He has several standup specials. Among recurring themes:
- References to his role in Full House/AFHV (they made him wealthy)
- References to his role in Full House (having sex with a younger cast member)
- References to his role in Full House (cheap shots at the other adult cast members)
- Generally high-shock-value sexual references/innuendo
- Various self deprecating jokes mainly of a sexual deviancy nature
- A not-surprising-in-hindsight large amount of musical bits
- A general not so subtle hint that this, too, is all a facade and that while you may be appalled or interested in this other side of him it’s just as insincere
And if all of that makes it sound banal: it is, and it isn’t. It’s very predictable humor you could imagine coming from a “how to reboot squeaky clean image as surprisingly dirty and dark”, and it’s also very well delivered and more thoughtful than you might expect.
I’ll give an example, with apologies to Dang as it’s pretty raunchy.
I remember some comedian woman saying that Bob Saget’s favorite birthday present for women were ultra slim tampons. He’d say “put this prominently in your bathroom that way men will think you’re really tight.”
I’m… probably more uptight than most people about respectful humor. And while I wouldn’t say this is totally in the clear, and I don’t have full recall of the joke, it’s certainly one that could be delivered with respect. And at least to my mind it defaults to “punching up”, in this case the butt of the joke being foolish men who would draw that conclusion in the first place.
It’s been several years since I’ve watched any of his comedy specials, but even when he got really … over the top … I think there was usually at least some hint or signal that he was generally making fun of the grotesque in his own mind and not fully excusing it.
It would never occur to me to consider whether a joke from a standup comic is or isn't sufficiently respectful of a group, is or isn't accepting of something unacceptable.
That's like questioning whether the comedian really did have that conversation with his neighbor at the bus stop he mentioned in the set-up before the punchline.
A standup joke doesn't need to be respectful, it only needs to be funny.
My attitude is if it’s funny I laugh at it, whether offensive or not. However I recognize in this day and age there is a certain sort that will be offended. I caveat for no other reason than to acknowledge that I am aware of all the downvotes I am going to get…and don’t care.
So brave! But seriously, how can you post so confidently that funny is somehow objective and that you get it when others don’t? That in itself is a joke, so we’ll-played, I guess?
Of course humor is objective. Do you think honestly it isn’t? Pretty sure there is no “universal humor truth” out there.
Also not sure what’s brave about posting about laughing about something possibly controversial when you don’t care about the consequences. I don’t care if I am down or up voted on anything I post. My self worth is not tied to any social scoring system.
Probably neither... they were both for the audience. The 'America's Dad' thing came mostly from his stint on the show Full House in the 80's and 90's. However, his standup could get hilariously filthy and was as anti-'America's Dad' as one could imagine. I doubt it was a drug thing, he just had two different audiences he played to and did it well.
In fairness, this wasn't his joke or even meant to be funny... it's kind of a comedian test of sorts re: delivery. But you wanted to know how filthy he could get...
I've heard the Aristocrats joke before (mainly Gilbert Gottfried's version), but I was wondering if Saget had any routines where he would come off as more, for lack of better phrasing, "impassionatley and authentically vulgar". Reciting a hand-me-down joke just doesn't strike me as that. I'm of the opinion that even Tom Hanks has had an opportunity to recite the Aristocrats in front of an audience and I wouldn't be surprised if there's a tape of that somewhere in the world.
Fair enough... most haven't. Pretty much any of his standup/specials (i.e. the stuff he didn't do for network TV) will have a fair amount. For example, I started doing a YouTube search on 'bob sagat' and it offered to complete it as 'bob sagat stand up nasty' so I figured 'sure' and this was near the top: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bjGm5DNDadU and of course he didn't need to club you over the head with it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TLazfBlUkfk
- References to his role in Full House/AFHV (they made him wealthy)
- References to his role in Full House (having sex with a younger cast member)
- References to his role in Full House (cheap shots at the other adult cast members)
- Generally high-shock-value sexual references/innuendo
- Various self deprecating jokes mainly of a sexual deviancy nature
- A not-surprising-in-hindsight large amount of musical bits
- A general not so subtle hint that this, too, is all a facade and that while you may be appalled or interested in this other side of him it’s just as insincere