"Harmon begins pacing the room, slowly launching into a discourse that’s part Socratic inquiry, part one-man improv show. He lists examples of anything in the culture that might show how powerful men treat the weak: Goodfellas, Neil LaBute films, Freudian theory, even the actorly essence of Goodman himself. The whole spiel is immensely entertaining—like hearing a version of Billy Joel’s “We Didn’t Start the Fire” that’s been rewritten by a semiotics-obsessed video-store clerk—and it concludes with Harmon reenacting Ned Beatty’s famous monologue in Network."

"Conducted by comedian Adam Cayton-Holland (who was an open micer at the time), this nearly 20-minute interview went down only five months before Hedberg died. The comic was on tour at the time, driving his RV — with wife, comedian Lynn Shawcroft — from town to town. “It’s 10 percent away from being a bus,” he proudly says about his new mode of transport."

One Thursday this fall, Louis C.K. was in a dressing room at Manhattan’s Beacon Theatre, passing time between two back-to-back stand-up performances and feeling, as he so often does, like a piece of shit. “I was so upset,” he recalls, sitting in the same dressing room a couple of evenings later. The Thursday performances were being taped for an upcoming special, and although they’d both sold out in no time, and although he’d polished his jokes in clubs for months, C.K. had suddenly convinced himself that his material was garbage. “It happens every time,” he says, his stocky frame parked in a plush armchair, his thinning red hair freshly trimmed. “I tape two shows, and the first one feels lackluster and uninspired. The audience feels judgmental and disappointed. I’m going, ‘This was a mistake. This material’s not as good as last year. This is gonna be the one where they say, “He didn’t do it this time.” I didn’t do anything right. All this stuff is shit.’” He grins. “Then a few minutes before the second show, I go, ‘No. This is fun. I enjoy it.’”

"Jon Stewart has made a career of avoiding “Whooo” humor. He has flattered the prejudices of his audience, but he has always been funny, and he has always made them laugh. At the Juan Williams taping, however, at least half of Stewart’s jokes elicited the sound of Whooo! instead of the sound of laughter. He’s been able to concentrate his comedy into a kind of shorthand — a pause, or a raised eyebrow, is often all that is necessary now — but a stranger not cued to laugh could be forgiven for not laughing, indeed for thinking that what was going on in front of him was not comedy at all but rather high-toned journalism with a sense of humor. Which might be how Jon Stewart wants it by now."

A reexamination of Chris Farley’s tragically short career.

Tina Fey profile