Chelsea Handler Pins L.A. Fires on Trump

It’s more than okay to hate Trump. But if you’re a comedian and Trump obsession is all you got, that’s a deeper problem. Unless you’re already on a network late night talk show with a guaranteed contract. Your next thirty million is locked. Exorcise your personal demons.

Chelsea Handler’s hit that fork in the 40-something female in Hollywood road when it’s time to take an honest accounting of the future. A small handful of more established and talented performers get signature runs in Vegas or the roles Nicole Kidman turns down in movies as the vibrant mom of teens. The rest have to consider what to do in the next two decades before the pension kicks in.

Handler tried her hand at Netflix where she became one of the few notable failures. Objectively, it’s truly hard to fail at Netflix. They’re producing more shows than they can possibly ever supervise or even realize they’re making. You could do thirteen, fifty-minute episodes watching spackle dry and they’d renew you for two additional seasons.

Hulu already has their middle aged spinster Jewish comedian in Sarah Silverman. She’s similar to Handler, but twice as talented, for the same price. You’re left with three options.  Wait for the occasional “best friend” role Judd Apatow throws you for being in the right social circles in Los Angeles, charge somebody famous with sexual groping, or simply go whole hog on a partisan political bent. Handler’s chosen the latter. 

Handler officially announced she was leaving television to spend more time focused on her activist activities. If you magnified by ten thousand the sounds of sorrow and lamentation heard round the world from her departure, it’s still not in human hearing range. It’s hard to nail down specifically what Handler’s new schedule might look like, but if you guessed lots of booze, an occasional liberal arts college tour date, and anti-Trump tweets daily, you’re a very educated guesser.

Handler started out her new journey by snidely blaming Trump for igniting the L.A. wildfires ravaging homes and horses, including forcing Handler to evacuate her little Bel Air home:

The inherent problem with Handler’s joke is, first, that it isn’t technically humorous. Though that’s not stopped her from earning ten million in her career, so you can see where she might not get it. Secondly, it’s impossible to ridicule somebody cleverly for the 8000th time. Rodney Dangerfield had about fifty jokes about his wife before even he petered out. And he was skilled and hard working.

Handler’s that chick who’s obsessed with some guy who pays her no attention so all she does is talk about how horrible she is. There’s nothing comedic about that pathology. Especially when you try to explain to everybody back at the club house why you had to cut his dog into pieces to make him see what a jerk he is.