Latest news with #LarryCharles
Yahoo
13-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Kanye West Is A 'Golden Goose' Being 'Exploited' By Hollywood, 'Seinfeld' Writer Says
Kanye West seems to have changed drastically in the eyes of many who knew him prior to his marriage to reality TV star Kim Kardashian. Famous comedy writer, Larry Charles, described the rapper, whom he almost worked with many years ago, as a "sweetheart," nothing like the Nazi-endorsing artist he has recently become. Kanye West has now run into financial difficulties due to his unsettling social media rants and very public support for Hitler, as many venues have reportedly banned him from performing in their location. Long before the reality shows and the controversial headlines that have now defined him, West was, according to comedy creator Charles, a "sweet, funny, and self-aware" artist. The "Seinfeld" writer sat down for an interview with Page Six and recalled almost working with West around 2008 when he was working on "Entourage." "He was like a sweet, funny, self-aware guy. He was very loose — this is pre-Kardashians," Charles told the news outlet, referencing West's marriage to Kim Kardashian from 2014 to 2022. Charles went on to share that the first thing the "Vultures 1" rapper told him at the time was, "I'm the Black Larry David." "[West] was constantly telling me funny stories about putting his foot in his mouth and having to apologize," the "Borat" director continued. West and Charles worked on a half-hour comedy show based on the rapper's life that was set to air on HBO but didn't see the light of day after the network dropped it. "That show was kind of like him," Charles explained. "His life as a comical horror story." "Everybody got along great," Charles continued, "and [West] was wonderful to work with, actually. And I even considered him a friend at that point." The comedian also shared that he sometimes thinks about how West's life would have turned out differently if the show had been picked up. "There's all these little things, these little changes in life that sort of have these gigantic consequences," he said. "And so, again, he's somebody who has veered off into this direction, and clearly there are mental health issues." Ever since their meeting, West went on to marry the "Keeping Up With The Kardashians" alum and also welcomed four children with her before their divorce, which was finalized in 2022. In that same year, West married his wife Bianca Censori, and together they've sparked controversy for her indecent public appearances, especially when she pulled a nude stunt on the 2025 Grammys red carpet. The "Carnival" rapper has also been embroiled in several lawsuits from his former employees who accused him of sexual harassment, unfair work treatment, and unpaid wages. He went on an anti-semitic rant in 2023 that saw him fall from his billionaire status as brands like Adidas and The Gap severed ties with him. Despite the dislike for West, Charles told the news outlet he feels sorry for him instead. "He's a golden goose and golden gooses in Hollywood are exploited," the comedy writer said. "Nobody steps up to help them and take them out of the limelight for a while and get them the help they need." "Instead, they continue to exploit them because they can make so much money," he added. Meanwhile, West is reportedly experiencing financial troubles and scrambling for shows to perform in as he's seemingly been blacklisted in and outside Hollywood. The rapper has come under fire for his controversial social media rants and vocal support for Hitler, making many venues refuse to host him for shows. West is scheduled to play a small music festival in Slovakia next week, but the location, which has a 26,000 capacity, appears to be something he's settling for as he has been told to "stay away" from Germany, France, the U.K., Spain, Italy, Scandinavia, and Australia due to his anti-semitic comments. Reports suggest both Wembley Stadium and the London Stadium in the U.K. blacklisted him even before he released his scandalous "Heil Hitler" song in May, leaving him to scramble for bookings around the globe. According to a Daily Mail insider, several top venues have no intention of associating with West anymore after his multiple controversies. "He's getting his team to phone around desperately asking for gigs, and he is said to be asking for $7 million a night. No one will touch him with a barge-pole," the insider told the news outlet. "Wembley and London Stadium both said: 'No chance, we don't need the protests,' and that was before the single came out," they continued. The insider added, "It's the same story everywhere they have asked. He is banned pretty much everywhere in Europe – either the venues won't touch him or he isn't able to travel there as he cannot get a visa."
Yahoo
21-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
‘Borat' Director Stopped Talking to Sacha Baron Cohen After He Started ‘Surrounding Himself' With ‘Show Business People' and ‘Pulling Away' From Subversive Humor: ‘He Wanted to Be More of a Traditional Movie Star'
'Borat' director Larry Charles has lost touch with his once-frequent collaborator, Sacha Baron Cohen. In a recent interview with the Daily Beast, Charles said he once considered Cohen a 'comic genius,' comparing him to the likes of Charlie Chaplin and Peter Sellers. However, when they began production on their 2012 film 'The Dictator,' their relationship deteriorated as Cohen started 'pulling away' from the subversive character humor that made him famous. Charles suspected it was because 'he wanted to be more of a traditional movie star.' More from Variety Sacha Baron Cohen as Elon Musk? Actor Would Be the 'Most Hilarious Choice' to Portray Mogul in Movie, According to Musk's Grok AI Chatbot: 'Comedic Goldmine' Sacha Baron Cohen Revives Borat to Mock Trump and Tell Kamala Harris: 'You're a Woman, a Person of Color and Married to a Jew. I Advise You Not to Come to Kazakhstan' Rebel Wilson's Memoir to Be Published in U.K. With Sacha Baron Cohen Allegations Redacted 'He was surrounding himself with more traditional show business people and getting advice from them, which I don't think was good advice for the kind of rebel sensibility that Sacha had had up until that time,' Charles explained. 'And so, for a variety of reasons, it started to kind of fragment and fracture and fall apart. And the movie's not bad. It's good. It's funny. There's actually a lot of funny stuff in it, but it just didn't reach the potential that it had.' According to Charles, 'The Dictator' was a 'very problematic project from the beginning.' At first, he imagined the film as a 'classic political satire' more akin to 'Dr. Strangelove' than 'Borat' or 'Brüno.' However, the movie fell apart because of too much 'input from outside people' as well as a lack of 'focus' from Cohen. 'I would try to get [Cohen] to trust himself, trust his instincts, which I've learned is the only thing you have,' Charles said. 'And instead, he was trusting so many different people with so many different contradictory thoughts that it started to just unravel and issues arose that should never have been issues.' Best of Variety New Movies Out Now in Theaters: What to See This Week 'Harry Potter' TV Show Cast Guide: Who's Who in Hogwarts? 25 Hollywood Legends Who Deserve an Honorary Oscar
New York Times
20-06-2025
- Entertainment
- New York Times
He Laughed Along With Larry David and Borat. Until He Didn't.
Early in Larry Charles's juicy showbiz memoir 'Comedy Samurai,' he describes a formative moment writing for the television sketch show 'Fridays.' Andy Kaufman was doing a bit with a masked magician swallowing a sword, only to spit up blood. 'These were the laughs, the comedy, that I would try to pursue all my life,' Charles writes. 'The deeper codes of comedy.' His book, a must-read for comedy nerds, is an account of nearly half of a century attempting to crack those codes, mostly as a director and writer, working with the most famous funny people in show business (Mel Brooks, Jerry Seinfeld) and some of its most notorious bullies (Scott Rudin, the Weinstein brothers). Charles, 68, describes them all with entertaining candor, while also illuminating the creation of several of the greatest comedies of the modern era, including 'Seinfeld' (he wrote for the first five seasons), 'Curb Your Enthusiasm' (he directed episodes for two decades) and 'Borat,' which he directed. His career, which began by selling a joke to Jay Leno, is a pocket history of modern comedy, anchored by surprisingly melancholy portraits of his two most fertile artistic relationships — with Larry David and Sacha Baron Cohen. In a recent interview over Zoom, he reflected on the path from Coney Island to Hollywood. You grew up in Trump Village, a then new housing complex in Coney Island built by the President's father, Fred. You meet him? Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
Wall Street Journal
17-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Wall Street Journal
Larry Charles Sold $10 Jokes Before Larry David and ‘Seinfeld' Changed Everything
Larry Charles, 68, is an Emmy-winning screenwriter who wrote episodes of 'Seinfeld' and 'Curb Your Enthusiasm' and directed the films 'Borat' and 'Brüno.' His memoir, 'Comedy Samurai: Forty Years of Blood, Guts and Laughter' (Grand Central), is out today. He spoke with Marc Myers. I witnessed a lot of surreal, absurd stuff growing up in the Coney Island section of Brooklyn. Much of it was seared into my brain and, to some degree, informed my sensibility and sense of humor.
The Guardian
10-05-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Nick Offerman and Megan Mullally: ‘Our secret? We really like each other – which I highly recommend'
If you could be on any reality TV show, which one would you choose?MM: I mean, should we just go on Temptation Island together? NO: OK. No! MM: I think the real answer would be The Traitors, right? Or Survivor. NO: I think I would go for Survivor or Alone. But if we wanted to [go on a show] together, then I think The Traitors. But guess what? I don't want to go up against you on any show. How do you think you'd go on Alone, Nick?NO: I'm very stubborn. I have maybe half the survival skills that most of those survivalists have, but enough that I would love to take a swing at it. And I would just love the quiet time, to be honest. MM: The killing of the animals is kind of a bummer. NO: It's kind of the luck of the draw where they end up putting your camp. But I am skilled at catching fish, and it seems like the people who can bring in a regular supply of fish do really well. I'm probably not going to kill a moose and preserve the meat, but if I can get some fish, I stand a chance. What one thing the other person has done that made you laugh the most?NO: Megan was in a movie a couple years ago called Dicks: The Musical – it's by Larry Charles, the director of Borat, Seinfeld and Curb Your Enthusiasm and [writers Josh Sharp and Aaron Jackson]. From the moment Megan started having me run lines with her and I heard what she was going to do with the character, I was so jealous of the audience that would experience this for the first time. It is so funny. Couldn't recommend it more highly. MM: Nick does funny dancing. When he was in high school, he and his cousin had a breakdancing concert. Were you Tick Tock or Flip Flop? NO: I was Tick Tock. MM: He has retained some of his breakdancing, but he will attempt other styles of dance, and yeah – it's pretty good. Who is the funniest person you know? You cannot say each We know a lot of people, that's a tough one. [But] I'm gonna say Kate Berlant. She's one of my very best friends. NO: It's really tough. I'm gonna go Conan O'Brien. MM: I was gonna say that, but I knew you'd say it. NO: Ditto. [giggles] You guys have been together for 25 years; what's your superpower as a couple?NO: We just really like each other, which I highly recommend if you're going to make a promise to someone to spend the rest of your life with them. And we take that promise really seriously. When I hear people complain about their relationship, I think, you can change this – either repair it or make a different choice. But you know, we are open and romantic and pay attention. We make our relationship a priority. And it's always a growing, evolving organism. Also, Megan has not let me have sex with her yet, and so that really keeps me in the game. MM: Maybe someday, honey. What is each other's worst habit?NO: I'll say Megan's worst habit is worrying about things right when it's time to go to sleep, and then keeping herself awake worrying. MM: Are you a little bit of a procrastinator? Has that come to light? NO: I'll tell you tomorrow. MM: Fair enough. NO: I am a bit of a procrastinator. It depends. I really need a deadline. I have a hard time jumping on projects. I wait until I know it's due. And then I tend to get stressed out. Follow-up for Nick: what do you do when you procrastinate?NO: I overbook myself. I don't play a video game or do something that's just amusing – it's more that I always have three or four plates spinning. If I'm supposed to be building something in my wood shop or learning my lines, I'm like, 'Well, I'm too busy writing this part of my book.' I've saddled myself with too many different hats, but I do feel like I successfully get everything done. Megan is just a much better organiser of time. When you get to a hotel, what's the first thing you do?MM: Oh god, I have to turn all the lights on and decide if the lighting is going to be up to my standards. I can't stand LED lights, but that's how everything is run since we can't have incandescent bulbs any more! I have been known to move lamps around and even some of the furniture. NO: In a couple extreme cases, we've even gone to the store to get different lightbulbs. MM: That was in very extreme circumstances. NO: It's something that I had to learn as [her partner]. At the end of a day of travel, you get into the hotel room and you drop the bags, and you're like, phew, we've made it to the end of the day of travel – I've even been so foolhardy as to start unpacking my things. And Megan will say, 'Hold up there.' MM: I've actually started an interior design company with a friend of mine, so it's something I'm quite interested in. How are you supposed to relax if the lighting is like you're in a freaking gynaecological exam? It's not cute. What do you spend too much money on? MM: Lightbulbs [laughs]. He doesn't spend money – what have you ever bought? NO: Work boots. MM: I pick out all his clothes – I'm the personal shopper. NO: But I will get the finest grass-fed beef when it's time to fire up the grill [and] I will happily spend too much money on cooking ingredients. What's the best lesson you learned from someone you've worked with? NO: I'm working on a show with Nicole Kidman, and the other day she had the flu. It was a big event that we were filming – so you can imagine the expense and organisation involved – and she was sick enough that she should not have come to work. Any rational human would have called in and said, 'I'm sick as hell.' But because she's an extreme professional, she showed up and managed to get through all of the scenes that we needed her for so that the production didn't lose the day. It was really impressive, and it was such a great lesson. That's how you get to be Nicole Kidman – you show up no matter what. And I'll remember that next time I've got a runny nose and I think maybe I should stay in bed. I'll think: Nicole would be ashamed of me. MM: I learned this from Nick: he's so great about not just hanging out with the actors and director and producers, but getting to know all the crew and learning everybody's names. But also: I did a movie a couple years ago – it's not very good – with Susan Sarandon, and she does not take any you-know-what from anybody. Which was great to see, because as a woman, it is a little different than it is as a man. It's easy to feel like, 'Oh, OK, whatever, you can just treat me whatever way you want.' And I saw her being very strong, and she did it in a really lovely way too. That was nice. What book or film do you always return to, and why?NO: My favourite writer is an agrarian Kentuckian named Wendell Berry. He's an essayist and a poet, and he writes fiction, and he's sort of my Shakespeare. I continue to return to his writing because it makes me want to be a better citizen. MM: One book that I've read several times is Disgrace by South African author JM Coetzee. It's definitely not a comedy, it's pretty intense, but I just love it. What's the oldest thing you own, and why do you still have it?NO: It's my virginity, and I'll let Megan answer the why. MM: I have a teddy bear that I had when I was a little kid. I hugged it so much, all the fur eventually fell off of it. That'll be you, [giggles] MM: That's right. Some day. Unscripted & Unfiltered with Nick Offerman & Megan Mullally takes place 14 June at ICC Sydney Theatre as part of Vivid Sydney.
