Why the comedy scene is so male dominated, and what we can do about it
Let women be mediocre!
I'm not going to write another “Are women funny?” article, because it’s been written 1000 times over both ironically and not. Spoiler alert: they are. In fact they're funnier than men. Cats are better than dogs, Jupiter is the best planet and this is how you spell colour.
I find the idea of the gender binary pretty dated, but this article recognises it as it’s about people holding on to boomerish views. I also recognise that there are other deeply ingrained prejudices within the comedy scene, but I feel unqualified to write about that. I believe that some of the solutions I’ve arrived at will be helpful across the board.
This article is about the patriarchy and fairness. This is about how comedy is for absolutely everyone and that’s one of the things that makes it so great. It’s the great leveller. Opera singers, abattoir workers, trustafarians and dodgy locksmiths all converge on one stage to talk about the time they followed through. It’s a beautiful thing, we are all connected to each other by the absurdity of being alive and a little brown stain in our underwear that we thought was going to be much worse than it was.
My beginner’s classes are pretty well gender balanced. 45% of my students have female first names in a pool of 877 students since 2016. I’m sure it would be skewed more male if I was male. I’m glad I repel people that wouldn’t want to learn comedy from a woman, hopefully they’ll die in a ditch.
The reason nearly 90% of professional comedians are men both in 2021 and 2010 (I can’t find any current info), is because the 70s weren’t that long ago, when giant boomers roamed the earth. Back then it was an undisputed fact that comedy was a man’s game, as was voting in Switzerland. Women were only granted the right to drive in 2018 in Saudi Arabia. You might think - “but their culture is so different!” And “I would never hide Nazi gold!”. But isn’t it also true that we’re all the same, we all love and yearn and if you prick me do I not bleed? And should women be allowed to drive?
Talented, fierce, thick skinned, deluded “one of the lads”
Success is not final, failure is not fatal: It is the courage to continue that counts.
Winston Churchill
It’s very hard to break in to a scene where you’re so under-represented. You have to be one or all of: talented, fierce, thick skinned, deluded or “one of the lads”. If you are part of the ruling class, you don’t have to be anything. Something I have noticed is that failure is perceived completely differently if you’re a man or a woman.
OMG I’m soooo sorry, argh you must hate me!
Wendy Churchill
In fact if you ask Chat GPT for quotes about failure, as I did, all 20 of them are by men. Failure by a woman is judged much more harshly, it can be seen as cretinous. Also there are so much fewer women around to have your back. And often the women who are around act within the “Fuck you, I got mine” mentality. They like being a novelty, they don’t want the playing field to be level. They suffered so should you. Girl power?
In my many years performing and teaching comedy I’ve seen a lot of mediocre, seemingly untalented male comics just keep at it and over the years they’ve put in their 10000 hours they've honed their skills to become genuinely accomplished comics.
Let women be mediocre!
Women on the other hand are judged by a much higher standard, both by themselves and the society at large. By both men and women. Because comedy has so long been seen as a man's game, when a woman takes the stage one’s knee jerk reaction is “I hope this goes well!” With a man the reaction is at worst neutral.
A mediocre woman gives up on comedy much quicker, denying herself the chance to find her voice.
Huge punchable smile
I was teaching a stand-up workshop in an international high school here in Berlin, and I was shocked that in 2023 gender roles were still alive and kicking. I thought youths were all hairless non-binary beings called Leaf and Tuxedo by now. It was just as gendered as when I was at school in 1805. The boys were loud and rawkus, and frankly wouldn’t STFU. Whereas the girls were meek, and in some cases afraid to read their material out loud, even though it was very good. If one was to take this class as a microcosm for a comedy scene, every time a male read out their stuff (no matter how mediocre) there would be giggling from the start as some bolshie angled cap wearing lad took a very over-confident run-up at whatever he was about to say. People were already primed to laugh. The material itself was met with howls and hoots. You could see this huge punchable smile grow bigger over the lads face. With the females, it was a whole different energy. They’d be quiet and embarrassed from the start, needing words of encouragement to even get going - so the reaction was at best “Well done for even trying”.
But surely things are improving?
Things are improving in that people actually think about the gender split on a show in a way they didn’t used to. So we have gone from very very bad, to still quite bad and it’s holding steady at pretty bad. Improvement is on hold because there’s still a much smaller pool of female comedians so the 2-4 regulation female comedians that one should book on a 10 person open mic are usually the same people. This is kind of great for them? I say if people want to book you, then take the gig even if you are clearly being tokenised - stage time is stage time. But now we have the situation that women who aren’t quite ready are being thrown up the ladder and appear to be… shit. This perpetuates the theory that women aren’t funny.
Finally, what can we do about it?
Dudes, here is what you can do to help:
Don’t start a show. I know the urge will be great. You’ve done 5 gigs, it’s time to run this scene! But seriously, the last thing this scene needs is more male gatekeepers. Even if you’re “one of the good ones and I’ll book loads of women” now you sound like a pimp. Don’t do it! At the very most start a show but co-produce it with a woman. Do not start an all male produced show, I’ll be so mad!
Don’t hit on female comics. This is a workplace, it should follow the same rules. Obviously if you have a genuine mutual connection with someone yadda yadda – but you know the difference. Don’t be a creep. Call out other guys that are.
Women get judged to a much higher standard than men, don’t be one of those guys. Call out this double standard. Women are allowed to be sucky and mediocre just like men.
I didn’t want to write “women here’s what you can do” part as it’s victim blaming but here it goes anyway:
Don’t judge women to a different standard to men, duh.
Write material that is authentically true to you. Please avoid the temptation to write material for the “male gaze” (not the male gays - that’s fine). Sure if sex is your whole deal then smut the place up! But if you’re writing a lot about sex because you think it’s what the male masses enjoy hearing about then you’re dead wrong + you’ll end up pigeonholing yourself in to just one style.
When you’re starting out remember that you have as much right to suck as any other beginner. Embrace mediocrity!
If you’re interested in improv comedy and how they tried to tackle the gender imabalnce there’s a great article by
on Tumblr
dear caroline,
this is great!
lots of great points and also this is a very funny sentence thank you for writing it:
"I thought youths were all hairless non-binary beings called Leaf and Tuxedo by now."
i appreciate your work!
love
myq