Film and television comic Jonathan Winters, who was known for his eccentric characters, has passed away at the age of 87.

Winters died yesterday at his Montecito, California home, of natural causes, The Huffington Post reported. He was surrounded by friends and family during his last few moments.

Winters had a comedy career of about 60 years; during that time, he appeared in over 50 TV shows and films. His retirement was nonexistent, with his most recent work being the voice of Papa Smurf in the “Smurfs” film, and its sequel, “The Smurfs 2″ LaughSpin reported.

He recently completed the film “Big Finish” which features some big names in the comedy world like Bob Newhart, Jerry Lewis, Don Rickles, Tim Conway, and Garrett Morris.

“Big Finish” focuses on retirement community residents who fight against a wealthy developer who wants to tear down their home and is set to hit theaters on July 31.

According to the Huffington Post, Winter’s career began when he won a talent contest that later opened the door for appearances at comedy clubs and radio gigs.

Winters’ legacy will live on through his original work as well as his new projects that have yet to be released.

Take a walk down memory lane and check out the video below of some of Winters’ best moments.

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A few months ago, before the New Year, AmericasComedy.Com gave readers an exclusive expose on “Family Guy” creator Seth MacFarlane’s newest project,  ”A Million Ways to Die in the West.” Since then, besides learning that the film is a Western parody and that MacFarlane would be acting in, we’ve also learned there will be an all-star cast which includes Liam Neeson, Charlize Theron, Amanda Seyfried and Giovanni Ribisi.

Today, The Hollywood Reporter divulged that Sarah Silverman is in talks with producers to play the town whore in MacFarlane’s western spoof.

“A Million Wasy to Die in The West’s” plot circulates around a timid sheep farmer played by (MacFarlane). After his significant other leaves him (played by Seyfried) and after running into the damsel in distress (played by Theron) the sheepherder is forced to play the hero against Theron’s vindictive ex-husband (played by Neeson).

Silverman’s character, so far dubbed  “Prostitute”, is the infamous and well-worked town whore. She’s notorious for lascivious acts although being the good Christian that she is, Silverman’s character refuses to have sex with her fiancé until they are married.

The part is lewd, it’s raunchy, it’s definitely Silverman.

“A Million Ways to Die in the West” will be MacFarlane’s first formal live action acting gig. In lieu of his debut film’s (Ted) success, there’s no doubt this new western movie has potential.

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I think Mike Birbiglia’s greatest strength is that no one else has a voice like him. I don’t mean vocally, I mean the way in which he presents stories with his anxious, self-confident but so very human self.That is after all largely where his comedy comes from. He has turned “Sleepwalk With Me“ from a one-man show into a book and now a movie.

Breaking the 4th Wall

The film takes a look at a fictionalized reworking of Birbiglia’s early life as a comic who struggles with money, a girlfriend and terrible sleepwalking problems. The story opens by immediately breaking the fourth wall. The movie snob in me doesn’t want to like this, but it serves as a greater motif to remind us that Mike – or his character Matt Pandamiglio – is a performer who is always conscious of his audience. So I left it alone.

Mike’s character, who is telling the story after it’s already happened, takes his girlfriend Abby (played by Lauren Ambrose) to his sister’s wedding. Pressure to finally tie the knot falls unexpectedly on Matt from his parents and family. This leads to the first episode of sleepwalking.

Matt works at a bar where he occasionally does five to ten minute sets of comedy. He slowly gets hold of an agent as well as some terribly awful and awkward gigs while trying to make a real job out of his part-time obsession. All the while his sleepwalking worsens and he refuses to break up with Abby who he is so obviously not right for. Instead, he goes the alternate route and eventually proposes to her.

One of the important things that stuck out to me as a Birbiglia fan is how much I would hate his character if I hadn’t spent literally hours laughing at Birbiglia’s albums. Pandamiglio can’t make a commitment, he doesn’t follow through on anything and for the most part the comedy that he actually performs only pays enough to buy him gas to the gig and back. And this aspect of him is important.

The reason Matt’s talking to us in the future is to show that he wasn’t a very likeable guy. And I’m not trying to say he’s loathsome. He’s simply at that stage in life where he hasn’t reached adulthood – the point every person passes when they’re utterly confused with what they want to do with their life.

Conclusion

There’s a great scene when Matt is talking to a comedian played by Marc Maron. In a moment of vulnerability Matt admits that he “won’t get married until I’m sure that nothing else good can happen.” At which point Maron’s character just says, “Why don’t you just say that on stage.” It’s important because without that moment of epiphany the movie doesn’t happen.

One thing that you have to say about Birbiglia’s comedy is that it’s very human. He lets people laugh at his vulnerabilities because more than anything, shared experience gets the ribs tickled. Everybody knows what it’s like to be vulnerable and sure that the decision and life they’re leading is the wrong one.

If you’ve got Netflix you can watch the entire movie right now on Instant Stream. Mike is currently showing his movie to fans in Australia, and you can catch the latest updates about the film via his blog here.

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If you’re reading this, I’ll just assume you’re a Daily Show junky, and you’re already familiar with the show’s Senior British Correspondent, John Oliver.

My question – and I’m sure everyone else’s – is why was he picked to replace Jon Stewart during Stewart’s movie directing hiatus? What about Jason Jones, Sam Bee, Wyatt Cenac or Aasif Mandvi?

Oliver and all of these correspondents are incredibly talented. But Daily Show fans should note the significance of this move by the show’s producers (of which the primary one is Stewart himself).

When Johnny Carson took nights off, NBC brought in Leno or Letterman. This is why the selection of Oliver is significant. He could wind up the permanent replacement.

Outside of The Daily Show, Oliver has a recurring role on the hit comedy Community. He also has a very funny stand-up special called “John Oliver: Terrifying Times.” His humor is smart, and it’s hard not to be a fan.

The silver fox (Stewart) will not be in the big chair forever – everybody retires. Having grown up on The Daily Show, it’s hard to think of it without Jon Stewart, but someday he’s going to need a replacement.

Do we really want a British guy making fun of our government 5 days a week? It just doesn’t feel right.

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Before he became the iconic lefty satire news talk show personality that we all admire and loath, Jon Stewart was just a simple actor. Like many greats before him, Stewart climbed the massive vined walls of success in Hollywood without plummet or tangle. Now he’s ready for his directing debut.

For the duration of Stewart’s 12-week filming break during the summer, Daily Show correspondent John Oliver will sit in as host for 8-weeks. There’s no telling who did the math on that one.

The films title is Rosewater and on top of directing it Stewart also wrote the screenplay.

Rosewater is an adaptation from the book Then They Came for Me: A Family’s Story of Love Captivity and Survival. The story is based on the true account of journalist Maziar Bahari and the 118 days he spent in an Iranian prison back in 2009.

Bahari has made multiple appearances on The Daily Show, which has landed him in trouble with the Iranian government who dubbed him a spy, specifically for his first appearance on the show.

If you couldn’t tell by now, this movie WILL NOT BE A COMEDY.

Stewart seems pretty laxed about his first big directing and drama-writing debut. When asked about his motivation for the film he says that the idea was sparked from his friendship with Bahari and that “it just kind of happened.”

It will be interesting to see if Jon Stewart’s news time persona and lefty politics will have any effect on box office sales.

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Chris Rock will be releasing a new movie titled, “Finally Famous.”

What makes this latest movie newsworthy is that Rock will play, Andre Allen, a blockbuster comedian-turned-actor struggling with his fans.

This idea of having a comedian-turned-actor play a comedian-turned-actor is similar to Louis C.K. being a comedian who plays a comedian on FX’s “Louie.” (Say that ten times fast.)

According to LaughSpin, the plot of the movie goes something like this: “… Allen has been coasting on his fans’ adoration and he’s come to resent is cushy career. So now, he’s pledged to reinvent himself and become a serious actor.”

In addition, IndieWire blogs that, “While Andre’s acting career appears to be failing, his upcoming marriage to a popular reality star is expected to be ‘the biggest media event of the year.’” (Insert Kris Humphries/Kim Kardashian joke.)

The movie should have many parallels between Rock’s real life and career, and even that of other Hollywood actors who have had similar struggles to the fictional Andre Allen.

The heights you can reach artistically through film are incredible when you’re not doing an Adam Sandler movie.

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Bonnie McFarlane did her first open mic in her native Canada over a decade ago and has since worked her way up to being one of the most well-respected comedians in the country. In 2005 she married fellow comedian Rich Vos and the pair have a child and a podcast together.

Recently, McFarlane decided to film a documentary about the old cliche that women aren’t as funny as men and called it, appropriately, “Women Aren’t Funny.” On an episode of Ari Shaffir’s Skeptic Tank, she described the project as just going on the road and interviewing a bunch of her friends, which makes for a great movie when your friends are the likes of Patrice O’Neal, Artie Lange, Doug Stanhope, Colin Quinn and Sarah Silverman.

AmericasComedy.Com spoke with McFarlane about the movie, the cliche behind it and her marriage to Vos.

AC: It’s always interesting to talk about the myth that women aren’t funny with different comedians – whether it’s a myth, a reality, propaganda for PR – what’s your thought? When someone says that, how serious do you think that is?

BM: Intellectually, I think everyone really knows that women are funny, but it’s a weird thing that people keep trotting out. I think it’s because you can point to certain women that aren’t funny. You can point to a lot of guys that aren’t funny but nobody seems to give a shit about that.

You know, women are burdened with all this other crap all the time, like looking good. You need to be really superhuman to be successful as a woman. You have to be thin and beautiful and funny and charming and you can sort of see that sometimes that funny takes a little bit of a backseat to those other qualities. So then they point to that person and go, “Look, that person’s not funny.”

Nobody looks at Tatum Channing or whatever that guy’s name is and says, “He made it and he’s not funny.”

AC: Did doing the movie change your attitude towards that whole concept in anyway?

BM: Well, I think that I had put blinders on to sexism – I never really felt it. I’ve always been friends with guys. When I started doing stand-up, I was embraced really early on. So, I just kind of felt that my experience was the same experience everyone was having.

And, also, I think there was sexism going on with me, I just completely ignored it. I mean, stand-up is so hard for everybody. For a white guy, it’s hard, too, it’s hard for him to stand-out. You have different challenges. So I just swept it all under the rug.

But when I talked to the women, I realized there is real sexism going on that I always just acted like it was bullshit before. I think especially like, for women of color and for women who are… what’s the term… fatties? Is that right? [laughs].. you know they’re having different experiences. There might be bigots against them. I think for overweight women in comedy, you think it would be easier for them, but it’s not even. Like, Melissa McCarthy got called a hippo.

You know, when you’re around comics, you hear people get called “hippo” or worse all the time. But that guy is… was.. a serious critic. I thought that was a little weird, it was just so odd. Like it bothered him so much, he knew he was going to get in trouble and he couldn’t stop himself from typing it out.

AC: Well, that goes back to your point about having to be a superwoman. It’s like he thought, “Oh my god, here’s this imperfect woman being successful!”

BM: How dare she. I don’t know Rex Reed – is he gay, I don’t know? But it’s like guys are thinking, “I don’t want to fuck her, what is she doing on my television???”

AC: Going back to the movie, something you said on Ari’s podcast was that you grabbed all your friends to do this. Did you find things out about your friends that were surprising?

BM: Well, very early on, I spoke with a documentary filmmaker about making this and he said, “The problem you’re gonna have is that no one will go on record to say women aren’t funny.” And I was like, “What? I don’t know if you know my friends.”

So, I knew there were people that were gonna say it, I just wasn’t sure which ones. Like, in my mind, Colin [Quinn] could have easily taken the stance that women aren’t funny and given a bunch of reasons for it. And when I went to interview Doug Stanhope, I had no idea which way he was going to swing on it. And I was actually kind of surprised that he said women aren’t funny because I always think Doug takes the hardest argument possible, the unpopular side. And I think with comedians, the unpopular side is that women ARE funny.

That was really fascinating to find out where people were going to sit on it. And comics have to take a side, that’s the nature of what we do. So you knew there wasn’t going to be anybody who said “Well….”

And the other thing is with Patrice [O'Neal] or Artie [Lange] or Stanhope, you don’t even know for sure that they really think it. It’s a weird thing with comedians that it’s not necessarily what you believe in your heart, it’s what’s going to get the biggest reaction sometimes. So, like with Patrice, he likes to just stir it up.

So I never took it that personally, but I did take it personally with the club owners. It’s not their business to stir things up, it’s their business to put on talent. When they’d say, “Well, if there were more funny women, we’d book more women.” I was like, “Are you kidding me?” That’s when I really started to think, “Maybe there is sexism.”

AC: That’s what always gets me. Like with the whole Adam Carolla uproar, I was like, ‘Who cares?’ That guy is giving maybe five people jobs. Worry about the guy who’s booking the Omaha Funny Bone or wherever.

BM: You know, I interviewed Adam for the movie, too.. AFTER that whole thing. And he said what I figured he was thinking all along. You know, when they’re interviewing you, you just have to take stands. So, he was asked a question, he took a stance, it blew up in his face.

I think with comedians, I just can’t see how they believe it because they see funny women all the time.

AC: Though it might be that thing of, “Well, I know the one funny girl, but in general…”

BM: Well, I had a list of funny women and Adam said “yes, yes, yes” to all of them. And he said “Well, you have a list of a thousand funny women, but in the scheme of things there’s more funny men.” But that’s a different argument, but not nearly as provocative. That’s like saying “Well, there’s more female nurses, so men aren’t nurturing.” That’s a terrible analogy. Men don’t care about being nurturing.

And that’s the thing. Men just don’t listen to stuff they don’t like to hear, but women get all invested. Like all these women took to Twitter and I thought, “Now you’re making this a big thing. Why don’t you just ignore it?” As I say that, I made a whole fucking movie about it!

AC: I think that’s always the thing with anything about race or gender.. there’s a part of you that just wants to think, ‘This isn’t a big deal.’ But in reality, it kind of is and I have to say something.

BM: Well, the thing is, I really just tried to make the movie funny and not have an answer for it because I felt like giving it any real weight just gave credence to the argument.

AC: Well that brings up a good point. You say you think comedians are going to say the thing that gets the biggest reaction and not necessarily what they seriously think. Do you think everyone’s going to get that?

BM: Yeah, I made this with a comic’s brain, so like when Artie Lange was saying things, I thought they were funny even though they were disparaging to my gender. And so I thought people would see that, and see that’s it’s funny. But there were people that really liked the movie that said, “Oh, I really hate Artie Lange.” And I thought, “Oh no, I don’t want people to hate Artie Lange! I love Artie Lange!” I don’t want it be some kind of war, but what can I do? I mean, I’m sure Artie Lange doesn’t care.

But I really do love all the people in the movie. I really do think all of them are funny, it’s not like I set out to prove men aren’t funny or anything. And the women, Chelsea Peretti and Sarah Silverman are so funny in the movie. They get huge, huge laughs. I just wanted to show a balance. Here’s some funny men and some funny women and let’s just forget about it.

AC: Okay, one last, totally unrelated question. And I’m not being gendered about it, I asked the same question of Tom Segura. How the heck are you married to another stand-up comedian?

BM: Well, it’s funny because I did film a thing about this that didn’t make it into the movie. For me, when people say “How can you do that? I would never date a comic!” well I would never NOT date a comic. I’m not gonna come home and listen to someone talk about their dentistry practice for two hours. I would kill myself if I had to listen to… I don’t know, um… I don’t know what other jobs are out there.

AC: One of my favorite things about interviewing top level comedians is that whenever something comes up that has to reference a normal person job, they are stumped. Like, what do other people do?

BM: Accountant… people are accountants, right?

Anyway, I think if you’re a comic, you’re addicted to stand-up in a way. So, like, our date night is going to do comedy on some show and having a glass of wine. For us, I’m not going to say it works, because we hate each other, but I would never want to be married to a non-comic.

And as a female comic, what guy is going to want to go to his job at a bank or whatever and say, “Yeah, this is my wife, she’s a comedian” and is gonna be cool with you saying, “I’m gonna go on the road and share a condo with three other fellas, see you in a week!”

And once you hang out with a lot of smart, funny guys, you start to crave those fucked up conversations you’ve been having.  And you can’t do that with a normal person. They want you to have normal emotions. I am either on the floor sobbing or making jokes about something. That’s it.

“Women Aren’t Funny” recently played at the Athena Film Festival in New York City. Follow Bonnie on Twitter @Bonnie McFarlane

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First the good news: comedy fans can look forward to a new movie called ‘Hell Baby,’ a horror/comedy starring talented actors Leslie Bibb, Thomas Lennon,  Paul Scheer, Rob Huebel,  Riki Lindhome, Keegan-Michael Key, Robert Ben Garant and Alex Berg.

The bad news? I’m not sure there’s any love lost between the cast. In a recent interview with Entertainment Weekly‘s Anthony Breznican (see video below), star Rob Corddry made it a point to answer every question that came the actors’ way, much to their chagrin.

After being fed up with Corddry dominating the interview, some of his fellow actors lashed out, saying he was “like working with a more difficult Sean Penn.”

Comedy Central’s Keegan-Michael Key also took beef with Corddry for constantly pointing out that he was a “colored person” while they were on the set.

Riki Lindhome added, “He made me cry every single day.” Either this movie is bound to lack chemistry, or a bunch of awesome comedic actors pulled off a great prank on viewers and fans.

I’m going with the latter.

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Semi-respectable actors Adrien Brody (he has an Oscar), Michelle Rodriguez, and Lindsay Lohan are starring in a new raunchy comedy film created by comedians Ari Shaffir and Ken Pringle under the wand of TV troll ShamWow Guy (Vince Offer).

The movie InAPPropriate Comedy is ShamWow Guy’s full length directing debut and premieres in theaters March 22.

A few years ago, the ShamWow guy aired his commercial advertising the infamous spongy cum-rag. Instantly, ShamWow guy and his product became a household name and an urban legend.

But maybe that was it all along. Maybe ShamWow guys real name is Offer Shlomi. And maybe he’s really just a normal guy who did a little comedy and created the greatest character of our generation.

All with no one else knowing the true genius behind ShamWow. Enjoy the InAPPropriate Comedy trailer below!

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“I think you can’t really tell art what to do,” comedian Sarah Silverman said to a TMZ crew that asked her about Django Unchained use of the n-word.

The new Quentin Tarantino movie has received criticism from many different people, most notably filmmaker Spike Lee. Some feel that using the n-word over 110 times was unnecessary. Others say that the word makes the movie more realistic.

“Wouldn’t it be odd if it didn’t have that horrific word in it?” asked Silverman.

There’s really no better person to ask about censorship than a comedian. They face questions about inappropriate material constantly, whether it’s jokes that are too soon or jokes that involve rape, race or abortion.

As for Spike Lee’s criticism, he tweeted recently, “American Slavery Was Not A Sergio Leone Spaghetti Western. It Was A Holocaust. My Ancestors Are Slaves. Stolen From Africa. I Will Honor Them.”

Check out the video below and let us know what you think!

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