Hysterical
Jolie Lash | April 5, 2021 - 10:00 am
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FX is stepping behind the velvet rope with
Hysterical, a documentary about emerging and established female comics that looks at how the comedy world is finally catching up with the times.
Feature-length, the piece explores the joy of stand-up, tackles the “women aren’t funny” trope, tiptoes into cancel culture from a female perspective, and reveals a heartfelt camaraderie behind the scenes something that hasn’t always existed in its current form.
“The idea came from Jessica Kirson,” executive producer and Hysterical director Andrea Nevins told
SPIN of her fellow producer, who is a full-time standup. “She looked around at the community of women that she was spending time with and she thought, ‘People should know about them. People should know who they are, how funny they are and what it took for them to get there. ”
4/2/2021
With her hour-and-a-half long FX documentary
Hysterical, director Andrea Nevins attempts the impossible: To craft a single shared experience of womanhood from the perspectives of more than a dozen contemporary female stand-up comedians. Through talking heads and archival footage, Nevins (
Tiny Shoulders: Rethinking Barbie) surveys an ambitious range of topics, including sexism, racism, cancer, depression, insecurity, sexual harassment and more. The film is sleek and colorful, but not overly probing. Whereas some documentarians might choose to frame this kind of behind-the-scenes project as raw or visceral, Nevins instead hopes her film will serve as a nourishing broth extracted from the wisdom of veteran comics and newcomers alike. Frankly, though, I wanted something a little meatier.