Schumer tests positive for overexposure
Hilarious skit teases Season 4 of comic’s hit show
In comedy as in life, it’s the little things that make it all worthwhile.
While the more flamboyant and aggressive aspects of Amy Schumer’s comedy understandably get the most attention, I often have appreciated the subtle touches, too.
As an example, I’ll point to a widely circulated promotional clip for Season 4 of Inside Amy Schumer, which debuts Thursday across Canada on the Comedy Network, as well as on Comedy Central in the United States.
Schumer, as we all know, has become the It Girl of comedy over the past two years. She pokes fun at her runaway celebrity status in the clip.
The main joke is that Schumer gets some devastating news from her doctor. The test results came back positive. She has been “overexposed.” “What’s the cure?” Schumer asks. “GO AWAY FOR A WHILE,” the doctor says. “No late-night TV-show appearances, no podcasts ... ”
And that’s when Schumer, almost under her breath and in response to the nixing of podcasts, says softly, “Thank God.”
That’s the moment for me. That’s what separates Amy Schumer.
Listen, the promo would have been funny enough without that bit. The doctor advises Schumer not to go back to her basic-cable TV show if she wants to avoid further overexposure. But Schumer tells him she has to follow her heart and keep on “exposing” herself. It’s a great little 30-second production.
But the fact that Schumer went out of her way, even within those 30 seconds, for a comedic drive-by shooting at podcasts, well, I find stuff like that rather brilliant, to be honest with you.
Inside Amy Schumer is back for Season 4, and Season 5 already has been ordered. The show has to be a hell of a lot of work. Even if there only have been 10 episodes per season, there are a lot of skits in there.
So it will be interesting to see how long Schumer wants to keep going with it. I imagine it may depend upon the state of her movie career. Not that movies are a step up from TV in any kind of creative sense (good lord, they aren’t), but you know what I mean in terms of workload.
For any comedian, however, the only condition more serious than overexposure is underexposure. Doctors never have found a cure for that sucker. So I’m all for as much Amy Schumer as possible. You gotta drive while the tank is full.
And speaking of driving and full tanks, a new comedy road-trip series titled The Detour makes its Canadian debut also on Thursday immediately following Inside Amy Schumer on the Comedy Network. The Detour originates on the U.S. cable channel TBS, where it made its debut last week.
The Detour was created by real-life Canadian couple and Daily Show alumni Jason Jones and Samantha Bee, but Jones stars in it, whereas Bee does not. Bee, of course, has her own show — Full Frontal with Samantha Bee, also on TBS and the Comedy Network — keeping her busy.
In The Detour, Jones and Natalie Zea play married couple Nate and Robin, who embark upon a long family road trip with their fraternal preteen twins Delilah (Ashley Gerasimovich) and Jared (Liam Carroll). The idea is to travel from Syracuse, N.Y., to Fort Lauderdale, Fla., for a vacation, but there’s far more than that going on, as we deduce in the first episode.