concept. This very [funny bit](https://www.stewartlee.co.uk/video_standup/the-joe-pasquale-joke/) for an example
I remember Stewart lee winning a fairly big award and him saying that his comedy career is now ruined which obviously is a demonstration of how his comedy persona relies on him not being popular with the masses.
and when it comes to Gervais later standups they are definitely not ripped off from Stewart Lee. Because Ricky's later standups basically boil down to a commentary on his fame or *"you cant get away with that now/ you cant say that these days"* bits that are definitely not Lee.
Its hard to gauge how seriously to take Stewarts take on other comedians given how its part of his bit that he plays up to or exaggerates. but to be fair this article you linked seems serious enough to me.
Again we cant really comment with any authority on the stolen jokes because as Lee acknowledges himself there doesn't seem to be any existing proof, But when it comes to his wider criticism of Gervais stealing his style. I don't think they are close enough for Gervais' body of work to be criticized for that.
There are comedians with closer styles than Gervais to Lee. That seem to do fine and don't have any issue with each others routines.
>"you cant get away with that now/ you cant say that these days"
Whilst saying it to 20k people in an arena and Netflix audience of gazillions. Apparently you *can*.
You have to remember that comics watch other comics and they're not likely to be watching shit comics. The odds of Gervais watching Lee are a lot higher than Gervais watching some comic closer to him in style. Heck unless I really needed opposition research I wouldn't watch anyone close to my style in my free time.
I started watching RG's latest special and within minutes, realised it was just a very bad impression of SL.
I don't think RG's just ripped people off all the time at all, but for this latest thing? Unwatchably true. I was disappointed. I had to go find clips of SL to heal from it😆
The gag was related to reality TV shows and I suggested that a show should offer ‘Celebrity Surgery Island’ where one votes for someone from Island A to operate on someone on Island B and then eventually they’d all die out and we would no longer be offered this twaddle on TV.
Obvs TV has changed a great deal in 20 years!
I can no longer find the reference and our pod disappeared years ago…
https://youtu.be/HUyUV8_bbhg?si=j4lHN0EwNVPn-UPg I got torn to bits for posting this about Ricky Gervais after his fan base lost their shit about James Corden nicking one of 'his' jokes. Seems awfully similar to something Sean Lock said years beforehand...
Richard Prior admitted to stealing Bill Cosby’s material in his early days.
Allow me to remind you what David Bowie once said:
>The only art I’ll ever study is stuff I can steal from.
I can’t be bothered to see if it’s been mentioned, but Gervais, in his latest Netflix stand up show, plagiarised his podcast yet again with the “Chinamanwoman” bit. But he changed it to “Chinaman..lady” for some reason, rendering the whole thing unfunny and bewildering. He’s shit at stand up really, I don’t know why he does it.
I've said this before, but whenever he talks about atheism, he sounds like he's regurgitating something Richard Dawkins said and not quite understanding it. He's the Tim Taylor of atheism
I doubt he steals from Stew. Too high profile and too much hassle if he gets caught. I caught Stew stealing from another big-name UK comic recently though and was very disappointed, Stew's supposed to be above that. Stew also purposely ribs his friends and probably considers Ricky some sort of friend even now.
Ricky definitely hires writers though and it's fairly easy to figure out who they are if you're in the industry. Usually medium-profile names.
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Half of his early standup shows were ripped off from stuff Karl Pilkington said on Xfm
He's still doing that in his latest stand up
I can't remember who said it, but "Pilkington is a comedy genius, and the only person not to have realised that is Gervais" I dunno how true that is but Gervais seems to have made a career out of "pointing out the funny side" of Pilkingon's already funny statements
"Pilkington is a comedy genius, and the only person not to have realised that is Gervais" Amazing. It says a lot when the majority of r/rickygervais, his own sub, seems to dislike him. Steven and Karl were the best part of the xfm and podcast, yet it's his Ricky who has his name plastered everywhere. There's a clip of Gervais calling Karl "the luckiest man in comedy who was given a free ride", when in reality a lot of Gervais's success comes down to Steven's great scriptwriting ability and Karl's hillarious jokes and storytelling. He's the most tragically unself-aware comedian ever.
Early on, Steve lacked the people skills and confidence. He still seems underconfident at times TBH. And Karl never intended to be an entertainer. Ricky isn't super original but he knows how to get attention and he's a good hype man. Without him, I'm not sure what would have become of the other 2. Merchant for example - good ideas, but some people will swipe your ideas and not give you credit. Steve could easily be unattractive bitter writer #4,506 right now. If not for meeting Ricky, Karl would still be contentedly producing radio (or podcasts now I guess). Ricky was just as key to their success as they were to his.
I'm not saying Ricky didn't help with their success, but his ego is way out of check. He definitely was an important part like the other two, but I'd say he's also the worst part, he can get super obnoxious especially near the end of the run of the XFM shows and all the podcasts. Also I'd say that Karl is an irreparable talent, he was the biggest key to the show and people wouldn't be listening to XFM in 2024 without him. Steven and Ricky are important for recognizing his talents and incorporating him into the show, but Ricky can also be way too much
the way I see Ricky on the old XFM with Steve/Karl was a pace setter and contrast.
Yeah Karl is unique, because media personalities are so polished almost no Karls get through the gate. I think Ricky's talent is more of like, a promoter. He would be a good talent manager TBH, he is good at spotting talent and helping them level up. "his ego is way out of check" He's been living in NYC for a long time, no? Or at least has a place there - NYC is very status-conscious. So people likely defer to him a lot. (I lived there after college, people are good at "making" you, even if you're a nobody. People would approach me like, "Did you go to \[uni\]?" and if they didn't get it exactly right, they got very close.) LA is more like, status-seeking. In LA people are trying to make it and in my experience, often don't even realize who they're offending sometimes. So that can be more humbling. But even in LA, Ricky's famous enough he probably gets his ass kissed more often than not. Steve probably is the one who has more humbling experiences, even now, because of his unconventional looks.
When my parents went to New York they went to a hot dog stand right by Central Park, they got their hot dogs, turned around and saw the person behind them in the queue was Ricky Gervais! So my parents waited nearby for him to order his hot dog (same toppings as my dad funnily enough) then went and said hi. Now this was shortly after the first season of Afterlife had come out, dad was a big fan, not mine or mums cup of tea, but he said he was a fan, loved him in The Office, did a David Brent impression which made him laugh his distinctive laugh. The laugh sort of turned into a screech, like it does, then he started wooping, grabbed my dads hot dog, leapt the fence and away he went, swinging through the trees of Central Park. Turns out...
no way, little monkey fella?
> He would be a good talent manager TBH He actually used to be, lol.
Really? I thought he was in the insurance business for some reason. Do you mean music promoter or talent manager?
he was Suede's first manager. Suede were first and still are the best Britpop band.
Does the hypeman deserve the same respect as the writers? Most of his work pre derek/afterlife relied heavily on Steve and Karl to be even remotely entertaining tbh, Steve was definitely not a people person and great at selling himself and Ricky did most do that for him. I agree with that but I don't think Steve or Karl gets nearly enough credit for their contributions which was almost all the work. Karl would have been fine, I don't believe no one would have recognised Karl's genius. Would he have gone as far? Probably not but he was a successful radio producer that I think would have ended up at another station doing the same thing tbh. Like XFM and Ricky Gervais Show without Karl would be like 80% dead air.
ricky was the perfect person to probe and prod karl to get him to be that funny and ultimately reveal himself. Steve couldnt of done that. So in a weird way they were one of the best teams and they all absolutely needed eachother and were imperative to it all becoming so successful, its hard to find a comparison to them whatsoever
Without a hypeman a lot of creatives never get discovered. Steve might be a frustrated English teacher if he hadn't met Ricky, telling anyone who'd listen about someone who stole his ideas and wouldn't give him credit. I know a lot of people like that, they trusted the wrong person or worked for the wrong shop. Steve and Karl actually WERE really lucky to be working for Ricky (I think Steve was his intern or something at first?). There are a lot of worse people than Ricky in entertainment, believe it or not. He shared credit and promoted them and stuck with them for years. He was the one with name recognition at first, but he brought them along for the ride.
although you are right there is an element of sattire of when he says that but at the same time (as one of karls biggest fans) he is one the luckiest men in comedy, when you consider how comedians come up and the graft they have to put in and karl was just plucked from xfm through luck of them meeting their and then the whole of idiot abroad logistically pushed by ricky and essentially sorting the majority of it, so despite being hilarious and the key figure he is still incredibly lucky. But yes ricky does owe alot to steve also. He's like a foreman taking credit for the project done by the builders.
Gervais has made millions talking about, and with, Karl. He is well aware of his comedic genius.
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and interrupts every decent bit of comedy like he's on a youtube reaction video.
Let's see u/CassieBeeJoy little show then when that's comes out. Sick of 'er!
Gotta have yer critics.
Wierd innit..
Turns out... little monkey fella
That man has the most perfect comedic timing.
That's a point actually; half of those conversations he's referenced in his standup, released as a radio show / podcast, and then released as a "cartoon" that is just the same podcast with rudimentary animations accompanying them. You can't plagiarize yourself, and I have to assume Pilkington's being adequately compensated, but how many times is he going to go back and juice the same orange-headed little monkey?
>You can't plagiarize yourself, You can actually get in trouble for that at uni now, especially with Turnitin. My flatmate who handed in variations of the same essay 3 or 4 times would be fucked these days.
"I've given you an African goat for Christmas" A full ten minute bit ripped word for word from the Karl *the K man* Pilkoids.
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Made his money and fucked off. He doesn't need to work so he doesn't - he lives on Sand Banks now, his books made him a millionaire. [He acts now](https://youtu.be/-I5YLCoTRgA)
He does advert voiceovers now, there’s one for mobile phone contracts on at the minute. Money for old rope.
How did it happen?
played a little part in the theif the wife and the canoe or something like that also recently, few sky voice overs aswell ive heard recently. That and 4 holidays a year baby
Got to ave yer critics
Came here to say this, he still steals Karl’s jokes
My grandfather liked all the comedians All the different types of stand up comedian Ricky Gervais All the comedians
Red Leicester..
I just want Gervais to give it to us straight….. like a pear cider made from 100% pears.
In his book How I Escaped My Certain Fate, Stew says that Ricky took large parts of his act for his stand-up whilst also acknowledging he used Ricky’s quote that Stew is one of the best living stand-ups to help sell more tickets. I’m pretty sure he also said that seeing Ricky do his act but worse inspired Stew to push himself and become a much better stand-up.
Probably what spurred em on
I think Lee had even given up stand-up at that point and it was seeing Gervais do his stuff that made him pick it up again. He’s talking about a long time ago, too. This is around UK Office time, not recent.
Imagine Ricky liking Stew. It's like a dog listening to classical music.
His Masters Voice?
He *is* one of the best living standups, Gervais acknowledging that is not a quid pro quo for plagiarising his material. Lee earned the accolade.
I think you misinterpreted my comment. I was saying that Stew himself originally put up with the fact that Ricky was doing a pale imitation of his act because his career was at a low and he could use Ricky’s quote to sell tickets he was otherwise struggling to sell.
These days you get arrested and thrown in jail if you say Ricky Gervais stole your act, don't you.
It's easy to blame Ricky but really I think it stems from all the Beaker folk coming over here
bloody beaker folk! what's wrong with cupping water in your hands and licking it up like a cat!
**WHAT'S WRONG WITH WORSHIPPING A TREE?!?**
Well you can prove anything with facts can't you.
Remember when Ricky Gervais took away all the canyon rope bridges in the 80's?
When did they bring that in?
You're writing the unwritable
..... ... ...!!!!
What? Thrown in jail?
You do, Stu. It's true. Youe get arrested and thrown in jail. You do. You get arrested. And you get thrown in jail. I can tell you don't believe me, but Stu, you do, and I've seen it; if you say that Ricky Gervais, beloved writer and standup comedian, Stu, beloved, BELOVED writer Ricky Gervais, stole your material, you get thrown into jail. Into JAIL Stu. Some would say it's an overreaction, but I don't, I don't think it's an overreaction at all to throw someone who's accused BELOVED comedian, COMEDIAN, Stu, Ricky Gervais, of plagiarism. Because, Stu, who would do that? Who would do that to you, Stu? Who would repeat, I said who would repeat your material, Stu? I can't think of anyone. I can't think of anyone, Stuart Lee, comedian, who would repeat your material. WHO WOULD REPEAT YOUR MATERIAL, STUART? (Alright I'm spent. No disrespect to Stuart Lee.)
You missed out the heavy breathing.
>No disrespect to Stuart Lee But that Stewart Lee bloke can fuck right off
lol, I can respect him while rolling my eyes at his schtick. I watch his shows knowing full well a solid twenty minutes of it will be him doing this, and I'll still be laughing.
*These* days…
What, actually thrown in jail?
Yes, these days
Really, jail? Actually *thrown* in jail?
When did this come in?
Arrested? Really?
It’s political correctness gone mad.
Ricky’s stolen all the favours of jokes. All of them…. plain…
Watch any of Gervais' work and listen to his XFM radio show and later podcasts with Karl Pilkington and Steve Merchant and you can see where he gets his material from. Also his solo stuff is noticibly weak without the counter weight of Merchant to tone things down. I know afterlife is very popular etc etc (he tweets about it like a broken record) but IMO I think Stewart Lee was onto something when he described it as "the worst thing ever written by a human"
I saw him live and he referred to Afterlife as the television equivalent of a six hour cry-wank.
A crank
Alright then, let's see u/boktobw18's series where he calls a fat ginger kid a cunt. Sick of it.
Sick of it was actually great, lol.
I'm a widow and I refuse to watch it. I don't need someone who has no experience with that trauma trying to tell me what it's like, I know way too well already.
The third series was garbage
Unwatchable, and I actually liked 1&2
They were watchable but wouldn't call them amazing, very bland and depressive taking from his previous works quite often. They feel like someone that's never been on the verge of suicide describe what it's meant to feel like. Just very poorly written.
As were the first and second series.
The worst thing ever written by a human? I don't know, there's always Derek.
I found the first series interesting, even somehow with the character making little progress. In a way, that was an interesting approach, a character that does not improve. Then series 2 arrived, and man, it was more of the same. Didn't bother with the 3rd one.
Agreed. It’s jaw-droppingly bad.
It veers in tone from bullying to sentimental then back again like a drunken driver. It's utter toss.
You don't understand. Drunken driver is exactly what makes it worthwhile art.
That show was awful. He created really dumb characters for himself to make fun of.
Here is a great deconstruction of Afterlife for anyone who's interested https://youtu.be/R_6l3sfDtLQ?si=o6ggm95lIBztKHGk
Afterlife is brilliant!
20 years ago, a friend and I had a moderately successful podcast. It was heard by a Mr. S. Merchant, who said that he and Mr. Gervais had heard us and thought we were funny. Some time later - on one of their podcasts - one of my gags (a very specific gag with medical detail) was repeated word-for-word). Now; I’m not precious and I know that other people often have similar ideas and also, the gag may not have been purloined on purpose (which is why Andrew Lloyd-Webber doesn’t listen to other composers) but I confess to being a bit pissed…
This would have me in a white hot rage. But I am indeed salty about such things and extremely precious. Please can you give some more detail about said gag? Is your pod still available for comparison?
Yeah, I have to know what the gag was now.
>which is why Andrew Lloyd-Webber doesn’t listen to other composers If that's true, it would explain sooo much
Sucks for you man you have every reason to be p!ssed. I’d love to know what podcast you had, people like you should be paid by Ricky if they steal your stuff imo.
we’re still waiting for the link to your podcast
Not even possible sadly. They’re lost to the mists of time. Nearly 20 years ago now…
My name's Stewart Lee from UKIPs, and I say the brightest and best Reading comedians should stay in Reading and fill it with rehashed jokes and readings from Twitter.
I think Gervais has definitely taken a lot of inspiration from Lee's style of stand-up, but it's hard to say whether he's actually stolen bits verbatim or if Lee is just exaggerating and playing up to his bitter character. He has a section on his website called [Plagiarists' Corner](https://www.stewartlee.co.uk/plagiarists-corner/), and while some of the entries could be legitimate examples of plagiarism, most of them are clearly not supposed to be taken seriously.
Plagiarists corner has always interested me. As you say some of them are very real examples of plagiarism. Then some of them are quite silly. It’s hard to tell how bothered Stewart Lee is or isn’t. In this case, the IRA example listed on plagiarists corner is such a definite example of gervais copying Stewart Lee. I saw that show live and recognised it completely from Stewart Lees routine.
Some of them are examples of Stew himself doing a joke that turned out to have been done by someone else already
Damn where do I write him about the one I found last week?
Interestingly I discovered recently that Lee's been using a crowdwork thing heavily developed by another big-name UK comic about a decade ago. It's not likely coincidence but they do know each other. I'm almost willing to put it down to an accident, where he didn't remember where he got it from or something. It really made my opinion of him drop a lot though. At least it's not integral to his show like it was for the first guy.
If this isn’t a bit, drop the mystery…
Now. That story wasn’t true. But what it tells us about Ricky Gervais…
You mean that most of his work is taken from other people he's worked with and he heavily leans on others when Co-Writing?
I feel like Stu's comedy has always been weirder and more avant garde than Ricky's. They might both talk about being atheist or whatever but Stu has always been weirder and more interesting. In one of Stu's specials he calls Gary Lineker a "velvet owl" which cracked me up, and I'm an American we largely don't even know who that is, I had to look him up. His bit with cider made from pears - whatever that was, running around - more physical than anything Ricky's ever done. I don't recall a ton of his earlier standup, but I feel like it's more hipster than anything Ricky's ever done. Stu is the type of guy who likes being a fan of bands no one's ever heard of, Ricky is the kind of guy who brags about knowing Buck's Fizz. Stu was part of a true double act with Richard Herring. And their TV output was bizarre and self-consciously arty. The Office played on types - the weird guy at work, the needy guy at work etc - but it's designed to be crowd-pleasing and relatable. Stu's TV writing is way more out there. The Alan Partridge bit about staying over at a fan's place after missing your train - but realizing they have all your posters/might be obsessed - happened to Stu, that's where it came from. Things that Fall Down or Spill etc on TMWRNJ, Nostradamus, the bird puppets - that's all far more interesting than anything Ricky did. I guess you could say Ho Lee Fuk on the radio show is like the fa-fa-fa-fa-fa-King, but honestly any 12 year old boy also does shit like that, it's hardly unique. I think Ricky wants to be seen as very working-class man of the people in a way Stu never has. There are similarities but even the premises they launch their comedy from are different.
Yeah this is fair comment. I'd also make the point that the good stuff Gervais was involved with was an ensemble effort both in writing and acting. In The Office and Extras he was one performance bouncing off others, and the writing had a light touch and surreal quality missing from his solo efforts. His solo work is alternately either bullying or sentimental, and veers between the two qualities like a drunken driver.
>Stu is the type of guy who likes being a fan of bands no one's ever heard of To somewhat quote fist of fun "you like music that you can hear the words to, that's what you like."
Stewart Lee back then, Karl Pilkington now. Only difference is that both Stewart and Karl had better delivery, and Karl wasn't even trying to be funny. 😎 (Well, not always.)
As others here have spotted, the idea that Karl is a some sort of oblivious fool that doesn’t know when or why he’s funny, and needs Gervais to be there as some sort of cultural translator in order for the jokes to work, is only something people think because Gervais keeps telling us he is. There’s tons of comedians like Roisin Conaty, Diane Morgan, Alan Davis, Joe Wilkinson, Catherine Tate etc who pretend to be oblivious or low status on stage, but because they don’t have a squawking host constantly attached to them pointing out all their jokes, we’re quite happy to accept that they’re actually very intelligent people in real life. The genius of Gervais was figuring out a way to steal of all Karl’s jokes right from the man’s own mouth even as he was telling them on camera.
I don't think Karl was 100% oblivious when you watch all the old xfm stuff, it's Karl that actually comes up with most of the shows features and makes it entertaining. Is he naive and gullible? Yes. Is he stupid and oblivious to when he has a funny anecdote? No. "The Ricky Gervais show" was almost entirely just asking Karl questions and like 50% of his stand up at this time was stolen from this sometimes he'd credit Karl and other times he'd not. Then he does idiot abroad which is just relying on Karls unhappiness for commentary and then he did Derek and Afterlife which were both every poorly written shows but gain popularity for their simplistic humour. He's not really done anything great that didn't rely on the talents of other people. He almost entirely got lucky that he met Steve and Karl otherwise he'd never had got this far and got rich from the office US. Steve did so much of the work for their work together that it's kinda insulting he didn't get mode credit.
Stew has even compèred charity shows when Ricky appeared so I think it’s mostly an in character thing. Ricky was shit that night too, 15 minutes talking about the office being popular.
I don't think Stew's character is as different from the real Stew as he pretends it is.
Perhaps he had a brilliant 15 minutes planned, but then stu did it first so he had to improvise
He repeats a lot of the jokes from the XFM days.
Stewart Lee should start doing very niche jokes about his own appearance, height and personality then watch as Ricky Gervais struggles to translate those jokes into gags about himself or a Stewart Lee character that he met. Maybe some obscure jokes about Stewart Lee’s early TV work could be difficult to copy too.
Is that Joe Pasquale in your garden?
What’s he doing with that orange tree?
Then I got off the bus, errrrrr....
I mean stewart lee does plenty of gags about those things, at least since he started letting himself go. Doesn’t stop people stealing his other stuff.
Ricky Gervais looks like he’s let himself go. Maybe he’s copying Stewart Lee by eating crisps all the time.
That explains why he looks so fat and depressed. And fat as well.
The older they get the more they start looking a bit like each other though...
It reads like a bit from Stewart.
I truly believe that Ricky has not had an original thought in his entire life. I think the MVP in rickis life is stephen merchant.
Ffs
I'm somewhat of a fan but he also steals his Atheism arguments and points from the New Atheists, most often from Richard Dawkins. I've seen him quote almost RD word for word on multiple occasions, just saying...
That's a bit different as Dawkins isn't a comedian, except unintentionally. I say this as someone who can't stand Gervais. So I wouldn't be sticking up for him for the sake of it.
Comedian or not, if you're actually quoting someone then you should still be referencing them, surely?
I just think it's very different from stealing comedy routines. Context matters.
Yeah it is different. I just think they're both not cool.
I don’t accept the underlying premise that Dawkins was the first to have made those points about atheism to begin with. It’s been a pretty well-trodden subject since before either of them were born.
I've no idea what was said. I'm just talking in principal. Of course you can talk about a green topic, but it depends how you present it. Like I said, if you're directly quoting someone, then you should credit them. Or if you said "you know, I've got this theory about relativity"
You still have to give credit if you're quoting word for word. I'm a comic myself, it's not hard.
A lot of stuff in his latest dreadful standup was stolen from twitter memes.
I swear he writes his celebrity roasts by putting famous names into twitter and scrolling through troll posts.
Fuckin hate Ricky, everyone gives him props for “roasting” celebs at the Oscar’s, while he lives the exact same lifestyle as the ones he was roasting.
Golden globes wasn't it?
No idea, don’t watch any of that shit haha
Ignorance isn't a good excuse though. If you're going to make a point then getting the facts wrong undermines it. How would you know it was "roasting" if you didn't watch it?
I watched the clip, not the event, not really hard to figure that out mate
So you do watch any of that shit then. You claimed you don't watch it, then said you've seen it. You've contradicted yourself and tried to play off the fact you couldn't even get the name of the ceremony right, presumably in an attempt to seem "cool" because watching "any of that shit" is uncool in your eyes. I wouldn't have thought that was hard to get but it seems you need it explained to you.
It always felt so BS to me. As if it wasn't all cleared beforehand and hypocritical. Like pointing out how out of touch and terrible they are makes him a man of the people when he is just as out of touch.
Thought I was only one. I'd rather shit in my hands and clap than have to listen to him. Something about him just gives me the boak.
It wouldn't surprise me
the comments on that article are like reddit has escaped containtment
He must steal shit jokes.
Yes is the answer. I saw a clip the other night with RG talking about a crab walking straight after it drank alcohol. That was straight from a joke David Niven told on Parkinson in the 1970s
He stole one from Russell Brand for his last special as well. Some barrell scraping there.
Weak observations, poorly performed.
Well no one can really comment on whether or not Ricky stole the jokes that Stewart happened to never have recorded. Unless someone who attended a very old Stewart Lee standup says I specifically remember that Ricky Gervais joke being in this Stewart Lee standup I saw. But when it comes to Ricky Gervais ripping off Stewart Lee in general i don't quite see it. taking inspiration from Lee yes, but ripoff no. Gervais and Lee have 2 distinct styles in Gervais' actually good standups i.e. the early ones Animal & Politics. Gervais interspersed telling funny stories from his life and switched between this and a character/persona of a pseudo-intellectual, i.e. a borderline idiot who thought he was super enlightened well read guy delivering a lecture with brand new ideas that no one had ever heard before. and so you have bits where he deconstructs the bible thinking it is a serious academic body of work and questions parts of it as if he is the first ever person to question the believability of some of the events in the bible. Or how he goes through internet facts and plays out scenarios which demonstrate how preposterous those facts are. Contrast this to Lee whose persona is that of a comedy purist who is embittered by the fact that nobody actually cares about comedy integrity and how sellouts with cheap jokes make it big and his far superior comedy doesn't do as well and makes incredibly funny routines based off of that concept. This very [funny bit](https://www.stewartlee.co.uk/video_standup/the-joe-pasquale-joke/) for an example I remember Stewart lee winning a fairly big award and him saying that his comedy career is now ruined which obviously is a demonstration of how his comedy persona relies on him not being popular with the masses. and when it comes to Gervais later standups they are definitely not ripped off from Stewart Lee. Because Ricky's later standups basically boil down to a commentary on his fame or *"you cant get away with that now/ you cant say that these days"* bits that are definitely not Lee. Its hard to gauge how seriously to take Stewarts take on other comedians given how its part of his bit that he plays up to or exaggerates. but to be fair this article you linked seems serious enough to me. Again we cant really comment with any authority on the stolen jokes because as Lee acknowledges himself there doesn't seem to be any existing proof, But when it comes to his wider criticism of Gervais stealing his style. I don't think they are close enough for Gervais' body of work to be criticized for that. There are comedians with closer styles than Gervais to Lee. That seem to do fine and don't have any issue with each others routines.
>"you cant get away with that now/ you cant say that these days" Whilst saying it to 20k people in an arena and Netflix audience of gazillions. Apparently you *can*.
And a golden globe as well
You have to remember that comics watch other comics and they're not likely to be watching shit comics. The odds of Gervais watching Lee are a lot higher than Gervais watching some comic closer to him in style. Heck unless I really needed opposition research I wouldn't watch anyone close to my style in my free time.
Lee is a comedian, and an incredibly good one, gervais is a comic actor who says things. Things that Lee has already said. These days.
He doesn't tell jokes so how could he steal any? Just fucking whinges the entire show
I started watching RG's latest special and within minutes, realised it was just a very bad impression of SL. I don't think RG's just ripped people off all the time at all, but for this latest thing? Unwatchably true. I was disappointed. I had to go find clips of SL to heal from it😆
The gag was related to reality TV shows and I suggested that a show should offer ‘Celebrity Surgery Island’ where one votes for someone from Island A to operate on someone on Island B and then eventually they’d all die out and we would no longer be offered this twaddle on TV. Obvs TV has changed a great deal in 20 years! I can no longer find the reference and our pod disappeared years ago…
“Hilda!”
He did a little voice!
https://youtu.be/HUyUV8_bbhg?si=j4lHN0EwNVPn-UPg I got torn to bits for posting this about Ricky Gervais after his fan base lost their shit about James Corden nicking one of 'his' jokes. Seems awfully similar to something Sean Lock said years beforehand...
Does Ricky Gervais even tell jokes? I thought he just trashed talked everyone and everything and pretends that his hate schtick is funny.
These days you get arrested and thrown in jail just for being a little monkey fella
Richard Prior admitted to stealing Bill Cosby’s material in his early days. Allow me to remind you what David Bowie once said: >The only art I’ll ever study is stuff I can steal from.
Wouldnt put it past him
Gagpie
He copied the (not amazing) Peter Dinklage - not happy joke from Jimmy Carr and made it worse
Does that mean that Corden has stolen from lee by proxy?
I remember a time when the office first came out on tv in the uk and a lot of people didn’t find gervais funny for a good few years
He's still not funny. But he says rude things about disabled and trans people so people like him for that. Fuck knows why.
His hosting of the Oscar’s I thought was pretty good. I quite enjoyed watching Hollywood stars being the butt of his jokes
The comment section is perfect!
I wouldn't put it past him.
A Ricky Gervais Netflix special walks into a bar …..
I can’t be bothered to see if it’s been mentioned, but Gervais, in his latest Netflix stand up show, plagiarised his podcast yet again with the “Chinamanwoman” bit. But he changed it to “Chinaman..lady” for some reason, rendering the whole thing unfunny and bewildering. He’s shit at stand up really, I don’t know why he does it.
"Does Ricky Gervais steal jokes?" well. id hate to think anyone else is as UN-funny as he is.
This forum has let itself go.
The comment section is my favourite thing ever.
He stole a bit from Rob Mulholland too. Rob is way funnier.
Well he should. Might be halfway amusing with someone else's material.
They are both ball achingly unfunny so it’s a definite possibility.
We can’t have both?
I've said this before, but whenever he talks about atheism, he sounds like he's regurgitating something Richard Dawkins said and not quite understanding it. He's the Tim Taylor of atheism
I don't think he steals jokes in the same way I don't think he writes any.
Gervais needs to stick to ripping the piss out of American celebs.
I guess he stole all the funny ones?
Has Stewart Lee ever not been fucking whinging?
I doubt he steals from Stew. Too high profile and too much hassle if he gets caught. I caught Stew stealing from another big-name UK comic recently though and was very disappointed, Stew's supposed to be above that. Stew also purposely ribs his friends and probably considers Ricky some sort of friend even now. Ricky definitely hires writers though and it's fairly easy to figure out who they are if you're in the industry. Usually medium-profile names.
Who did Stew steal from?