The stand-up comedian Ron “Tater Salad” White’s original special, “If You Quit Listening, I’ll Shut Up,” was released on Netflix Tuesday.
The Texas native’s signature routine is a cocktail of bawdy anecdotes, biting cynicism and a certain brand of brashness that can only be described as the kind of dirty, offensive humor your drunk uncle annually delivers at the Thanksgiving table.
And, of course, there are actual drinks involved in his set, too. In this Netflix special, the cigar-smoking, whiskey-swigging comic returns to the stage complete with his trademark stage props of a black stool, an ice bucket and an ashtray.
Right off the bat, White tackles intense topics such as drunk driving and infidelity like they’re mere pastimes.
“I’m 61 years old now, and I know two things to be true,” he starts. “One: anything has the potential to become a DUI checkpoint if you crash your car into it, and you can’t unf— the housekeeper. That’s it. That’s all I know.”
He continues to hammer the nail into the coffin of masculine decency with a sharp reference to a familiar case — “Governor Schwarzenegger helped me with that second one, so I didn’t have to do that one myself, so that’s good.”
While brazenly offensive humor like this appeals to some, others might perceive it as flat out distasteful, especially in the light of movements like #MeToo and #BlackLivesMatter.
It may be hard to believe, but it truly gets worse. Like a couch potato slowly sinking into the uncharted depths of a La-Z-Boy, White spirals into deeper, even more insulting territory when he begins to talk about a news article that “befuddled” him concerning a Middle Eastern town where women are required to wear burkas with only one eye hole opening.
The crowd chuckles as White makes an “OK” hand gesture, holds it up to his right eye and looks across the crowd.
“One eye hole,” he said, “not two eye holes like those other sluts.”
The joke continues as White explains his confusion about how the men are able to tell which women are hot or not, and he impersonates one of these men, racist accent included, and says, “Ooh, look at that one!”
He briefly assures the crowd that he’s not “busting on women from the Middle East” because he is aware that they are “perfectly content to live the way they do.” He takes a moment to pause and let the crowd process this, and roaring laughter ensues.
White’s approach to humor is the punch drunk answer to any therapist’s most basic question, “So, how are you doing today?” He leaves nothing to the imagination with his candid remarks, and he airs out all of the dirty laundry with no concern for who may be listening.
While he insults every minority on the spectrum, at least he isn’t leaving any behind. LGBTQ people, Middle Eastern people, black people, women — you name them, he’ll take a stab at them.
White is undeniably a storyteller. He relays tales from his early youth in Texas to his days with the troops during the Vietnam War to his modern day escapades as a wealthy, critically acclaimed showman with a blue-collar soul.
His straightforward approach to comedy is not difficult to understand, but that doesn’t mean it goes down easy. White’s abundant use of profanity combined with his blunt, cocky demeanor may at first create a sense of approachability, but pulling back the curtain on this act reveals the lack of inventiveness of most of his jokes.
Also, listening to him talk about sex simply feels wrong. His misogynistic and sexist commentary does not help his case, either. White goes into vivid detail about various sexual acts and his experiences with prostitutes, as well as his current sex life.
Every sex story he tells is vulgar, bawdy, demeaning or just plain gross. Some older members of the crowd may find comfort in the idea that someone is willing to have a “post-sex talk” discussing the nitty gritty details, but there is a reason why one doesn’t ask grandpa for sex advice.
With each long swig of scotch, White sinks further and further into a pit of ill-prepared jokes and sloppy deliveries.
The most upsetting part about this act was that anyone could see that this man is clearly aware of his alcohol-related problems, but he chooses to do nothing about them. He continues slurring certain words and is even forced to repeat jokes that he couldn’t quite get out the first time.
Overall, White’s “comedy” bit falls flat with his redundant references to his house in Beverly Hills, California, and his overuse of the word “f—in’.” His routine feels tired and outdated, not unlike the man himself.