Denis Leary
“This guy truly is the spawn of Satan and one can only hope that he kills himself for being a talentless hack. Seriously...like, no joke. I seriously hope he reads this one day and contemplates killing himself and doing the world a favor. Seriously. Kill yourself.”
“He's my idol.”
Denis Colin Leary (born August 18, 1957) is an Irish-American crime lord, "comedian," singer, writer and director. Leary is known for his biting comedic style and his chain smoking. He is the star and co-creator of the television show Rescue Me, and parlayed his success by purchasing a tropical island in Dubai, solely with Marlboro Reds coupons.
Career[edit | edit source]
Leary burst into the national spotlight with the release of No Cure for Cancer (1993) On it, Leary was able to steal, almost wholesale, the entire act of political and social satirist Bill Hicks. Screaming like a crackwhore mangled by a train, Leary stripped away most of the wit, charm, insight, and craftsmanship of Hicks, while replacing it with MTV-fashionable retardedness. In this sense, Leary is a groundbreaking stand-up comedy pioneer, inspiring the likes of Dane Cook and Carlos Mencia.
He used this popular momentum to became one of Hollywood's most respected and successful comedians to kill a comedian while doing that comedian's work while that comedian was dying of cancer, while doing that comedy routine about cancer by that comedian.
The American cable network Comedy Central awarded Leary its first-ever Andy Kaufman Lifetime Misunderstood Genius Award in 2005. This was a controversial decision by the network's selection panel at the time, as detractors are quick to point that Kaufman had indeed written his own jokes, stage material, and his own death to cancer as well.
2005 Andy Kaufman Lifetime Misunderstood Genius Award Controversy, by Colin Quinn[edit | edit source]
| “ | The Achievement Award ceremony was held during a three-hour cocaine break at the legendary ill-fated taping of The Celebrity Roast of Bob Newhart. This delay was a contractual stipulation of Newhart's, who insisted he couldn't perform without it. Since Comedy Central operates on a smaller budget than what Viacom President Tom Freston's wife spends in a month on catering, while Newhart retired to his hotel suite for an interlude with Ashley Dupre and two of her skilled employees, they decided to just squeeze the Leary thing in, Roger Corman-style, since they already had everything rented and set up. Leary was filmed accepting the award before "modifying" the old Kaufman Carneige Hall milk-and-cookies bit, and led the roast audience down the street to a pub for shots of Jameson and menthols, leaving the real man-of-the-hour to finally stagger back from his coke-and-whores binge to an empty room and no show. Newhart was furious. | ” |
How Bill Hicks Turned Into Denis Leary[edit | edit source]
Many conspiracy theories originate from the bitter rivalry between Leary and Hicks. The most prominent urban legend of this controversy is the one currently being trumpeted by Anonymous. In January 1993 when the comedy album No Cure for Cancer was released, Hicks metamorphosed through Satanic alchemy into his current human form of Denis Leary. The human experiment was funded and monitored by an unnamed Native American tribe in the state of Massachusetts (USA).
The Transformation of Hicks Into Leary[edit | edit source]
According to Anonymous, Bill Hicks' comedy material and attitude were not technically plagiarized by Leary on Cancer. Before he became Leary, Hicks was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer since infancy. Almost ready to give up all his Hollywood dreams, Hicks concocted a plan to attain immortality by transforming himself into a more palatable, showbiz industry uber-beast:
| “ | Instead of rotting away from cancer like a sad little goat boy, I've decided to find a way to live forever in another living form. Something that's a little more hardier kind of breed, more Hollywood-savvy.
Right now with the help of several Native American shamans, we are creating a blueprint for a body, a receptacle where my soul will keep on living for about three or four more decades. I will be known as 'Denis Leary.' To achieve this, I will live in a teepee in the desert, let the cancer take over my body, and just before I turn into Denis, for a year, the shamans will soak me in a tub of NyQuil and Sudafed. -- Bill Hicks Diaries, 1990 |
” |
Not So Fun Facts About Denis Leary[edit | edit source]
- Leary is not really that proud to be an "asshole"
- Yes, he did write a song called "Asshole." He likes assholes
- Addicted to NyQuil and Sudafed
- Associated with Scientology via Leary Firefighters Foundation regarding a "purification" therapy
- Not a good Catholic. See Scientology. See also The Eighth Commandment
- Denies that he's into the "Shiny Happy People" of R.E.M.'s Michael Stipe
- Related to Conan O'Brien and Jay Leno, for some reason
- You don't have to bring him the head of Barry Manilow, because he's had one on his own head for years
- He's not really an actual NYC firefighter like actor Steve Buscemi. He just plays one on Rescue Me
- Claims to smoke "seven thousand packs a day" but really only smokes five
- Still unable to get a real laugh about his movie flop Operation Dumbo Drop in his stand-up act
- The gold standard of joke thieves in Hollywood. Proteges include Carlos Mencia, Dane Cook