Miscellany

Comedian Dane Cook ‘Jokes’ About Aurora Shooting

By Tim NewcombJuly 27, 20120

Phil McCarten / Reuters

Dane Cook in Los Angeles.

The audience at the Los Angeles Laugh Factory (the same location of Daniel Tosh’s apparent rape bit) wasn’t so sure if laughing was the right response after comedian Dane Cook joked (is that what you still call it in this situation?) about the Aurora theater shooting on Thursday, just less than one week after the event.

Perhaps Cook wanted to be the comedian to tell the first Aurora joke—or at least the first to be caught on video doing so. An audience member recorded his attempt. Cook was apparently talking about the shooting and says: “Here’s my thought. Whoo. Here we go,” a bit of a tender-footed preface to warn people that a joke was coming on a subject most wouldn’t expect.

(MORE: Everyone on Twitter Has Something to Say About Daniel Tosh’s Rape Joke)

He then explains that The Dark Knight Rises movie is “pretty much a piece of crap … yeah, spoiler alert” and that if the shooting hadn’t happened, that “somebody in that theater, about 25 minutes in, realizing that it was a piece of crap, probably was like, ‘Ugh, f—ing shoot me.’”

You can hear the dialogue below and catch a slight glimpse of it here.

The crowd initially mixes in loud groans with some applause—then some uncomfortable waiting. But the response turns favorable in the end, with some loud hollers plenty more laughs.

Now we sit back and see if Cook opened up the floodgates for Aurora-related comedy or if he will go down in flames like Gilbert Godfrey after 9/11.

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61 comments

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Gretchen DeKok

This idiot's so-called "joke" is not funny. It's hurtful.

Silky Johnson

It's fine to joke about it... It's just that nothing Dane Cook says is funny. When a good comedian finds a joke about it that isn't so obvious I'll laugh.

Indanavetta PBGA

Well, it's not funny though. We're still in deep condolence for Aurora Shooting and he made a joke of it? Not smart.

StillbornJesus

I take offense to any notion that Dane Cook is a 'comedian.' He is about as funny as a toddler with cancer.

Surfboat Dan.

Maturing as a comedian requires risks and mistakes. This was a home run, in that it was both. Trying to make people laugh in the face of so much tragedy around us is not easy. If your audience is douche bags you do what you think will work. 50 years from now it may be funny. Dane Cook might be also. I can see a good humored victim in the hospital laughing at this admittedly, in poor taste, joke.

JeffinIL

Is Gilbert Godfrey any relation to Gilbert Gottfried?

Donald J Caldwell

stop crying people it was a joke. no humor these days i tell ya

gregkells

Judging from the comments here, it seems most people are offended by the fact that it wasn't funny. If you're going to tackle a subject like a recent mass murder you should at least be clever and original about it, or it just comes off like a cheap gimmick (kinda like taking your shirt off and dancing around like a ponce). Using other peoples tragedy as a cheap gimmick is just weak.

David Smith

This wouldnt have been funny from a comedian with actual talent...

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walkertom98

What a moron...

Josh Warrender

Somebody's still paying Dane Cook to do standup? Who knew?

Mark Denzer

Controversy is the cheapest publicity. Stop falling for it. It is their way of getting free air play, and trying to seem at the center of everyone's awareness. I will never watch a Dane whatever his name is show. Period.

sumthingnew

dane cook has never been funny

Ann

To do something like that, it has to be REALLY funny. That wasn't really funny.

ipgrunt

What Dane Cook says to his audience is simply free speech, and no matter how insensitive, not a news worthy topic.

gregkells

Free speech is a right guaranteed to protect dissenting political speech. It doesn't apply here. Nobody is calling for his arrest, or saying he isn't allowed to say what he did. We're saying it wasn't funny, he's not funny, and he should have stuck to pandering to his repressed homosexual frat boy audience. a Dane Cook show should consist of ball jokes, then a little shirtless prancing, and culminate in an audience wide circle jerk.

stfusa

that was genuinely funny!..Well done Dane!... if the survivors heard this bit just after the shooting it would have taken the edge-off and calmed them down...

the fact that the femi-nazis and their lap-dogs (gays and the effeminate men) don't get it is not surprising at all...

gregkells

It was almost as funny as the joke about Abraham Lincoln's shooting that he took it from. If the survivors had heard this (which I'm sure most have) I seriously doubt they'd find any comfort in it. It's not that anyone doesn't get it, it's that it's not remotely funny. As for how gay and effeminate men think I couldn't tell you, why don't you take that guys sack out of your mouth and ask him?

ladyofargonne

Tasteless yes. But everybody's talking about him.

gregkells

Headline from the near future; Angry gunman fires 500 rounds and lobs a grenade into a comedy club where Dane Cook was performing. Thankfully, nobody was injured.

Silky Johnson

See that was funny.

Wolfgang Goethe

This guy is just not funny--controversy or no controversy. Not one original thought in his bones.

Charles Balter

This is exactly it: DANE COOK IS NOT FUNNY.

Seriously, I'm glad he goes to the gym and stuff, but just because you have a microphone and can jump up and down and scream into a microphone doesn't make you funny.

Dane Cook is like a lot of entertainers where he's so arrogant and full of himself that he deludes his audience into thinking he actually possesses talent, which he doesn't. Unfortunately, if Dane Cook flexes his biceps and runs across the stage and makes a lot of gestures, that fools enough people into thinking he's actually funny.

chef69

I love it !!!!!!!!!!!

jeru0455

The Dark Knight Rises is WAY better than any Dane Cook movie I've ever seen.

WAHBL

What can a played-out cliche do to get mentioned one last time? Well, the only thing he can do! Dane Cook got lucky with the Burger King skit, but after being irrelevant for 8 years, it's time to move on. Like TV movies from the 80's, I have to wonder, was it funny then - or was I just an idiot?

Guest

Why is it so shocking that Dane Cook and his small legion of fanboys are big enough DBags to laugh at this joke? Don't get me wrong, smart toilet humor can be funny but this guy's comedy is just not clever or funny.

John Blabber

shows how much you know because Gilbert Godfrey has done numerous sold out shows since then and has done just fine....

ladyofargonne

Gilbert probably could have made more money as a Disney voice actor than a stand up comedian.

gregkells

I'm pretty sure it's Gottfried, but you're right. He lost his gig as the voice of the AFLAC duck, and went straight back to work and hasn't looked back. He definitely didn't go down in flames. The difference is Gilbert Gottfried is a comedy legend, Dane Cook is a 40 year old drunken frat boy who's never been even remotely funny. Watch Gottfried do the Aristocrats routine. That's comedy gold.

WAHBL

Actually, I think Cook was funny for a few minutes around 8 years ago. So, not entirely true, but close.

gregkells

You mean back when at the end of his routine he would take his shirt off like a d-bag Jersey Shore reject and and play air guitar? Sorry, but even musicians who take their shirts off during a performance are d-bags. Unless your shirt is on fire, your set involves swimming, or you are a stripper, keep your clothes on. No offense, but even in his his prime Cook wasn't funny.

Juan Salinas

How long has it been since Dane Cook was actually funny? 7 or 8 semesters? Or was it supposed to be an ironic hipster joke? You know, calling The Dark Knight Rises a piece of crap when he's been the lead in major league hose monster suckfests like Employee of the Month, Good Luck Chuck and My Best Friend's Girl? Maybe Dane should go back to stealing material from Louis CK, because he's not a very good joke writer. After all, if you're going to steal, steal from the best.

gregkells

I have a feeling that if Louis CK decided to take on this topic he could pull the humor out of it. Not sure it would be worth the effort, but the topic wasn't the culprit here, it was the overwhelming lack of originality and creative thought that went into the joke.

gregkells

I like to think that no topic is off limits in comedy, and the only jokes that are offensive are the ones that just aren't funny. That said, this was offensive. Not because of the the topic, but because it was just a poorly crafted joke, and an obvious attempt to shock. If you're going to use a topic as sensitive as a recent mass murder, you better make sure it's undeniably funny or you just look like a hack trying to get attention at the expense of the victims. Stick to taking your shirt off and prancing around like a ponce Dane, you lack the intellect to tackle a subject like this. In his defense though, the people who paid to see Dane Cook perform probably couldn't tell.

Megestos

Humor is a great way to cope with the absurdities of life. Many enraged

people will now say: there is nothing funny about the Aurora Shooting.

And they're right, it's horrible, it's utterly monstrous - and that's

exactly why we need to laugh about it. Not to laugh at the victims, but to laugh an the bizareness and absurdity of life.

Megestos

Humor is a great way to cope with the absurdities of life. Many enraged

people will now say: there is nothing funny about the Aurora Shooting.

And they're right, it's horrible, it's utterly monstrous - and that's

exactly why we need to laugh about it. Not to laugh at the victims, but to laugh an the bizareness and absurdity of life.

RobotOctober

The problem is that so many comedians aspire to be the next Louis C.K., but their idea of absurdist humor is to throw out a shocking joke with no context. Louie's persona is so full of melancholy and nihilism that it works for him, while the same humor falls flat when Cook does it because of his mainstream, frat-boy image.

gregkells

Getting gang raped by clowns must be like comedy nirvana to you. Simply being absurd isn't enough to make something funny. If you are going to attempt to find humor in something as horrific as a very recent mass murder, you need to bring your A game. Dane Cook doesn't have an A game to bring.

Megestos

Humor is a great way to cope with the absurdities of life. Many enraged

people will now say: there is nothing funny about the Aurora Shooting.

And they're right, it's horrible, it's utterly monstrous - and that's

exactly why we need to laugh about it. Not to laugh at the victims, but to laugh an the bizareness and absurdity of life.

Megestos

Humor is a great way to cope with the absurdities of life. Many enraged people will now say: there is nothing funny about the Aurora Shooting. And they're right, it's horrible, it's utterly monstrous - and that's exactly why we need to laugh about it. Not to laugh at the victims, but to laugh an the bizareness and absurdity of life.

Vernon Danker

Actually, he's not the first to use this line. The first joke like this was about Abraham Lincoln, and that one was actually funny. Dane Cook is neither funny nor original.

Vernon Danker

Dane Cook is about as funny as a sack of dead puppies. When are people going to wake up to no talent douche bags like this, and stop supporting them?

LindaLuttrell

When will these insensitive clown-wannabes get it through their thick heads that rape and murder are NOT funny! I'd have to ask them: If this were happening to YOU...would you think it so amusing then??? Why no empathy for your fellow human beings? There is still plenty of fodder for humor...be creative...just look around. Apparently, you are incapable of that!

gregkells

Comedy isn't about empathy, there's nothing funny about being sensitive. Comedy is very often about shocking or surprising the audience, and breaking social conventions. Murder and rape aren't funny, but they can be the subject of humor. It's only offensive if you use a topic like rape or murder, and you don't use or possess enough intellect to make it humorous. This wasn't offensive because of the topic alone, it was offensive because Dane Cook isn't funny and he used a very recent tragedy to shock people into paying attention to him. Apparently taking his shirt off doesn't work anymore.

LindaLuttrell

I can agree about empathy...but to me and, guess I'm not alone here...another person's personal tragedy is simply not funny. Don't care how clever these guys thinnk they are. I take that back...I have laughed over two deaths

: Adolph Hitler amp; Osama BinLaden! Now. THAT's funny!

gregkells

Mel brooks said "tragedy is when I cut my finger, comedy is when you fall into an open sewer and die." It's all perspective. I don't find Alzheimer's jokes funny because I watched my grandmother suffer with the disease for 15 years. I would never presume to tell anyone else that they are out of line for not sharing my sense of personal tragedy. I would imagine that Osama Bin Laden's family doesn't share your sense of humor regarding his death. If we tiptoe around afraid to offend anyone, we may as well just quit telling jokes altogether. Nearly every topic will strike someone as insensitive.