Carlos Mencia - The Milli Vanilli of the Comic World
Apparently many of Mencia's jokes were taken from Ari Shaffir, a Jewish comedian best known for his racially-charged jokes, and comedian George Lopez who claims that Carlos used fifteen minutes worth of his material on an HBO special.
As if that wasn't enough, it turns out the über-beaner is not a beaner at all. Carlos's real name is Ned Holness and he is half German and half Guatemalan. Joe notes on his website http://www.joerogan.net/ that Ned changed his name to Carlos Mencia to relate to the Mexican population in Los Angeles where he first started out, despite Carlos pulling out his green card during a recent confrontation at The Comedy Store in Hollywood, CA. The confrontation can be seen in full on YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jsq1uTLBHBc . It includes the argument plus clips exposing Carlos/Ned as a comic fraud. Even comedian Bobby Lee who you may remember from the gay Pirates of the Caribbean skit on Mind of Mencia rags on Carlos's real name and the fact that Carlos, supposedly good friends with Bobby, stole some of his material a couple years ago.
While Rogan comes off as a bit of a bully with a personal grudge, he wholeheartedly sticks up for his comedic brothers who were blatantly ripped off. After the incident at The Comedy Store Mencia asked Rogan outside, "Do you know how hard it is to write [expletive]?" to which Joe comes back with, "I do! You don't [expletive]!"
So how has Mind of Mencia been able to hang on to its Comedy Central slot with so many accusations flying around? Mainly because his targeted viewing audience doesn't know the acts of the comics he ripped off. Undoubtedly, "Carlos Mencia" is a good performer who puts his heart into his act and can make some people laugh so hard that they shed tears, yet many others look past the act and see tiresome repetition and comedic unoriginality. When comparing the racial jokes of Carlos Mencia and Dave Chappelle, Mencia will use a trite racial stereotype and loudly re-proclaim it to the world where Dave Chappelle can put a spin on these old stereotypes to make them fresh, new and funny for his audience. Unfortunately, Mencia might be shedding a few tears of his own as Mind of Mencia is currently on hiatus as Comedy Central has been receiving petitions to have his show pulled off the air.
Published by Alicia White
Alicia is a former air traffic controller who lived in Japan for several years. She's currently a freelance writer in California, and a full-time student majoring in digital media/graphic design. View profile
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32 Comments
Post a Commentprides himself on his ego, and sees comedy as his personal ego-therapy sessions, where he pretends he's a great comedian by sitting center-stage and insulting everyone else for how stupid and dysfunctional they all are. And this, is what makes Carlos the true LEGEND "Inside the Mind of Mencia."
He got his own show because NASA discovered that new planet in the solar system, and so Comedy Central figured that now there might finally be ONE planet, where Carlos Mencia could be considered "funny." However I think this was a mistake, because it's more far likely provoke an interstellar war. But if it results in the Death Star blowing up Carlos Mencia, or at least Darth Vader shutting him up with his "magic choke-hold."
Carlos was the 17th kid from a small Mexican family, and enjoys compensating for his insignificance by acting like an a$$ and putting himself in the center of attention, doing bits where he wins every time. Though incapable of self-deprecation, irony, wit, timing, originality, or even how other people don't think that simple repressed anger and open hostility is funny (rather than the irony that causes it), he has the rare ability to repressing it at public expense, rather than seeing the humor in what he IS, thus avoiding the status quo of comedy,
Carlos also
it was a comedy central error....
...I think people just hate Carlos/Ned because he's famous, and he's a dick. Maybe he did steal jokes. Maybe he didn't. So many jokes are the same anyway, there it's hard to tell who stole what and from who.
true, we all have shared many of the same experiences. it doesn't take a geniues to to come up with real life experiences. but is does take bravery to actually say it. the one thing that bugs the hell out of me is..15 minutes of someone elses material? thats not brave, thats f*#k up! whos the dee dee dee now? "what are you doing...."Carlos" "?
Everyone claims Mencia is such a ripoff artist, and yet, the only people he has supposedly ripped off were: Kinison,Cosby, Bobby Lee, Ari Shaffir, the dudes that did the "David Blaine" parody, and 15-18 minutes of a George Lopez set.
No offense to G. Lo, but I heard a lot of similar stuff said by Pablo Francisco and Freddie Soto. It's called "being Mexican." Culturally, we're very similar, so we're bound to have similar experience therefore, may have similar anecdotes.
David Blaine parody:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AYxu_MQSTTY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xSvJU0bO4N8
I don't know who the genius was who said Mencia did "an exact replica" of the Youtube video, but they may have been smoking crack. Ok, that's not fair to say, but in the very least, can't we agree this is a very generic topic? Type in "Chris Angel Parody" or "David Blaine Parody" and see how truly unoriginaly we all can be. Seriously. If you look hard enough for something you will find it, and I believe t
Yes, comedians have been known to "borrow" other's material from time to time - but Mencia has gone way beyond the normal amount of joke pilfering, and into wholesale ripping off of material from other performers. Especially considering that nearly 15 minutes of his HBO special was ripped off from George Lopez.
Whether you are a fan or not, what he has done is pretty much inexcusable. I am glad that Joe Rogan took on the burden of being the one to bring this information to the public. It was the right thing to do.
"D Armenta: As I wrote on Sarah Leach's piece, comedians have "stolen" each others' lines forever and it's always been a running joke between them. Why would Rogan make an issue out of it now? Sounds like a personal vendetta to me, or sour grapes on Rogan's part. Thanks for the article."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dnr67Giq-LE
link for those who wanna know the other side
1st off people i grew up in the same part of town where carlos also grew. Maravilla projects in east los angeles to be exact.There wasnt many white families living there back in the late 70's early 80's but i had 2 very good friends who were white that lived nearby.Now theese 2 guys even though they were fully white not mixed still considered themselves mexican.I think its the way you feel about your being not what color or name u have .They were good friends of mine and i met their parents both white last names Brandsguard /dolson.So anyone living in east los angeles was proud to be mexican at the time including carlos mencia aka ned holmes which i remember seeing s few times walking around the projects
Mencia steals from Kinnison:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iQWUwDbmOm0
Mencia steals from Cosby:
http://www.break.com/index/carlos_mencia_stealing_jokes_from_cosby.html