This video discussion between Gilbert Gottfried and Richard Belzer about whether jokes can be “too soon†is worth checking out if you have the 20 minutes. Gottfried is famous for getting in trouble for mining large-scale tragedy for material, but here he tells the positive story of making the first 9/11 joke at a roast of Hugh Hefner in 2001, and the resulting mass catharsis among the audience:
The laughs just exploded out, and everybody was just screaming and crying and - Rob Schneider was there, he fell off his chair - and they were applauding and going nuts, and it was like that moment of, “Hey, it’s okay. You can come out, climb out from under your beds. Everything’s fine. You’re gonna live after this.â€
The pair also discuss Gottfried’s tsunami jokes and the ways the Internet has amplified people’s outrage. Rest assured, though, they do find time in these 20 minutes for Gilbert Gottfried to do a bit about having sex with Richard Belzer’s cat Minnie. He is still Gilbert Gottfried, after all.