I'm old enough to remember seeing Phyllis Diller and Joan Rivers doing their stand-up routines on TV. They broke ground for the next generation of female comedians. Those women (Elayne Boosler, Roseanne Barr, Rita Rudner, and Paula Poundstone to name a few) expanded the field and made comedy more gender equitable -- less a man's world crashed by a couple of unorthodox females.
Today we think nothing of women who step onstage and make jokes about sex. But when Joan Rivers started out, you could hear audible gasps during her routines. Women just didn't say those things.
Last week I went with my friend Lorraine to see Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work. I'd heard about the documentary and wondered how in-depth the film would dare to go. Rivers' career has been a succession of peaks and valleys: overnight fame when Johnny Carson anointed her as the next big thing; a shot at the first late night talk show hosted by a woman; an abrupt cancellation and the subsequent suicide of her husband; rebirth as a red-carpet TV commentator at the Academy Awards; and throughout, a stand-up routine that she's honed and updated over the decades.
If you judge the merit of a film by the number of viewers who linger outside the theatre afterwards to discuss what they've seen, then Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work is successful. Although the audience at the showing I attended was overwhelmingly white, female, liberal and 45+, it should also appeal to those younger audiences who know Joan in her most recent incarnation as a surgically-enhanced TV personality.
As for whether or not I (or Lorraine) liked the film, well...you'll just have to read the review.
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