Image Credit: Gustavo Caballero/Getty ImagesThere’s the old truism attributed to Picasso that good artists copy, but great artists steal. So does this make Carlos Mencia the greatest artist of our time? The stand-up comedian is known primarily from his former Comedy Central show, Mind of Mencia, but you could argue that he’s equally famous nowadays for his alleged joke-stealing, and now the accusations of thievery have led to something of a mini Twitter-breakdown.
This comes after comedy podcaster Marc Maron put together a fascinating hour of discussion about the comedian’s tendency to pinch punchlines, interviewing two of his friends and colleagues, as well as the man himself. It wasn’t the first time he’d been accused of plagiarizing jokes. Bro-median Joe Rogan confronted him onstage in 2007, and this video of Mencia telling a joke extremely similar to one told by Bill Cosby decades earlier has gotten nearly two million views on YouTube:
Maron comes off as impressively even-handed, even sympathetic, towards Mencia. He treats his actions more as a condition or a personality disorder than anything that’s actively malicious. The interview is pretty revealing, and clearly affected Mencia a great deal. Last week he Twittered: “I’m devastated. I canceled my gigs this weekend cuz at this moment, I don’t ever wanna do stand-up again that’s how hurt I am.”
A lot of comedians regard their jokes like children. After a painful creative process not unlike birthing, the joke comes into the world, but it still isn’t completely developed yet. It takes months, even years, of rearing it on the road, using trial and error, and continual tweaking, to make it into the joke it is today. So when a comedian steals a bit from another, it’s understandable that they may see it less as copyright infringement than straight-up kidnapping. See Patton Oswalt’s gut-busting rant prompted by his bizarre saga with an unknown comedy thief who copied large swathes of his hilarity verbatim.
What do you think, PopWatchers, is Mencia a thief, or is it just that his comedy tends to be so stock and obvious that comparisons with other comedians are inevitable? And if he is stealing jokes, should he at least try to steal better ones?
Didn’t South Park deal with this a while ago? I believe Kanye West had Mencia’s head lopped off
This hack is still around?
No. From what I assumed, and had heard rumblings , leading up to the Rogan incident (and definately after it), other comedians would refuse to perform if Mencia was in the house or on the property, out of fear that he would steal their jokes. It literally got to that level. Apparently, no ability to steal=no new material=drops off face of Earth for Mencia.
That’s exactly what I was thinking. I didn’t understand it when I first watched it (I just thought that Trey and Matt weren’t big fans of Mencia) but I guess they were playing off these accusations.
yup, Mencia was telling the “gay fish” joke as his own
Mencia definitely steals bits. But the problem is, so do a lot of other comedians – look on YouTube. There are tons of videos showing almost every comedian doing someone else’s bit. I guess Mencia is just the worst offender.
He started by stealing whole minutes from Joe Rogan’s stand-up routine. You can check out any Joe Rogan performance from about 7 years ago, and then watch any Mencia performance from about 5 years ago- you’ll hear the exact same jokes, told the exact same way. Mencia’s been a comedy thief for years, and I’m wondering why anyone would be shocked by this allegation. It is, after all, 100% true. Mencia can say “I don’t even want to do comedy anymore”- well, you never really did comedy in the first place. You just stole jokes.
How do you say “talentless hack” in Spanish ?
I believe it’s pronounced “Mencia”
yea, this clown isn’t even funny. i tried listening to him for a minute but didn’t get him. who cares, let him steal. he probably had this story put out to bring his name back into the media. whateva!!
incompetente sin talento
Well, since I haven’t seen every single comedian’s routine, I can’t comment on how bad Mencia is with the stealing. All I can tell you is that he’s *great* to his fans. We saw him live; (laughed our butts off) he stayed after the show to pose for pix and sign autographs, until every single fan was happy. Someone here said other comics steal, which is true – *that* I’ve seen myself. But I guess I’ll never know how many of them recycled their stuff. Richard Pryor gave Paul Mooney a liner note credit for stealing one of his jokes.
It was an amazing set of interviews. “WTFpod” for those looking for Marc’s podcast
Talentless Hack in Spanish is “Paul Rodriguez”
Actually, Paul is pretty funny. I guess you had to struggle to think of another Latino.
No comment on the Mencia thing, because I don’t know his stand-up well enough to weigh in…but damn, that stuff with Patton Oswalt was serious shht. I generally like Patton for his comic book geekery and pretty awesome acting cred (as well as his stand-up), but the thing that that kid tried to do…that was crap. Even though Patton Oswalt had a hernia dissing this kid on his blog, the kid deserved it. He was a major douche nozzle. No one deserves to be stolen from…
How is he hurt? He brought on himself. Whatever …. George Lopez is funnier.
Um … this story is nothing new. At all.
And for the record, I do think that two independent comedians could come up with the same joke. The Cosby one about football players thanking Mom seems obvious even to me.
Watching it though, it’s told in a very similar style besides basically being the same story. Though Mencia adds a touch of sexism to the joke. That “B****” never played ball with you”? Nothing funny about his version.
Having a similar short setup/punchline or premise from an obscure comic is understandable. A 3 minute rant that’s almost word for word and hitting all of the same beats and the exact same punchline from one of the most respected comedians in history is a little suspicious. And most jokes seem obvious when you don’t write them. Just because you know it exists after it’s pointed out to you, doesn’t mean you would have had the insight to see it on your own.
i really dislike him. his ‘comedy’ show was consistently unfunny and, i suppose realizing he isn’t that funny, has taken others’ jokes. w/e. i bet he’s happy he’s in the news.
It’s more offensive that he’s not funny. If you have to talk about how edgy you are all of the time, you’re probably not that edgy, “Carlos”.
He ought to try stealing funnier ones…
This is old news. The Joe Rogan slam was years ago and was back when Mencia was actually (semi-) relevent. Rogan and the other guy who went after Mencia for joke-stealing had some pretty damning video proof at that time. I just assumed that was the reason Mencia dropped off the face of the Earth since then.
I agree on the timing. Is someone going to release an article in five years titled ‘BP – Oil Leakers?’
I think the timing is due to the Marc Maron interviews, which really cut through all the hearsay and got to the heart of the matter. Mencia charmed his way through the first interview, but the followup really exposed what a lost soul he’s become. Fascinating stuff. Nice to see Maron’s podcast given a nod in a mainstream publication.
“And for the record, I do think that two independent comedians could come up with the same joke. The Cosby one about football players thanking Mom seems obvious even to me.”
Yes and as in “Simpsons Did It” when you find out someone else has already done the bit, you drop it. Also there’s no WAY any comedian today doesn’t know that Cosby bit. Even if Mencia didn’t the first time he did it in a comedy club I guarantee another comedian would have told him.
I never heard him tell the joke except for that video clip. Perhaps he did drop it?
Fact: Not every person can know every joke ever told, even if it is Cosby. Plus, most of these people tread the same ground.
Mencia told Maron the producers of the show edited the bit out for broadcast of his tv special, but it appeared on the DVD.
While you’re slightly on the right track, this is most definitely stolen. If it was a comedian who had never been accused or proved to be a thief, okay. But Mencia is acknowledged as one of the worst offenders, has been for a long time. He’s like the Hispanic Robin Williams.
Old news…surprise not many people are in trouble
It does appear that Carlos steals bits either intentionally or unintentionally. But the guy’s name is Ned, not Carlos. He even “stole” his name to seem more “ethnic.”
Yawn. Also old news.
They were fascinating podcasts. Two of the finest ever done. Maron covered joke stealing with a revealing interview with a far more famous comic -Robin Williams- just a few weeks ago. Robin isn’t “on” during the show and, even if his comedy isn’t your cup of tea, his interview with Maron is wonderful.
Absolutely. Maron should get a Peabody or something for those.