Amy Schumer: Live at the Apollo Movie Review
Amy Schumer, in all her vulgarity, is remarkable. And her hour-long HBO special Amy Schumer: Live at the Apollo, which aired on Saturday, was no exception. Any comedian who can successfully map, plan and perform an hour of uninterrupted standup with no outside interaction or visible flubbing deserves congratulations. Schumer did so exceptionally well. She maintained a close connection with a captive audience, and while the show was filmed months ago, a good number of the jokes still hold up (quite a feat in a world of ever-shifting trends and senses of humor).
The special, directed by Chris Rock, incorporated some of Schumer’s older jokes, including her classic challenge of sexist stereotypes in comedy: because Schumer acknowledges sex and sexuality, she says, she is labeled a “sex comic,” whereas a man could “come up here,” engage in a vulgar sexual act, “and people would be like, ‘He’s a thinker.’” These jokes were funny and are still funny. But for the seasoned Schumer viewer, they are repetitive and were not met with uproarious applause.
Some jokes were unskillfully re-used, often verbatim, which irritated some critics and those who have seen all of her skits. But to Schumer’s credit, these jokes are her classics, and ones worth hearing for any viewer unfamiliar with her work. Her newer material was very good, if sometimes tiptoeing the line of what is too crass without enough humor to justify it.
Her site-specific jokes were especially successful. Toward the beginning of the show, she looked at the predominantly white crowd in the Harlem-located Apollo theater. “You guys look like you’re from this neighborhood!” she joked. Here and elsewhere, Schumer’s unapologetic and utterly shameless style served her well.
She is not afraid of trying a joke that may make her seem not only funny, but also painfully sad. In one line, she describes having “a little wine, weed and Ambien… or as I like to call it, tucking myself in.” In another, she sets a scene of herself in a kitchen, too lethargic to dirty and then clean a knife, eating saltines and butter separately and letting them meet once in her mouth.
Most of her jokes are about body image, self image, femininity, feminism and, yes, sex. She makes incessant jokes about her own body, which some (including herself) have deemed unfit for Hollywood. And these jokes are truly funny, relatable for most women and many men. She makes them more successfully, encouragingly and confidently than someone more painfully self-deprecating like Joan Rivers. Underneath her exterior, she seems to be very self aware and at least somewhat content. But these jokes can also come across as overly self-obsessed. Her self-criticism is extreme, and can sometimes feel forced and goes too far.
However, Schumer kept up a lively tempo and with the help of HBO’s editing, moved from topic to topic with impressive ease. She didn’t stray far from her typical repertoire of jokes, but perhaps that is where she is meant to reside and will always fit best. I hope to see her venture into newer domains and test her boundaries, but this HBO special was an ideal opportunity to set her reputation as a still relatively new comedian. She is making her way into the mainstream with the most grace we can expect of Amy Schumer. May there be many more HBO specials and impeccable standup shows ahead of her.