Researched and compiled by Mark Groubert
This is it. Finally, the Official Crooks and Liars Top 100 Stand-up Comedians of all time. Let’s face it, whether you’re David Letterman or Oskar Schindler, everyone loves lists. While highly subjective, this list has been scientifically vetted by recently deceased members of the Friar’s Club for accuracy and fairness. There is no wiggle room. This is the official list. Anyone thinking otherwise is of course in error but can explain their massive feelings in the comments section. (Please remember to keep all comments to ten words or less so more can vent.)
]John Amato: There are videos hyperlinked to each name so that you can see a small performance of as many of the great stand-ups as we could find. (language alert) Have fun–agree or disagree, but sit down for a few minutes and enjoy a laugh with us.
1. Lenny Bruce
2. Richard Pryor
3. Woody Allen
4. Mort Sahl
5. Buddy Hackett
6. George Carlin
7. Eddie Murphy
8. Richard Lewis
9. Robin Williams
10. Rodney Dangerfield
11. Gilbert Gottfried
12. Jerry Seinfeld
13. Albert Brooks
14. Lord Buckley
15. Steve Martin
16. Chris Rock
17. David Brenner
18. Jonathan Winters
19. Dick Gregory
20. Sam Kinison
21. Bill Cosby
22. Bob Newhart
23. Sarah Silverman
24. Jackie Vernon
25. Bob Hope
26. Don Rickles
27. Shecky Greene
28. Milton Berle
29. Phyllis Diller
30. Andy Kaufman
31. Bill Hicks
32. Martin Lawrence
33. Redd Foxx
34. Jack Benny
35. Jamie Foxx
36. Jim Carrey
37. Joan Rivers
38. Professor Irwin Corey
39. Billy Crystal
40. Shelley Berman
41. Eddie Izzard
42. Jon Stewart
43. David Chappelle
44. Henny Youngman
45. Andrew Dice Clay
46. Elaine Boosler
47. Johnny Carson
48. Bill Maher
49. Freddie Prinze
50. Johnny Yune
51. Jon Pinette
52. Steven Wright
53. Roseanne Barr
54. DL Hughley
55. Mitch Hedberg
56. Alan King
57. Richard Jeni
58. Totie Fields
59. Robert Klein
60. Dennis Miller
61. Gary Shandling
62. George Burns
63. Jackie Gleason
64. Richard Belzer
65. David Steinberg
66. Will Durst
67. Cheech and Chong
68. Pat Paulson
69. Lily Tomlin
70. Sandra Bernhard
71. Martin Mull
72. Ellen DeGeneres
73. Groucho Marx
74. Rick Aviles
75. Damon Wayons
76. Dana Carvey
77. Denis Leary
78. Tommy Davidson
79. David Cross
80. Jackie Mason
81. Moms Mabley
82. Jan Murray
83. Mel Brooks
84. Morty Gunty
85. Larry David
86. Carl Reiner
87. Jerry Lewis
88. Adam Sandler
89. Paula Poundstone
90. Larry Miller
91. Tim Allen
92. Jay Leno
93. Ray Romano
94. Lewis Black
95. Phylliss Yvonne Stickney
96. Joey Bishop
97. Billy Connolly
98. Flip Wilson
99. George Wallace
100. T.K. Kirkland
A WGA screenwriter/producer/journalist based in Hollywood, California, Mark Groubert is the Senior Film and Book Reviewer for CrooksandLiars.com. As a filmmaker he has produced numerous documentaries for HBO. Groubert is also the former editor of National Lampoon Magazine, MTV Magazine and The Weekly World News. In addition, he currently writes for the L.A. Weekly, L.A. City Beat, Penthouse, High Times and other publications while on strike and doing stuff like this.
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a list that puts don rickles above bill hicks can’t possibly be taken seriously.
Lewis Black
Woody Allen’s Stand Up at the top of the list?
I can handle disagreement on some positions and I realize I’m not god.
But, Woody Allen? Please!
Lewis Black at 94?????and Woody Allen in the top 5 - you gotta be kiddin’
Dave Chappelle at 43 Bill Hicks at 31. Are you really telling us that Bob Newhart is funnier than those two?!?
Any list of comedians that does not have Bill Hicks in the top 10 is not worth the paper it is printed on.
Richard Lewis, Gilbert Godfried, Chris Rock, Steve Martin … ahead of Hicks?…
Hand me a barf bag now.
Hahahaha…….thanks John!!!!!!! Nice to have a laugh!
23. Sarah Silverman??
———————
42. Jon Stewart
43. David Chappelle
BS
If top 3 were Lenny Bruce, Richard Prior, Bill Hicks…. then the list could be taken seriously…
carlin is number 3
anything else is bullshit
Sam Kinison at 20 and Lewis Black at 94? Give me a break. The only think Kinison could do was scream and that was more obnoxious than Don Rickles heckling. Mort Sahl at #4? He was about as funny as a truck load of dead babies. I think they need to rethink the list.
Lots of odd things about this list. Sarah Silverman well over Bob Newhart, Andy Kaufman, Bill Maher, and Henny Youngman? Uh, no. Richard Lewis ahead of Steve Martin? Uh, not even close. Still, lots of great talent up there to be sure.
You even have dead comedians ahead of John Stewart….and you have Jay Leno, but not Dave Letterman ??? Dave did write all of his standups when he was first on Johnny- remember ??? ( and is Colbert on the list ?he should be)…and I also did not see Jimmy Kimmel? ( but his girlfriend is real high on the list- and she is not even THAT funny)
Comedy is the only thing that gives me hope. After watching MSM not do their jobs all day,(Missing white chicks or election bullshit) having a laugh is the best way to chill without resorting to valium or whiskey. Jon Stewart and Colbert at least but a smile on my face.
1. Bill Hicks should clearly be number one. The man’s comedy was an absolute perfect mixture of brilliant social commentary (the kind you never get famous for. the kind that when you hear he’d died young, your immediate reaction is to think the government had him killed), vulgarity, poetry and courage.
2. For those that haven’t heard it, Woody Allen’s 1960’s era stand up WAS brilliant.
Gilbert Gottfriend @ 11 and Bill Hicks @31?
almost enough to make me switch to Republican.
I said ALMOST ….
Yes Bill Hicks should be in the top 5 at least! Shenanigans!
God knows the top 20 are all men…
I still hate Hillary BTW.
This is a retarded list. Folks that don’t know a darn about comedy always seem to do this. ‘But see, Mort Sahl was massively important’ and ‘Lenny Bruce laid the foundation.’ Now, look, Bruce was swell, Sahl was swell, but in terms of Bruce’s own standard of laughs against seconds, Carlin and Pryor demolish it. They’re superior. Putting Buddy Hackett, Richard Lewis, Woody Allen and Robin Williams in the top ten is ridiculous and requires more an academic knowledge of comedy than an actual knowledge of comedy. This list honestly looks like it was written by someone who to write it, studied other, equally bad lists…
Where’s George W Bush? Everyone laughs at him.
No John McCain?
Who can forget, “Bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb Iraq…”
Side-splitting FUNNY.
Seriously: I love ‘em all…comedy is art.
Wow, Bob Newhart was so good, he came in 22nd AND 85th! Hmmm, was 22 based on the years before and during “The Bob Newhart Show” years and 85 on the years of “Newhart” and after?
Some of those on that list by the way haven’t done standup in YEARS or they don’t do a lot of it. They’re now on TV or the occasional STV movie. like Rick Avilas???? I mean I thought he was funny when I first saw him years ago, but since his turn as “The Rat Man” in Stephen King’s the Stand, what has he done?
And to put him, Tommy Davidson and Damon Wayans above Larry Miller and MEL FREAKING BROOKS is insanity personified.
just my opinions of course.
Lollimom @ 21:
IraNNNNNNN
Mort Sahl, Gilbert Gottfried and Albert Brooks in the Top 20?
Give me a break!
Glad to see the Bill Hicks contingent so vocal today…I’ll see rduke’s Top 10 and state that any list that doesn’t have Bill Hicks in the Top 5 etc etc…
Goddam, do we need him around these days
Only 4 women in the top 50?? Geezzz
BAC
What a lame list made by an old person.
Hello?! Dave Chappelle?
Um… you have Bob Newhart listed twice. At #22 and #85.
Dennis miller?? really???
I agree with the Number One comedian. And I agree with the Bill Hicks commentators. I’d also like to see Mitch Hedberg in there somewhere. I mean come on.
As soon as I saw Bill Hicks missing from the top 10, and Richard Lewis at 8… I knew there’d be comments riot.
There are some REALLY bad comedians that made the cut on here, and I don’t see Doug Stanhope, who should be in the top twenty at least.
really???
What??? No Doug Stanhope?????????
vrk @ 1:
Amen. Bill HIcks not in the Top 10? No Doug Stanhope???? How can anyone take this list seriously? It’s made by the same people who think “American Idol” is entertainment.
I assume this list is in random order. If not, a retraction should be issued.
It is nice to see Bob Newhart make the list twice, though. Bue no Eddie Izzard? No Jake Johannson? No (that one guy who died, wore glasses, always seemed baked)?
I agree with Ed and Lollipopmom. Republicans are the best of bafoons. Trouble is they don’t realize they are the joke.
Bob Newhart at 85?!?!?
He should be in the top 25!
Oh wait he’s there too.
Bob Dylan and Lenny Bruce prove everyone in the 60’s were stoned.
That is just the begining of why this list has no credibility.
hicks at 31??!!! good god man. thats it, im joining HotAir. ;)
Lollimom. Sorry I got your name wrong. It must be the valuim and whiskey.
You forgot Frank Lunz.
You can eliminate at least 2/3 of that list.
And there are some funny females, but certainly not juvenile Sarah Silverman. “Are you god’s black friend?”
Or when she puts the microphone up to her vagina?
Kills.
Luntz
Robert Klein’s my number 1. One of the first comedians of the modern age. Made me laugh 40 years ago and still makes me laugh. His summer TV show Comedy Tonight killed me, and his stand up act is fantastic. Lenny Bruce, Buddy Hacket, and, uh, Lord Buckley, not so much.
No Todd Barry? No Dom Irrera? No Emo Phillips? No Jeffrey Ross? No Nick DiPaolo?
blah. this list is crap.
at least you got Steven Wright on there.
There is NO way robin williams or richard lewis is better than Rodney Dangerfield
Mitch Hedburg need to be in there somewhere.
I remember when Eddie Murphy used to be funny. Remember Raw and Delirious? :-)
Now we have Norbit :-(
Also, Chris Rock and Sam Kinison are waaaaaaay funnier than Jerry Seinfeld. Just my opinion…
Bravo Out.
Perhaps there should be expiration dates when some of these comics ceased being funny [not when they were de-ceased].
carlos mencia
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v.....re=re