PBS - Makers Volume 2 (2014) Part 1 Comedy

In the last half-century, women have fought their way into nearly every sphere of American life, from the battlefield to the comedy club, the soundstage to the Senate. Each documentary in this six-part series examines the impact of the women’s movement on six fields once largely closed to women business, space, Hollywood, comedy, war and politics. In each field, women have pried open, and profoundly reshaped, the central institutions of American life and culture. Through intimate interviews with trailblazing women known and unknown, viewers are given a rare glimpse– sometimes funny, sometimes sad, and always candid—of what it was like to be pioneers in their fields.

Part 1 Comedy

Makers Women in Comedy tracks the rise of women in the world of comedy, from the “dangerous” comedy of 70s sitcoms like Maude to the groundbreaking women of the 1980s American comedy club boom and building to today’s multifaceted landscape. Today, movies like Bridesmaids break box office records and the women of Saturday Night Live are often more famous than their male counterparts. Contemporary comics, including Chelsea Handler, Mo’Nique, Sarah Silverman, Ellen DeGeneres, Jane Lynch and Kathy Griffin, talk about where women started in this competitive, male-dominated profession and where they are determined to go.

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