JFL Awards Highlights! Just For Laughs Honors the Bright Spots of a Largely Unfunny Year

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Comedy during a pandemic needed to be pretty exceptional to stand out amid the despair and uncertainty of 2020. And indeed, as JFL Awards host Amber Ruffin noted, the honorees for this year’s ceremony “dragged us through a pandemic into sanity.”

Ruffin’s infectious energy felt right at home with the state of comedy that the award show sought to reflect – and indeed, reflective of how she described the slate: “largely the people in charge of what comedy will become.” She then quipped, “I have to say, I feel like comedy is in some good hands now…instead of the big, white, gropey hands it used to be in.” Read on to see whose hands Just for Laughs is ready to place the future of comedy in, instead:

Comedy Series of the Year: Ted Lasso (presented to Bill Lawrence and Jason Sudeikis)

Presented By: Patton Oswalt, Nina West, Nikki Glaser, and Bob Saget.  In Ruffin’s words, Ted Lasso gained notoriety for asking – in a moment where we collectively needed it the most – “what if White men were nice?” And indeed, in the montage of testimonials to Lawrence and Sudeikis, the sorely needed nature of Ted Lasso’s niceness was mentioned repeatedly. Glaser spoke openly about the degree to which it lifted her during the most depressive parts of her quarantine, while Saget openly praised its sincerity.

For Bill Lawrence, he quickly tied the ethos of the show to its runaway popularity – shying away from the recognition, because it’s far from the point of what they’re making. He used his time to praise the team that brought the show to our screens: “please know how grateful we are that anybody gave any of their time to watch our show, and super appreciative and super happy for each of our friends and coworkers that get a tip of the hat for the great work they’re doing.” Sudeikis aligned with him fully, while also noting that this accolade was a special one. “The reason why this feels so nice,” he said while clearly still affected by the montage, “is because it’s from comedy lovers. Those of us that made the show love comedy, comedy that we were shaped by growing up.”

Comedy Writers of the Year: Kristen Wiig and Annie Mumolo

Presented By: Wendi McLendon-Covey, Will Ferrell, Jamie Dornan, Maya Rudolph, and Jon Hamm.  Maya Rudolph, the star of Wiig and Mumolo’s breakout hit Bridesmaids, shared a feeling about watching her friends and collaborators’ work that feels wholly on the nose: “your joy is so infectious and so palpable that I can tell you two are cracking each other up, making each other laugh, peeing in your respective pants.” And as the only testimonial montage that inspired two musical performances (a sax solo from Dornan and an improvised song from Hamm), it’s clear that they bring out the comedic potential in those who they work with.

Accepting via a pre-taped video, Wiig and Mumolo expressed appreciation for Apple computers, Epson printers, and the unspecified contributors to their tribute video – assembled after they recorded their speech. It was a winding and silly improvised speech, fully fitting of the sort of comedy that their Barb and Star Go to Vista del Mar put out into the world last year. But it turned sincere later (and fittingly, while costumed in vintage formalwear) as they advised future writers to keep working toward their writing dreams. “No one can write in your voice, so keep writing because we need it,” they shared to close out the speech.

Breakout Star of the Year: Bowen Yang

Presented By: BD Wong, Colin Jost, Julio Torres, Awkwafina, and Matt Rogers.  In addition to winning the award for Breakout Star of the Year, I’d also submit Bowen Yang for best live reaction to his testimonial montage – a highlight of which featured his Las Culturistas co-host (and Variety’s 10 Comics to Watch honoree) Matt Rogers sharing, “it’s hard for me to express how late everyone is” to the greatness that Yang is finally being rewarded for.

Yang fought through that emotional reaction to express his appreciation for the honor, especially in light of “having mocked the city of Montreal in a public forum,” out of fondness and love for his time growing up there. He called out the excitement of getting to receive an award that had also been received from comics like his “hot older sister in comedy” Ali Wong, his “ugly distant cousin” Hasan Minhaj, and his “youth pastor” Nick Kroll – while drawing attention to the emotions that come from being honored by a festival that he went to as a kid and got inspired to do comedy.

Comedy Performance of the Year: Jean Smart

Presented By: Nathan Lane, Hannah Einbinder, Jen Statsky, and Kelsey Grammer.  Smart’s contribution to the comedy landscape through her portrayal of Deborah Vance on HBO Max’s breakout hit Hacks was summed up beautifully during the testimonial montage by the show’s co-creator and writer Jen Statsky: “the second you started reading as her and being her, even though I was 50 feet away and wearing two masks and a face shield because of COVID, I got like full goosebumps because you were just instantly so perfect in the part. It felt like the world of the show completely opened up.”

In a spark of the comedic timing that made her portrayal of a longtime standup comedian feel preternaturally accurate, she opened with a quip about her youngest assuming she got an “ah ah ah” award for all the screaming she does on the show. Smart was tremendously gracious to the full team that lifted up that performance, thanking the cast, crew, and team at HBO for bringing this role to her slate, and out into the world. “I just feel so fortunate to be surrounded by people who were so kind to me in every way.” And in a year when so many dealt with profound personal loss, it was especially poignant for her to close out her speech with a tribute to her husband Richard Gilliland, who passed as Hacks completed its first season of production, “who is one of the funniest people I’ve ever known in my life and he made me laugh every day.”

Comedy Person of the Year: Dave Chappelle

Presented By: Stevie Wonder, LeBron James, Norman Lear, Lorne Michaels, and Ted Sarandos.  For Chappelle to have the massive success he had from the release of 8:46 would have been enough to award him the honor of Comedy Person of the Year. But that wasn’t what many people talked about as they paid tribute to him ahead of his award ceremony. Instead, they talked about the community he created for comedians during the pandemic. Sarandos shared that in the entirety of lockdown, he only traveled two times: to see Dave perform in Austin, and to visit the comedy compound he maintained over the summer in his hometown of Yellow Springs, Ohio. James spoke about it as well: “the shows he did in his cornfield during COVID were not only comic relief, but economic relief to his community and the state of Ohio.” And to hear Norman Lear, who has spent nearly a century in the company of comedic greats, call him someone “who has added years to my life” was incredibly special.

In an honor befitting the magnitude of the award, Chappelle accepted his honor earlier this year from a show in Yellow Springs, presented by JFL president Bruce Hills. Hills recalled seeing Chappelle for the first time at the festival in 1991, and seeing immediately how special everyone knew he was. At times, the ceremony cut to Chappelle watching his remarks from backstage alongside comics like Luenell, Michael Che, and Dane Cook.

By the time Chappelle took to the stage, he was emotional – not just about the support that his community had given him as he put on these shows to keep comics working and keep people entertained (“any one of you that ever took a risk with your lives to come out and enjoy one of these shows, means the world to me”), but also to the community of comedians that his years involved with Just for Laughs has given him. Choked up as he recalled how many of the friends he’s made over the years that he’s lost in recent years, he recalled:

The Montreal festival opened doors for me in 1991 that I couldn’t imagine the treasures inside. Inside of that door were the best friendships that I ever made.

As he closed both the speech and the event, he expressed his gratitude for his time in the comedy world and for his time on Earth: “I can’t believe I get to live this life.”

For the first time, Just for Laughs has made several of its shows and its awards ceremony available to the general public for free; you can watch this ceremony in its entirety at hahaha.com,, or on Just for Laughs’ YouTube channel.  Or just watch it below!

 

 

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Amma Marfo

Amma Marfo is a writer, speaker, and podcaster based in Boston, MA. Her writing has appeared in Femsplain, The Good Men Project, Pacific Standard, and Talking Points Memo. Chances are good that as you're reading this, she's somewhere laughing.
Amma Marfo

Amma Marfo

Amma Marfo is a writer, speaker, and podcaster based in Boston, MA. Her writing has appeared in Femsplain, The Good Men Project, Pacific Standard, and Talking Points Memo. Chances are good that as you're reading this, she's somewhere laughing.