No baseball caps, no facial hair, and no puffy sleeves. Those were apparently the three things that broke the rules of comedy on Fox back during the premiere of Arrested Development. At least it was according to David Cross. The comedian discussed this bit of Hollywood backlot silliness during his appearance on Tuesday’s Conan, talking about his troubles during the early production of Arrested Development and how he had to fight to keep the mustache for Tobias Funke. Hard to see Funke without that goofy looking mustache, which must’ve been true for Cross too since he visualized the character the moment he read the script and went to a tiny war to keep the look intact when the show started production.
It’s just one of those interesting, silly backstage stories you end up reading about in an oral history or during a late night interview. They’re always worth a listen.
Later he and Conan look back on a joke he tried to tell on Conan’s show back in 1994 during his first nationally televised standup set. Back in ’94, it was a bit about Jesus that would’ve likely destroyed Conan’s career and could not work on television. Today it’s child’s play and all bets are off, especially when it comes to Jesus.
Cross apparently slipped it in past the host and crew, but they eventually had to remove it from broadcast anyway. Looking back, it wasn’t the only thing stirring the censors at NBC in 1994:
Ice-T uses the word “krunk”. It’s a swear word that’s soooo new that the network censors don’t know what to do with it.
Jesus jokes and “krunk.” Things that all look tame in comparison to 2016.
(Via Team Coco)
