Judd Apatow and Pete Holmes Break Down ‘Crashing’s Take on Sexism in Comedy

It’s not surprising that Pete Holmes and Judd Apatow’s ode to modern comedy Crashing would take on the all-consuming topic of sexism in comedy. But what is surprising is how nuanced and complicated that conversation is in Season 3’s “MC, Middle, Headliner.” Speaking with Decider about the episode, Holmes and Apatow explained what they wanted to accomplish, why so many comedians are so passionately holding onto their toxic viewpoints, and what the future may hold for the storied and increasingly controversial Comedy Cellar.

Though it never points its finger at a single comedian accused of sexual misconduct, “MC, Middle, Headliner” is a revolving examination of white male privilege in comedy. In the episode, Pete (Pete Holmes) takes an out-of-town gig performing with his older comedian friend and head of a New York comedy club Jason (Dov Davidoff) and his ex-girlfriend Ali (Jaime Lee). The first part of the episode sets the tone for the standup set’s hierarchy. Jason is the headliner, Pete is the middle act, and Ali — who is arguably the funniest comedian and is preparing to appear on Seth Meyers — is the opening MC with the least amount of time.

But after Jason performs an offensive set about not understanding consent, the club demotes him to the middle act and bumps Pete to headliner. Ali, despite being more experienced than Pete and funnier than Jason, remains the night’s MC. What follows is a fascinating exploration about what is and isn’t funny anymore and how “correcting” the sexism of this system often leads to helping another white man.

“We did want to talk about something we’ve all experienced which is just like a certain toxicity,” Holmes said. “Judd hates when I talk this way so be sure to run this, but know that he hates when I talk like this, cause he just wants me to make jokes and stuff — but I think Episode 4 is a little bit of an allegory of what happened in MeToo and all that stuff.”

The episode focuses less on Davidoff’s character acting inappropriately to women, though that certainly does happen. Instead it’s more about the uncomfortable sexism that has driven comedy sets for years. “I used to know [how a] guy was closing, I had never seen him before, if he started talking about the G-spot. That’s how I knew to get ready as the host,” Holmes said. “It’s not only ugly and offensive, it’s just bad comedy.”

According to Holmes, it was important that when the older and out-of-touch Jason first goes up, he kills. It’s only the next night when Ali takes the stage and inverts all his premises to point out that understanding consent isn’t difficult that the episode’s point really shines through. As shown through Ali’s whistle-blowing, what used to be “acceptable” in comedy no longer is.

“[Ali is] kind of turned off by a number of things about the club and one of them is also sexist, which is the ‘smile more’ [comment],” Holmes explained. “I have black friends that get the note ‘more energy’ a lot, which — this is not mine to say — but it means act more black. So every group has their show business code except for straight white men. That’s privilege right there. We were trying to show that Ali was burning the bridge for several reasons.

“And honestly Jamie had a lot to do with [this] episode too.”

Comedy super producer Judd Apatow was also “deeply involved” in Episode 4. “One thing that we wanted to explore was the idea of some of these older comedians who have performed a certain way and behaved a certain way slowly realizing that that isn’t kosher anymore,” Apatow said.

“Comedy is a world that was like the old west,” Apatow explained. “[Comedians] would hit on the waitresses, and they would drink a lot, and party. And in addition to being funny there was a lot of acceptable-for-the-time bad behavior. And now people are beginning to say ‘maybe a lot of that behavior’s very wrong and we should think about it.'”

The episode also seeks to show how frustrating it is for women comedians on the road. Like Ali, even if they’re funnier then their male counterparts women comedians are often not headliners. It’s also rare for a stand-up lineup set to feature more than one woman.

“It reminds me of the movie business,” Apatow said. For a long time it was believed that though women would go see masculine movies, men wouldn’t go see more emotional, “what-they would-define-as female movies.”

“But we never found that to be true when we made Bridesmaids. It wasn’t like, 90 percent of the crowd was female, it was still pretty even. It leaned female but not by much,” Apatow said. “I think that that kind of sexism prevents people from getting jobs, and prevents certain movies from getting made, and that’s why only a year and a half ago did we get Wonder Woman. It took so long and that’s arguably the best of all of them, certainly one of the top two or three. But it was institutionalized sexism that made people think ‘I don’t think that the men will come to a superhero movie if the superhero is a woman.’ And the same with comedy lineups.”

Apatow may be in tune with the predominantly white men who are complaining about comedy’s growing diversity, but he has little sympathy for them. “The great thing about comedy is the funniest person wins. The people who are complaining probably aren’t the best comedians because all comedians know that it’s really clear who’s incredible at it. And the people who are at the highest level always do very well professionally. So you can’t blame it on the fact that people want more diversity,” he said.

He also pointed out the logic behind the “evened up” argument. “If almost every TV show is about a white guy then efforts need to be made to make it more equitable. And that’s only a good thing,” Apatow added.

The producer also spoke about New York’s Comedy Cellar. Featured heavily throughout Crashing‘s third season, the Comedy Cellar is one of the industry’s biggest institutions. But after allowing Louis C.K. to return to its stage less than a year after he admitted to sexually harassing at least five different women, the organization has come under heavy criticism.

“When I started going to The Comedy Cellar in 2014 it was the first time I had ever been there, and there really [were] great efforts there to make the shows diverse. There were a lot of female comedians and there were a lot of gay comedians,” Apatow said. “So I have a lot of compassion for them because before any of this happened they had been doing the work. You can debate what any clubs lineup should be, but they certainly care a lot about that.”

Though Apatow said he’s personally had a good experience with the Comedy Cellar, he noted that the organization is in the middle of a complicated argument. “There are definitely issues to debate about when people come back to work and how do people show that they’ve made up, do people understand what they’ve done, and who decides when they work or don’t work,” Apatow said.

“I think for all people who are caught up in these cases, there’s no one person that decides,” Apatow added.

New episodes of Crashing premiere on HBO Sundays at 10/9c.

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