Margaret Cho’s hilarious new Funny or Die video raises the question of what it would be like if women ran Hollywood. Cho depicts a network sitcom’s writing room, but with women only around the conference table. The fictional show is called “The DUFF and the DILF,” and the women are struggling with how to make Dan, the DILF, be more like “a human man,” since “52 percent of our audience is male or whatever,” as Cho says. The tables have turned.
They try to give him a hobby; they think him doing stand-up would be funny since men are terrible at it. “What if Dan has like a hot guy friend?” asks one writer. “Do they… talk? Like, with words?” Cho asks. “No!” she responds. So that’s cleared up.
They joke about using his insecurity about his body, his “blue balls” (here used as the penis-haver’s version of PMS), and even rape as comedic tools, but nothing works. Baffled, they consult their “diversity hire”—a young white guy named Gary—about how to make Dan a better character. He questions the sitcom industry as it stands: “Dan’s a DILF. Why would he marry a DUFF?”
The clip brings attention to the crazy double standards in TV sitcoms, where the DUFF/DILF dichotomy is always gender-swapped in real life. You can’t help but notice how crazy it is when we think about using the above strategies to make a male character just a little bit more interesting, yet with female characters, it’s totally common. Check out the video below!
Image and video via Funny or Die
