Louis C.K. Re-Enters the Mainstream With Caustic Netflix Special ‘Ridiculous’: TV Review

As Louis C.K was publicly accused of sexual misconduct, subsequently confirmed that “these stories are true,” partially retreated from public life and gradually returned — a trajectory that began with comedy club appearances just nine months after the story broke in the fall of 2017, then continued through sold-out tours, self-distributed specials, a Grammy, and finally “Ridiculous,” a new hour now streaming on Netflix — one thing was never in doubt: his talent.

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C.K. is one of the most gifted and influential performers of his generation, and would remain so even if he never took the stage again. His FX series “Louie” set the template for an entire slate of auteurist sitcoms like “Ramy” and “Dave”; his pioneering method of selling specials and self-funded projects like the drama “Horace and Pete” through his website presaged the so-called creator economy, built on direct connection between performers and fans. (This same infrastructure would also allow him to weather the coming storm.) All this was built on a self-deprecating stand-up persona that made hay of middle-aged masculinity. C.K. had already been working for decades, but his career really popped off only when he was a divorced, pot-bellied dad mocking his own abjection. This was not a coincidence.

So when I say “Ridiculous” is a strong hour of material performed with practiced expertise, it shouldn’t come as a surprise. Throughout his time outside the mainstream, though never really out of the spotlight, C.K.’s output has remained consistent; “Ridiculous,” which C.K. also directed, is in fact the comic’s fifth special since the New York Times story that prompted his temporary hiatus. (Only the first, “Sincerely Louis C.K.,” addressed his behavior head-on: “You need to check in often…It’s not always clear how people feel,” he said of repeatedly masturbating in front of women who felt pressured into saying yes or staying silent, before giving his next hour the apparently tongue-in-cheek title “Sorry.”) C.K.’s presentation, too, has stayed largely the same — a schlubby guy in a black T-shirt holding forth on the foibles of modern life. 

The difference now is that “Ridiculous” is available on a major streaming service that paid C.K. for the privilege of hosting it. When the company’s stand-up czar Robbie Praw told my Variety colleague that “this is just about giving [subscribers] an option” and that viewers “have a decision to make” about their own personal viewing habits, he was downplaying the decision Netflix itself made to re-enter a business relationship with C.K. (The comedian also headlined the Hollywood Bowl earlier this year as part of the company’s Netflix Is a Joke festival.) The release of “Ridiculous” also culminates a tour that saw C.K. make inroads with the kind of liberal-coded publications that once covered his reputational nadir, with favorable writeups in both the Times and the New Yorker. 

As a basis for the institutional approval that C.K. evidently still craves despite doing just fine on his own, “Ridiculous” fits the brief. Some of the absurdism of his early style has crept back into the act, coupled with an evident joy in playing around with taboo topics and landing the plane to the audience’s approval. The opening joke — a one-liner proclaiming “I took an AIDS test today. I haven’t had sex in years, I just wanted some good news” — escalates into the faux-confession that “I fucked a gay rat and I got AIDS.” Later, he reassures the crowd that “Of course I don’t breastfeed from my mother now” — and then, after a pause, adds, “Because we had her cremated.” Pedophilia, diarrhea and the Holocaust are each addressed in turn. The only topic truly off-limits, it seems, is why C.K. took a nine-year break from Netflix after “2017.” 

C.K. has the skill to make all these provocations pay off in context, and gives the sense he delights in walking a tightrope in full public view. (He has this in common with Shane Gillis, another comedian who lost access to mainstream platforms after a scandal, then regained it through grassroots appeal. Beyond both their work airing on Netflix, C.K. and Gillis are friends and once made a four-part podcast together.) The fact remains that the reason C.K. was able to behave as he did for so long that it became an open secret even before the Times investigation, and the reason he’s been able to continue selling tickets and attracting crowds, is that he really does have a rare and exceptional ability to make people laugh.

He also has a genuine insight into the human condition that starts to take the foreground as “Ridiculous” goes on. It starts with the grouchy misanthropy that’s remained a signature despite multiple rounds of runaway success. “I hate waking up,” he laments — not the first time he’s made a bit out of the virtues of sleep-induced oblivion. “I live in New York and I don’t like it,” begins another segment. Much of this glass-half-empty grousing starts to concentrate around the aging body, especially his own. His daily mantra is “You’re just a guy. You’re kinda fat. It’s almost over.” After dissecting his new undereye bags and their looming shadows, C.K. claims “You never see a woman like that before she killed herself.” The line is a throwback to the kind of double standard gender commentary that once won C.K. praise, then acquired a more sinister undertone. Now, it’s just one joke among many.

The most extended run in the special, and the one most likely to gain attention outside it, concerns C.K. and his sisters putting their father in a nursing home, a place whose ambient depression he describes in evocative detail: “There’s a pink plastic water pitcher in the room, you know what I mean?” C.K. freely cops to some of his less-than-high-minded motives for sending his dad away, giving voice to the thoughts of middle-aged adults in the same extremely common situation. (“He was too old to stop us from putting him in there!”) The riff slots into the same place as the parenting anecdotes that were once a C.K. staple, now mostly retired since his kids have grown. There’s honesty and a little cruelty — “My father’s in that place right now while we laugh at him” — in how C.K. addresses a widely shared experience, tempered by the humbling knowledge that we’re headed in the same direction on time’s one-way conveyor belt.

Our culture inarguably erred in framing comedians as philosopher-kings endowed with special wisdom, a 2010s relic that endowed figures like C.K. with extra power they then abused. But days after watching “Ridiculous,” some of its sharper lines stuck with me — observations like “People don’t get where they’re at until later. Life teaches you how you should have lived it.” So did sillier moments like C.K. pantomiming the obstacle course that is getting up for a bathroom break during a movie, as necessitated by an age-shrunken bladder. (The very next day, I went to a screening and saw life imitate art.) The contrast between puerile bits about pissing and resonant reflections on slow-motion death is an effective one, enhancing the impact of each tactic in turn.

“Ridiculous” makes no mystery of C.K.’s resurgence, though it was never much of one to begin with. Even at its peak, #MeToo felt seismic precisely because the movement was an aberration from the historical norm; nearly a decade later, that norm has reasserted itself with inertia on its side. Despite how disingenuous Praw’s logic sounds when coming from a corporation like Netflix, he’s right that C.K.’s current position is the accumulation of many individuals opting to engage with his work. In my personal life, I’ve taken my cues from named accusers like fellow comedians Julia Wolov and Rebecca Corry, whose public statements suggest C.K. has not made amends to an extent that makes me feel comfortable turning to him for entertainment. In my professional one, the number of people who made a different choice with the same information have rendered him impossible to ignore, prompting this review. Many of C.K.’s mannerisms, like the effeminate voice that’s one of his stock impersonations, have stayed unchanged since before his forced career pivot. “Ridiculous” arriving on Netflix suggests much about the world has, too.  

“Louis C.K.: Ridiculous” is now streaming on Netflix.