Iliza: Unveiled

Iliza is my kind of woman, in so many ways.

If you don't like her other specials, you probably won't be swayed by this. But I love everything she does.

I've loved Iliza's previous specials, but this one just didn't stand up to the bar I had set for it. I'm all for political jokes, feminist jokes, social commentary, etc (even if I personal disagree with the point being made) when done well but a lot of the material for this set fell flat. Like, some of it was just observances without an actual joke. Idk, it wasn't terrible but not as good as I was expecting.

I laughed out loud and I'm a sad, bitter person. She is extremely smart, mean and fantastically aware of the absurdity of the human experience.

Being a Brit I often cannot get my head around a lot of the US comedians, sometimes because of references but mostly I can't seem to spot the jokes.

Iliza has a very snappy, sharp wit that she backs up with an amazing capacity for vocal skills and a great physicality; managing to contort her body in strange ways and pop poses to increase her satire. OK sometimes she does stagger around the stage making goat noises but even that eventually got endearing.

The material does have a political edge to it and does lean on gender politics. But Iliza is very even with her jokes and put-downs and is not afraid to point out some of the crazy things women do or expect.

Sadly, in a climate where just wandering on stage and declaring that men suck because they earn more than women qualifies as a joke now - Iliza's decision to not be overly anti-man has defecto made her a pro-man comedian in my eyes - a badge that I am sure she doesn't particularly want.

But all that aside the show is very funny and mainly pokes fun at stupid wedding traditions - many that we don't have in the UK but are on Youtube often enough to be relevant.

All in all a very funny show

Don't get me wrong it's decent but not her best. It's important that we all be able to laugh at ourselves and this special certainly spends a lot of time pointing out all of the absurd things women tend to do, especially all of the over-the-top wedding related situations we put ourselves and our loved ones through. While I definitely chuckled at some things, I found myself kind of apathetic through most of it.

Finally it hit me why I didn't love it: laughing at ourselves is often the best medicine but in this special the jokes are structured in a way where it seems like Iliza is mostly laughing at "others". Most of her jokes seem to observe other women as the ones behaving absurdly with the implied premise that Iliza herself is an exception to this behavior. It felt a little bit like an hour of her desperately trying to prove what a cool girl she is putting other girls down. Maybe a touch holier-than-thou?

Don't get me wrong, it's a comedy special not a speech to the United Nations. No lasting harm to womanhood is done, no protests will occur and no grudges will be held. It's just a bit one-note and not particularly compelling or nuanced. I found that with topics at hand, I was expecting some more layered, introspective, and self-aware jokes.