Curb Your Enthusiasm star J.B. Smoove has weighed in on the debate about whether or not political correctness is ‘ruining’ comedy on television and admitted it feels ‘discouraging’ that comedians are now having to be extra careful with their material.
During an appearance on The View on Thursday, J.B. – whose full name is Jerry Angelo Brooks – warned that stand-up comedy could end up going ‘underground’ if performers are forced to censor their acts.
Referring to Curb Your Enthusiasm, which was created by Larry David and ran for 12 seasons, J.B. said: ‘I think certain shows have already established they can get away with it, Larry has established that already.
‘But I think in the world of comedy, we’ve got to be careful because what we don’t want to happen is comedy and stand-up to be underground, and we don’t want comedy prohibition.’
‘We don’t want something like that to happen, we want our voices to be heard, we want that extension of the real world to be able to be broadcast to you by a comedian,’ the 58-year-old added.
Curb Your Enthusiasm star J.B. Smoove has weighed in on the debate about whether or not political correctness is ‘ruining’ TV comedy
J.B. played the role of Leon Black in the much-loved HBO series alongside the show’s creator Larry David
When fellow comedian and host of The View, Joy Behar, asked J.B. if he thinks ‘wokeism is killing comedy,’ he replied: ‘It can be very, very discouraging.’
He then said: ‘Now, here’s what you’ve got to be careful of… you’re watching a stand-up special, you’re in the audience, you’re laughing, you’re having a great time, and you know, the camera goes on the audience all the time.
‘What if there’s edgy material on stage and you’re laughing your butt off and your boss is watching it by chance and sees you, but it was edgy and something that’s controversial, do you get fired the next day if your boss sees you laughing at that?’
‘No, maybe not,’ Joy, 81, replied as J.B. continued: ‘[What] if they say, “I found you to be laughing at something that I found to be unpleasant?”, that would be horrible but what if it turns into that?’
The View cohost Ana Navarro then joked: ‘The moral to the story is if you go to the filming of a Netflix comedy special, stay way in the back,’ as the live studio audience laughed.
‘But also, you should know what you’re going there for and if you’re a fan, you’re a fan. And some people can separate reality from comedy and some people just can’t, but you shouldn’t be in that room if you know already what kind of comic that is,’ J.B. then claimed.
His comments come after Jerry Seinfeld recently claimed that the ‘extreme left’ politically correct mob had killed comedy with their oversensitivity.
‘Nothing really affects comedy. People always need it. They need it so badly and they don’t get it,’ he said on a recent episode of The New Yorker’s Radio Hour.
The View panelist Ana Navarro asked the actor about the debate that was ‘brewing right now’
Larry and J.B. pictured with their Curb Your Enthusiasm costar Jeff Garlin during an episode of the popular HBO show
Jerry Seinfeld, pictured here in March 2024, recently claimed that the ‘extreme left’ politically correct mob had killed comedy
He fondly remembered the days when people would get home and turn on the TV to watch comedies such as ‘Cheers,’ ‘M.A.S.H.,’ or ‘All in the Family.’
Seinfeld said he doesn’t think any modern-day TV comedies compare to those 1970s to 1980s classics.
‘Well, guess what? Where is it? Where is it? This is the result of the extreme left and P.C. crap and people worrying so much about offending other people,’ he said.
The 70-year-old’s Seinfeld costar Julia Louis-Dreyfus responded to his comments during an interview with The New York Times and described them as ‘a red flag.’
