In her third stand-up special since the pandemic, and third overall for Netflix, Chelsea Handler rewinds the tape on her life not just to how she spent the summer of 2020, but also some wild summers in her pre-teen youth. Will famous names be dropped? Will she reveal a bit too much? What do you think? It’s Chelsea Handler!
The Gist: Handler’s post E! career has included a lengthy relationship with Netflix, ranging from a talk show to documentary specials and stand-up hours.
But this hour is perhaps unlike anything else she’s done for the streaming giant, as she’s revealing some wild escapades involving booze, drugs and sexual encounters, from as early as age 8 or 9 all the way up to the first year of the pandemic. And then there’s her recollections about unexpected encounters with then-NY Gov. Andrew Cuomo or Bill Cosby, which come off a bit differently now that we and she have a different perspective on both of those infamous men.
What Comedy Specials Will It Remind You Of?: By opening her hour pandering to her LGBTQ+ fans, and all of the name-dropping to come, you might’ve thought this were a Kathy Griffin special.
Memorable Jokes: After her opening gambit, which we’ll circle back to in a bit and includes a gag at the expense of her exes 50 Cent and Jo Koy, Handler fills us in on exactly what “The Feeling” is that she’s referring to in the title. Masturbation. She describes learning about how to please herself sexually in a slumber party while still pre-pubescent, and recounts how she experimented in elementary school with success, and later during Thanksgiving at age 9, only to be found out by her entire family.
She regales the audience with stories from her summers on Martha’s Vineyard from ages 10-13, finding ways to make money through “hard” lemonade, babysitting and more. There’s also the matter of the summer when she was 11 that she had a fling with an 11-year-old girl?! Let’s put a pinned tongue in that, for now, too.
Meanwhile, cut to 2020, and Handler tells of how her sister convinced Chelsea to rent a house in Maine to enjoy open space during the pandemic lockdown, how the comedian tried to initiate a sexual liaison with “angry Italian meatball sandwich” Cuomo, and how being in Maine brought Handler into pickleball combat with the Bush family. In case you didn’t remember and think Handler was making up the Cuomo part, here’s the former governor responding to Handler’s appearance on The View with his own.
And in a time period Handler only refers to as in her 20s, she remembers what happened the time she was performing at the Borgata at the same time as Cosby, and wound up with an afternoon invite to his hotel room. She said yes, because as she reminds us of how Cosby’s legacy was different decades ago, an invite to meet him meant the world to her then: “Do you know how meaningful that was when I was that age?”
Our Take: Of course, Handler made it out of that encounter safely, perhaps because she had her male opening act by her side in Cosby’s hotel room. Although as Handler recalls, Cosby already made it weird and ugly by roasting that young male comedian, allegedly telling him he’d amount to nothing in show business by opening for a female headliner.
Oof. Cosby’s legacy obviously is and should be forever tainted now, no matter how funny some of his childhood stories were (and are, taken out of context).
But what about Handler’s legacy? It’s certainly not helped by her offstage politics in this moment, none of which come into play in this hour.
As for what she does talk about onstage now, well, I wouldn’t say opening with material promoting anal sex is going to launch her into the elites of stand-up comedy. Not many comedians would open by suggesting to their audience: “Let’s try anal and think of Chelsea Handler.”
And her childhood stories, told and recast now as if she were already living as a 40-something at the tender age of 7, might make her seem precocious enough, but also raise more questions than laughs. What is her family doing with a summer home on Martha’s Vineyard if they’re supposedly broke? Never you mind. Why is she so sexually active so young? Perhaps private therapy might be a better forum for some of this processing than a global streaming audience? But who am I to know how Handler handles her business, anyhow?
What I do know is that Handler has always hustled, and it has served her well professionally, if not always personally. And after pivoting from tabloid headline jokes to political activism, she’s now back in celebrity gossip territory, even if the gossip is about her.
Then again, it’s always about her. As she reveals the reason why her childhood dalliance with another girl ended, well, prematurely, it was only because the other girl wanted Handler to please her. Not on Chelsea’s watch. “It’s never going to be my f—ing turn!”
Our Call: Like the Bert Kreischer special last week, this hour from Handler is really only meant for her hardcore fans. Everyone else can SKIP IT.
Sean L. McCarthy works the comedy beat. He also podcasts half-hour episodes with comedians revealing origin stories: The Comic’s Comic Presents Last Things First.
