Comedy
Amy Poehler Scores New Deal at NBC
“Amy Poehler is staying put at NBC,” says The Hollywood Reporter. The actress, writer, and producer and her company, Paper Kite Productions, have signed a deal with Universal TV. The multi-year...
Andrea Berloff to Adapt “The Kitchen” Comic Series for New Line Cinema
Great news for fans of comics and female-fronted stories: “The Kitchen” is coming to the big-screen. The Vertigo comic series, which The Tracking Board notes “has been celebrated for its...
Catch a Sneak Peek of “Ghostbusters” With Its Screenwriter Katie Dippold
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has announced an upcoming event centered around one of summer’s most anticipated releases. “Ghostbusters” won’t hit theaters until July 15,...
Re-Writing the Script: June’s Web Series Picks
“Caring” This month’s women-helmed web series picks are clever, innovative, and and wide-ranging in their representations of women. By putting experiences usually cast aside front and center,...
Lily Tomlin, Gina Rodriguez, and Other Comedy Actresses Sound Off on Sexism at THR Roundtable
The Hollywood Reporter brought together some of the biggest names from the small-screen for its Comedy Actress Roundtable. The six hilarious participants —Lily Tomlin (“Grace and Frankie”),...
Exclusive: Hilarious Video from “Adult Life Skills” Director Rachel Tunnard Nails Industry Sexism
One of the things we love about Rachel Tunnard’s “Adult Life Skills” is how it rejects the notion of a “strong female character” in favor of an interesting one that is allowed to mess up,...
Oscar Winner Brie Larson May Play Captain Marvel
Carol Danvers/Captain Marvel: Marvel.com Rumor has it we’re getting another Oscar-winning superhero. As Variety reports, Brie Larson, who won Best Actress this year for her performance in...
Amy Schumer to Star in New Comedy from Producer Reese Witherspoon
We have yet another Amy Schumer movie to look forward to. The Tracking Board is reporting that the comedian will topline a new comedy from Universal, “Who Invited Her?” The project will be...
Elizabeth Banks Launches Online Comedy Platform for Women
Elizabeth Banks has announced the launch of WhoHaha, a new digital comedy platform she co-founded. The actress’ feature directorial debut, “Pitch Perfect 2,” grossed over $287 million on a...
EPIX to Air Wanda Sykes Comedy Event
Wanda Sykes is teaming up with EPIX for “What Happened… Ms. Sykes?” The one-hour Original Comedy Event — whose title is a nod to a Maya Angelou quotation about Nina Simone — will...
Trailer Watch: A Bronze Medal Isn’t Enough For This ‘Veep’
Leave it to Julia Louis-Dreyfus to ask a room full men how they’d choose between their “cock and balls.” But what else can we expect from one of the brassiest female-led comedies on...
Can Nikki Glaser Make Sexpert Comedy a Thing?
Back in the ’90s, “sex-positive” was a really big deal. Anka Radakovich held court over at Details magazine with her pioneering sexpert column; vibrators like “The Rabbit” made it into the...
Samantha Bee Is Poised To Change The World of Late-Night TV with ‘Full Frontal’
When Jon Stewart announced he was stepping down from “The Daily Show,” many prospective successor names were thrown around — one of the most obvious being Samantha Bee, the show’s most...
Trailer Watch: Samantha Bee Can’t Harness The Force in Star Wars-Themed ‘Full Frontal’ Spot
A new spot for “Full Frontal with Samantha Bee” has been released, and the setting isn’t exactly what you’d associate Bee with: She’s in a galaxy far, far away from the “Daily Show”...
‘Hunger Games’ Star Amandla Stenberg Debuts Kickass New Female-Centric Comic
Amandla Stenberg cleared our tear ducts as Rue in “The Hunger Games,” and she’s won our hearts by using her platform from the multi-billion dollar franchise — including nearly 500,000...
Julie Klausner’s Memoir ‘I Don’t Care About Your Band’ Optioned for Movie Adaptation
Julie Klausner’s 2010 dating memoir “I Don’t Care About Your Band” has been optioned by Broad Green Pictures. She is attached to co-write the script and may star in the film adaptation as...
Amy Schumer to Pen Book About Comedy, Feminism, Her Childhood and Her Family
Amy Schumer’s year is somehow getting even better. After winning an Emmy for “Inside Amy Schumer,” starring in and penning the summer blockbuster “Trainwreck,” appearing in her first HBO...
Jeannie Gaffigan on Injecting Her Voice into ‘The Jim Gaffigan Show’
Fifteen years ago, my work withJim Gaffigan began as a “side thing” to my own career. I was a writing partner,acting coach and album producer for a rising star in comedy clubs. I understoodhis...
Trailer Watch: Amy Schumer Bashes Beauty Standards in New Teaser for Her HBO Special
Amy Schumer’s incredible year is showing no signs of slowing down. A new trailer has been released for her upcoming stand-up special on HBO, and the premium cable network sure seems confident...
Margaret Cho Discusses Her Sexual Assaults, Her New Song “I Want to Kill My Rapist”
A week after being cast as Ken Jeong’s sister in the upcoming ABC sitcom “Dr. Ken,” Margaret Cho has been profiled by Billboard in a wrenching, inspirational and stunningly candid interview...
Happy Humpday: Most Badass Female Marvel Characters (INFOGRAPHIC)
Just because Marvel hasn’t made any female-led movies (and is increasingly running out of reasons why) doesn’t mean the comic-book company hasn’t created any superheroines worth telling...
Marvel Launches New Comic-Book Series About Black Pre-Teen Heroine Moon Girl
After debuting America’s first Muslim superheroine two years ago, Marvel is devoting a new comic-book series to an 11-year-old black genius and her friendship with a dinosaur. Moon Girl, AKA...
‘Louie’ Actress Pamela Adlon to Headline FX’s First Female-Led Comedy Series
After co-starring in nearly every season of FX’s “Louie,” Pamela Adlon has landed her own series. “Better Things” will star Adlon as “a working actor with no filter trying to earn a...
Tig Notaro to Team Up With Diablo Cody on Semi-Autobiographical Amazon Pilot
After being the subject of a Netflix documentary and releasing her own HBO stand-up special (out August 22), Tig Notaro will star in an Amazon series based in part on her (recently turbulent) life....
Comedy Club in Phyllis Diller’s Hometown Raising Funds for an Exhibit Dedicated to the Comedian
A comedy club in Lima, Ohio, is raising money to launch a museum exhibit honoring trailblazing stand-up comic Phyllis Diller. Lima was Diller’s hometown. Limaland Comedy is hosting the third...
Carol Leifer to Adapt Her Memoir ‘How to Succeed in Business Without Really Crying’ for TV
Four-time Emmy nominee Carol Leifer will turn her life writing TV comedy into, well, a TV comedy. The stand-up comedienne AND “Modern Family” and “Devious Maids” writer will adapt her 2014...
Watch: Margaret Cho Imagines Women Running Hollywood in New Funny or Die Skit
Comedy pioneer Margaret Cho has reimagined Hollywood as a girl’s club in a bitingly hilarious new video for Funny or Die. The former “Drop Dead Diva” star’s skit takes place in a writer’s...
Watch: Samantha Bee is “Female as F-ck” and Crashing the Sausage Party That is Late-Night TV
Samantha Bee, the longest-serving correspondent ever on “The Daily Show,” took herself out of consideration for the role of Jon Stewart’s replacement to front her own show on TBS. Alongside...
Feminism in Action: Lena Dunham Discusses Her Rape, Cecily Strong Kills at White House Corr. Dinner
History Lesson: Female Superheroes Were Not Created to Excite Men
Comic book writer B. Clay Moore is urging fans of comics to revisit the history of female superheroes and their costumes. Best known for the “Hawaiian Dick” series, Moore wrote a Facebook post...
Marvel Comics Announces All-Female Avengers Team
Following news of Marvel’s first Muslim superheroine and the reimagining of Thor as a woman comes the announcement of an all-female Avengers team. “She-Hulk, Dazzler, Medusa, Nico Minoru, and...
Tig Notaro Gets Her Own HBO Special
Grammy-nominated comedienne Tig Notaro will appear in her first HBO special later this year. Notaro will record an all-new standup performance before a live audience in the coming months. A guest...
Sarah Silverman on Joan Rivers: She Was Punished “for the Crime of Getting Her Own Show”
https://medium.com/media/4d27489cc07caf17804240a953eb5868/href [via THR]
Marvel Introduces New Asian-American Superheroine
After creating a Muslim-American superheroine in teenage Kamala Khan (alias: Ms. Marvel), Marvel Comics will continue to diversify its roster of do-gooders with a new series devoted to Silk, an...
Gamora and Wonder Woman to Get New Comic-Book Series
Neither Marvel nor DC, the two powerhouses that dominate the comics industry, has a great track record at gender diversity. According to 538, female characters account for only about one of four...
‘Makers’ Starts Tonight With History of Women in Comedy
It was less than a decade ago that the late Christopher Hitchens, a respected writer and thinker, wondered aloud in a mainstream publication “why women aren’t funny.” Many rational people...
Joan Rivers: An Appreciation of a Feminist Comedy Revolutionary
Like the rest of the world, I’m really sad about Joan Rivers’ death. I didn’t know her, though I met her once at the press day for the riveting and brilliant documentary about her life, Joan...
Watch: “Women in Refrigerators” Supercut: Female Characters Killed to Give Male Characters Depth
The recent release of a “women in refrigerators” supercut is an infuriating reminder — as if you needed one — of how female characters are (under)utilized and (under)valued onscreen....
Princess Leia and Orphan Black to Get Their Own Comic Books
The 47% of comic-book readers who are female have something new to celebrate: Princess Leia and Orphan Black are coming to newsstands. At San Diego Comic Con, Marvel announced that the first of...
Marvel Superhero Thor to Become Female Character in Comics
In a surprise announcement today on The View, Whoopi Goldberg reported that the character of Thor, played by blond beefcake Chris Hemsworth in his namesake movies and in The Avengers, would become a...
Six Reasons to See Tammy This Weekend
Tammy, the new comedy co-written by and starring Melissa McCarthy, opens today. Sadly, the film is not getting great reviews — at the time of posting, it’s at 18% on Rotten Tomatoes. I may...
Jessica Williams: Raising The Daily Show’s Game
Jessica Williams is Leaving “The Daily Show” After Raising Its Game
Jessica Williams: “The Daily Show” Your favorite “Daily Show” correspondent is leaving the late-night program. Entertainment Weekly has revealed that Jessica Williams’ last episode will be...
Chelsea Handler to Take Over Netflix with Talk Show, Stand-Up Special, and Four Docu-Comedies
Late night’s only female host has just signed a new deal with Netflix. Having just departed E!, Chelsea Handler will first appear on the streaming site-turned-mini-network in a stand-up special...
Kristen Wiig to Direct, Star, and Co-Write a Bridesmaids Follow-Up with Annie Mumolo
The writing team behind Bridesmaids is finally reuniting to make another female-friendship comedy. Wiig will sit in the director’s chair for the first time in the unnamed project. The former SNL...
Comedy Central Renews Inside Amy Schumer, Greenlights Two More Female-Led Comedies
Sometime in the last year, Comedy Central became the friendliest place for feminist comedy on the small screen. First came Inside Amy Schumer in the spring of 2013, a crass, honest, and of course...
Susanna Fogel’s Female-Friendship Comedy Life Partners Finds Distribution
Director Susanna Fogel’s Life Partners, about a couple of almost-thirty BFFs whose friendship becomes suddenly strained when one finds her new life partner, has found a distribution deal with...
Louis CK’s “So Did the Fat Lady” Is Not The Last — Or The First — Word On Fat Women On TV
Louis CK is getting heaped with accolades for “So Did the Fat Lady,” the third episode of his current season of Louie, which aired Monday night. I get why: it is, in its way, a progressive move...
Rebel Wilson to Star in Remake of Private Benjamin
Rebel Wilson has been cast as the lead in New Line’s remake of the 1980 classic “Private Benjamin.” She will portray a “redneck” who enlists in the Marines as a means of escaping a bad...
Trailer Watch: Melissa McCarthy Is a Fugitive From Justice in Tammy
Melissa McCarthy’s much anticipated summer comedy Tammy will focus on a broke woman who discovers that her husband is cheating on her. She then embarks on an eventful and ill-fated road trip to...
Watch: How Kamala Khan Is Changing Comics and Readers
Kamala Khan isn’t just the first Muslim superheroine — she’s a one-girl revolution. Created by Marvel editor Sana Amanat, writer G. Willow Wilson, and artist Adrian Alphona, Kamala is the...