In Half an Hour John Oliver Says More Unpleasant Things About Hollywood Then Ricky Gervais Ever Says at The Golden Globes. Why Does The Industry Revere One and Loathe The Other?

 

 

My memory escapes me on the particular episode but the circumstances are clear. On one episode of Last Week Tonight John Oliver was beginning the main story and the show did a bit where it looked like a view was choosing something else.

Oliver said: "Oh. You want to watch the Entourage movie? That's fine. I'll wait."

We then saw the first sixty seconds saw one of the characters say the opening line and then cut to the viewer going back to Last Week Tonight. Oliver then said: "I thought so. Let's get to the main story."

In hindsight this bit may have told us far too much about what Oliver thought of Hollywood and I'm kind of amazed I didn't get the point. By this point in my viewing career I was familiar with how everybody in late night used clips from TV or films to illustrate a point: The Daily Show had used it to perfection, The Colbert Report did it the same way and Stephen Colbert would bring it to the late show and Jimmy Fallon and Seth Meyers all did it as well. I also remember James Corden and Jimmy Kimmel using some version of it.

But in every case it was done to juxtapose a talking point from politics or talking heads and most of the time, not always usually, there was a sense of gentle affection. They were using the clips to criticize politicians, not Hollywood. Oliver, by contrast, was using a clip from the Entourage movie for the sole purpose of saying that Last Week Tonight is more entertaining and intelligent than something his network put together.

This wasn't the first time Oliver had done this; it wasn't even the first time he'd criticized Entourage. But it confirmed a pattern that is far different from any other late night show, whether it is a sketch comedy or talk. Whereas all of them clearly have some respect for the medium TV Oliver alone seems to think that he is above everything else that is on including his own network. I lost count of how many times he went out of his way to criticize HBO or the Max streaming service and almost the things connected with it.

This isn't to say that Oliver necessarily thought his show was entertaining: he's made that clear numerous times. But by his attitude towards his own network – and by this point almost everything else on TV or film he's taken shots over the years – he clearly thinks he's superior to the industry that's given him his platform.

It has to be said that so many of the jokes that Oliver's made about so much of TV are frequently bizarre. I once remember his choosing to make a remarking about no one knowing that Apple Tv existed or that there was a show called Defending Jacob on it. There was no reason to reference that particular show which obviously he never watched. The fact that he chose to highlight it for the sole purpose of mocking it really seems like the kind of punching down that most comedy isn't supposed to be. And honestly it really seems like the kind of thing that he accuses Trump of doing in his rallies: taking shots at things for laughs.

Oliver has been openly contemptuous of television and Hollywood in a way that no one other than his HBO colleague Bill Maher has been over the years. But where Maher always does so to argue that this is part of the mean-spiritedness of the left, Oliver frequently takes the position that Hollywood is not far left enough. Never was this clearer when he devoted an entire episode to berating Law & Order for arguing it created a false narrative of law enforcement. Not even he seemed able to make a coherent argument, he kept admitting it was just a TV show. But if that was the case why devote the same amount of time to it that he was willing to give to pullout on Afghanistan or the Sackler family? When you consider that on numerous occasions he'd invited cast members of the show to parody ideas of law enforcement years before, it seems even more spiteful like he's now choosing to turn on people who were good enough to make fun of themselves.

And at this point it's impossible for me not to compare Oliver to another British comic who is not much older than Oliver and whose career basically runs parallel to him but who by this point in his career, is practically a pariah in the industry: Ricky Gervais.

As I've said on multiple occasions – indeed as recently as this year's Golden Globes – I've never liked Gervais as an entertainer. I find his brand of cringe comedy unfunny, the man himself an unbearable presence on stage and his either attitude unctuous.  So the idea of having to take his side on anything makes me uncomfortable myself. Nevertheless when Gervais chose to repost something he said the last time he hosted the Golden Globes back in 2020 – something that I'd mercifully erased from my memory – it was hard not to find common ground.

He made it clear that if someone won: "They should not make a political speech. Just say your thank yous and leaves. You're not qualified to give advice on anything. You have less education then Greta Thunberg." I don't know how heartily Hollywood applauded or laughed (I'm actually going to get back to the point) but he's right when he said they didn't listen.

Gervais reposted this after the Grammys this weekend not long after Bill Maher had repeated for his audience for the exact same reason. Maher, if anything, was even blunter about Hollywood's behavior and its worth noting that this was one of the few ending monologues he gave that I have absolutely no notes on.  Every single thing he said about the average American greeting Hollywood's statements with eyerolls, that America sees Hollywood as an outreach of the Democratic party already was accurate as was his closing statement that they were making a difference "You're causing independents to vote Republican." Particularly in the aftermath of the 2024 election its impossible to argue this fact.

And the results played out pretty much as you'd expect on Sunday: every single out of touch millionaire who won a prize or presented at the Grammy chose to deliver diatribes on how horrible ICE was, apparently having reached the conclusion that the reason they were still in Minneapolis was because not enough people had seen them wearing buttons at the Golden Globes three weeks earlier.  The speech that has undergone the most scrutiny was Billie Eilish's when she chose to say: "No one's illegal on stolen land."

Setting aside the hypocrisy involved with Eilish's statement – every civilization has stolen land to an extent -  what I find more telling is how Hollywood has chosen to stand behind Eilish as if her statements were somehow above reproach. Its worth remembering even before Trump was elected to the White House the first time, every single late night show went out of their way to fact check every thing they came out of his mouth to prove that he was a liar and a hypocrite.  By the time Last Week Tonight debuted Oliver was still doing as a bit but he added: "The truth doesn't matter anymore."

In a sense the internet and cable news are doing by fact-checking   Eilish's statements are no different – and honestly with far less harshness - then comedians have done to Trump in the last decade. And it's not as though there was any real difference between Eilish giving her statement at the Grammys and anything the President says or does at a televised rally. Both are public figures and both should be subject to the same scrutiny.

But given the reactions of so many from Eilish's brother to Mark Ruffalo, Hollywood doesn't think the rules should apply to them.  If they want to give intellectually vapid statements that are the definition of playing to their base in front of millions of people then according to the Ruffalo's and Olivers of the world, they should do so free from the criticism of their opposition.

Its worth going back to Last Week Tonight which I've criticized immensely in recent years after spending much time enjoying it. I've pointed out multiple time the fallacies in Oliver's comedy and how he presents himself as the left-wing equivalent of Bill O'Reilly or Tucker Carlson. If anything, he's more insulated then they are as he has not even interviewed anyone since his first season and has made no secret that he thinks his show is less there to entertain or inform then to 'stir shit up'. In this case he goes even further then those in his industry who will at least go through the motions of working for some greater good. Oliver won't even hide that much.

Its here the comparison between Oliver and Gervais is the most telling. Oliver no doubt believes, like the overwhelming majority of entertainers in Hollywood, that his job is to 'speak truth to power'. That he does so, much like Eilish at the Grammys, hundreds of miles from the action from the safety of a studio filled with people who cheer everything he says, argues that his liberalism stops at the borders of his set.

Now contrast with Gervais at the Golden Globes. Gervais has never hidden the fact he only considers himself an entertainer and that you should keep your politics of your comedy. He then went to Hollywood and hosted a show that was full of the most powerful people in the industry, and people who believe that translates to intelligence and influence on every subject of the world. On five separate occasions he increasingly made fun of their hypocrisies and on the very last one, he got right up in their faces and said in front of a televised audience, that they were uninformed people who had no business lecturing the rest of the world on anything. That is speaking truth to power in a way that Oliver himself never does, considering he's never done any of his routines in a political setting, certainly not in the presence of actual Republicans.

I don't think it’s a coincidence that Gervais has never been invited back to host since. It's clear this doesn't bother Gervais any more than it bothers Hollywood. Even though he was nominated for a Golden Globe for a comedy special this past year (competing against Bill Maher) he notably didn't make the trip from London. Vonda Sykes, the presenter, made it perfectly clear she was glad about that because then she could make his award about her – and Hollywood cheered louder than they ever did it Gervais. Of course, if he'd been there Sykes no doubt would have been softer in her remarks the way she was to Maher, another figure in the industry that no one likes that much because he calls them on their hypocrisies

Essentially this fits Hollywood's behavior perfectly: they will say the most powerful things possible when their target (in the most recent case, he wasn't even on the same continent)  isn't there to take offense. No one bothered to make the argument that if any of the recipients at the Grammys, from Bad Bunny to Joni Mitchell, had said F--- ICE to an actual ICE agent in Minneapolis it would have been real bravery because they would have gotten a completely different and far harsher reaction. And few bothered to point out that Bad Bunny, like many other celebrities, is moving out of America altogether.

This does even more to argue for the hypocrisies of Hollywood in a way that is ridiculous compared to all of their other virtue signaling. They are fine criticizing what the American government is doing to immigrants while they have been emigrating to other 'safer' countries. As someone who's always thought actions speak louder than words this demonstrates how Hollywood is a bigger hypocrite than anything the Republicans are doing. You're criticizing the policy of a country you don't even want to live in any more. What message does that send to those people who might face deportation?  These people have been the biggest beneficiaries of the American dream and they can't wait to get out of here.

When Kevin O'Leary claimed that Eilish statements were isolating half the country Mark Ruffalo jumped to her defense by doing what Hollywood does: denying the truth of the statement while vilifying the accuser. This pattern followed not long after the cancellation of Stephen Colbert when Jay Leno made it clear that late night comedy was political activism isolating half the country. Every single late night host – Oliver among them – chose to deny the truth of the statement and say that Leno was not now, nor ever had been funny. The fact that he had been the most successful name in late night for twenty years – records that can be proven with a Google check – was irrelevant to this new breed of Hollywood.  The fact that their industry is clearly suffering and one of the factors might well be Hollywood's decision to attack Trump and by extension his voters is, in fact, the kind of thing that Last Week Tonight could do if it ever chose to do a show on it.

But Oliver has no interest in seeing anything that doesn't fit his worldview.  Despite all the seeming self-deprecation John Oliver truly thinks the world is how it is today because no one listen to John Oliver.  He is so far to the left in his politics that not only does he think the Democratic Party has sold out but that Hollywood itself is basically neo-liberal and perpetuating the capitalist system. I suspect by the time Last Week Tonight debuts later this month he will deal with the subject of ICE but if he mentions what happened at the Grammys it will only be to highlight what a horrible singer Billie Eilish is and how Trevor Noah never did enough when he was host of The Daily Show to use his platform. Then he'll spend that episode like he does every season, arguing how Hollywood is full of evil corporations that doesn't police itself adequately, that the shows and movies its makes are wastes of time and intelligence and of course that HBO has yet again failed the country even though a large part of the reason he has had his success is because Last Week Tonight has been following Sunday night hits for twelve years.

We'll then have another season when not a single thing he focuses on ever improves or gets worse. Of course if it improves we'll never know because Oliver only does follow ups on stories when they get worse, which fits his narrative. He will be idolized by the industry he says more nasty things about in an episode then Gervais did every time he hosted the Golden Globes but because he stands for the right things he will be honored by the industry with awards and millions of dollars.  This will allow him to continue to 'entertain' by 'speaking truth to power' for years to come to achieve the American dream by saying that America sucks. And hopefully this election year people will end up voting Democrat despite everything Hollywood says or does to convince them otherwise. If they do, they'll take the credit, if they don't, it's America's failure not Hollywood's and either way the Olivers of the world will be insufferable about it.

I won't care because I'll be watching something else. Not Entourage or Defending Jacob. Maybe Law & Order will be running a marathon.