Project and content management for Contemporary Authors volumes
WORK TITLE: I’m Fine…and Other Lies
WORK NOTES:
PSEUDONYM(S):
BIRTHDATE: 9/4/1982
WEBSITE: http://www.whitneycummings.com
CITY:
STATE:
COUNTRY:
NATIONALITY: American
Agent: CAA, 2000 Avenue of the Stars, Los Angeles, CA 90067, 424.288.2000
RESEARCHER NOTES:
LC control no.: no2011056824
Descriptive conventions:
rda
Personal name heading:
Cummings, Whitney, 1982-
Birth date: 1982-09-04
Place of birth: Washington (D.C.)
Affiliation: University of Pennsylvania
Profession or occupation:
Comedian Actress Writer Producer Comic Model
Found in: Whitney Cummings [VR], c2010: container (Whitney Cummings,
comedian)
IMDb, Apr. 7, 2011 (Whitney Cummings; born Sept. 4, 1982;
actress, writer, producer; stand-up comic)
Wikipedia, Ap. 9, 2011 (Whitney Cummings ; born Sept. 4,
1982 in Washington D.C., U.S. ; American comedian,
actress, and former model)
I'm fine and other lies, 2017: ECIP t.p. (Whitney Cummings)
data view (b. 9/4/1982 in Washington, DC; comedian and
actress; she is known as the creator and star of the NBC
sitcom Whitney, as well as the co-creator of the CBS
sitcom 2 Broke Girls; grad. of the Univ. of
Pennsylvania)
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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS AUTHORITIES
Library of Congress
101 Independence Ave., SE
Washington, DC 20540
Questions? Contact: ils@loc.gov
PERSONAL
Born September 4, 1982, in Washington, DC; daughter of Patti Cummings.
EDUCATION:University of Pennsylvania, graduated magna cum laude, 2004; studied acting at Studio Theater, Washington, DC.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Writer, comedian, actor, producer, and model. Stand-up comedy performer, beginning 2004. Producer credits include Live Nude Comedy (television series; coexecutive producer), 2009; Whitney (executive producer), 2011-13; Two Broke Girls (television series), 2011-2013; Whitney Cummings: I Love You (television special; executive producer), 2014; Whitney Cummings: I’m Your Girlfriend (television special; executive producer), 2016; A Lot (television movie; executive producer), 2016; and Roseanne (executive producer), 2018. Actor in films, including Grizzly Park, 2008; Made of Honor, 2008; Why Men Go Gay in LA, 2009; The Station (television), 2009; 3,2,1…Frankie Go Boom, 2012; The Wedding Ringer, 2015; The Ridiculous 6, 2015; A Lot (television), 2016; Unforgettable , 2017; (and director) The Female Brain, 2017. Actor on television, including the television series Half & Half, 2005; What about Brian, 2006; Tell Me You Love Me, 2007; Turbo Dates, 2008; The Tony Rock Project, 2008-09; House, 2009; Whitney, 2011-13; The Jim Gaffigan Show, 2015; Undatable, 2015-16; Workaholics, 2016; and Crashing, 2018. Also actor in short films and videos.
WRITINGS
Writer for television shows, including Last Call with Carson Daily (one episode), 2007; Comedy Central Roast of Bob Saget (special), 2008; Live Nude Comedy (series), 2009; Just for Laughs (series; one episode), 2010; Whitney Cummings: Money Shot (special documentary), 2010; Comedy.TV (series), 2010; (and creator) Whitney (series), 2011-13; (and creator) Two Broke Girls (series), 2011-17 ; Whitney Cummings: I Love You (special), 2014; Whitney Cummings: I’m Your Girlfriend (special), 2016; A Lot, (movie), 2016; (and producer) Roseanne (series), American Broadcasting Company (ABC), beginning 2018. Also cowriter of the feature film The Female Brain, 2017. Author and performer on comedy albums, including Emotional Ninja.
SIDELIGHTS
Whitney Cummings is a multitalented writer, comic, actor, producer, and director. Named one of the “Top Ten Comics to Watch” in 2007 by Variety magazine, she is one of the first female comedians to perform in both Dubai and Beirut, Lebanon. Cummings has written for and acted in film and television and is the creator of the television sitcoms Whitney and 2 Broke Girls. She cowrote, directed, produced, and acted in the 2017 film The Female Brain, a movie that Hollywood Reporter contributor Lacey Rose described as “centering on empathy between the sexes.” In addition, in 2018 Cummings became the executive producer of and a writer for the reboot of the television series Roseanne. As for her comedic influences, Cummings has sited Paul Reiser, George Carlin, Dave Attell, Lenny Bruce, and Bill Hicks.
In her debut book, the memoir I’m Fine … and Other Lies, Cummings recounts her sometime tumultuous career in entertainment. “Throughout her turbulent television career, Cummings continued to journal and write about things she tried to make sense of in her life,” Cummings told LA Weekly Online contributor Daniel Kohn, adding: “She didn’t know it at the time but those entries would become the blueprint for her first book.” Cummings does not focus solely on her career but also writes about the various adventures and mishaps that have occurred in her life, from breaking her shoulder in an attempt to impress a guy to almost spending her life in a Guatemalan prison. Cummings told LA Weekly Online contributor Kohn: “Writing the book was a nightmare. It was a truly harrowing experience to say the least.” Cummings went on to note that the book contains “the stories and material that I never felt comfortable talking about onstage because I was too embarrassed and didn’t want to say this stuff while making contact with strangers.”
I’m Fine … and Other Lies begins with chapters about the insecurities, fears, and neuroses Cummings has dealt with in her life. Among these issues is her struggle with anorexia, which lasted for fifteen years. She was also diagnosed with scoliosis and had her rescue pit bull viciously attack her. In addition, Cummings reveals that she was raped once. Cummings writes that she has spent a significant amount of money seeing doctors, psychiatrists, healers, and others in an attempt to change her life and be able to handle both her psychological and physical problems. “I’ve spent the last five years rewiring my brain, ending toxic relationships, combating insomnia, experimenting with antidepressants, struggling with love (or what I thought was love), talking to an imaginary child, and freezing my eggs,” Cummings writes in the introduction to I’m Fine … and Other Lies. “While all of these situations had disastrous potential, the author takes the sting out of each with deflective humor and straight-up honesty, humility, and a keen sense of humanity,” noted a Kirkus Reviews contributor.
As for her career in the entertainment industry, the self-professed perfectionist writes about the misogyny she has encountered, both from entertainment executives and even her audiences. In an unusual move for stand-up comics, Cummings notes she so wants to please her audiences that, when she is doing a part of her routine and sees people in the audience becoming uncomfortable, she typically changes topics. She writes in the book’s introduction: “With a book, I can’t read the room or see your reaction so I’m able to go off the grid without y’all shaming me into keeping the material safe or socially acceptable.” Cummings also notes that her struggles over the years have led her to a place of empowerment. “Cummings’ crisp comedic voice is the driving force behind each essay,” wrote Courtney Eathorne in Booklist.
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Adweek, June 23, 2014, Emma Bazilian, “Whitney Cummings: Comedian Whitney Cummings Talks about Her Fascination with Tinder and Why She Thinks It Just Might Be Genius,” p. 34.
ArtsBeat, February 15, 2013, Adam Kepler, “For Whitney Cummings, Good and Bad Ratings News.”
Booklist, September 15, 2017, Courtney Eathorne, review of I’m Fine … and Other Lies, p. 9.
CNN Wire, April 30, 2012, “Whitney Cummings Lands E! Talk Show.”
Daily Beast, June 25, 2014, “Why Whitney Cummings’ Dick Jokes Are Important.”
Daily Variety, January 17, 2006, Stacy Dodd, “Whitney Cummings,” p. 6; June 14, 2011, Robert Abele, “Whitney Cummings: New Double-Threat Has Hand in ‘Whitney,’ ‘2 Broke Girls,’” p. A5; November 18, 2011, Glenn Whipp, “Whitney Cummings: Familiar Late-Night Face Goes for ‘Broke,’” p. 18.
Hollywood Reporter, February 7, 2018, Lacey Rose, “Who Does Whitney Cummings Think She Is? The Prolific TV Star/Creator Helms Her First Feature, The Female Brain, p. 23.
Kirkus Reviews, August 15, 2017, review of I’m Fine … and Other Lies.”
Library Journal, June 15, 2017, review of I’m Fine … and Other Lies, p. 16a.
Los Angeles, October, 2017, “Get to Know Whitney Cummings: A Cheat Sheet on the Comedian, Who Can Now Add ‘Author’ to Her Résumé,” p. 82.
New York Times, January 7, 2018, Nell McShane Wulfhart, “Whitney Cummings Always Packs Her Duct Tape,” p. 2(L); February 9, 2018, Teo Bugbee, “The Female Brain,” p. C6(L).
Orange County Register (Santa Ana, CA), October 21, 2016, “Whitney Cummings Is Mad about Stand-Up and Bringing It to Irvine Improv for Five Shows.”
PRWeb Newswire, March 17, 2016, “Entertainer Whitney Cummings Says ‘We Can Do Better’ for America’s Homeless Dogs and Cats.”
UPI NewsTrack, July 28, 2015, “Feeling ‘Too Skinny,’ Whitney Cummings Gains 25 Pounds.”
UWIRE Text, April 18, 2013, “Whitney Cummings Drops out of Comedy Night,” p. 1; February 23, 2016, “NBC’s New Sitcom, ‘Whitney’ Just a Placeholder Show,” p. 1.
Vanity Fair, February, 2016, Julie Miller, “What You Should Know About: Whitney Cummings,” p. 66.
Variety, September 19, 2011, Brian Lowry, “Whitney,” p. 84.
World Entertainment News Network, July 18, 2013, “Whitney Cummings Suffered Meltdown over TV Show;” April 20, 2017, “Drugged up Whitney Cummings Forgot All about Unforgettable Audition.”
ONLINE
Anxious Wallflower, https://theanxiouswallflower.wordpress.com/ (March 20, 2018), review of I’m Fine… and Other Lies.
Dr. Paula Freedman, https://drpaulafreedman.com/ (November 6, 2017), Paula Freedman, review of I’m Fine … and Other Lies.
IMDb, https://www.imdb.com/ (May 27, 2018), author’s filmography.
LA Weekly Online, http://www.laweekly.com/ (October 3, 2017), Daniel Kohn, “Whitney Cummings Delves Into the Dark Stuff Beyond Donald Trump Dick Jokes and Sitcom Stardom.”
New Yorker Online, https://www.newyorker.com/ (November 28, 2011), Emily Nussbaum, “Crass Warfare,” author profile.
New York Times Online, https://www.nytimes.com/ (January 30, 2018), Whitney Cummings, “Whitney Cummings: The First Time I Hung Out With Wolves.”
Page Six, https://pagesix.com/ (October 6, 2017), “Whitney Cummings Reveals Eating Disorder Struggle.”
So Sensitive It’s Sexy, https://sosensitiveitssexy.com/ (February 27, 2018), review of I’m Fine… and Other Lies.
Whitney Cummings Website, http://www.whitneycummings.com (May 27, 2018).
Whitney Cummings
Birth name Whitney Ann Cummings
Born September 4, 1982 (age 35)
Georgetown, Washington, D.C., United States
Medium Stand-up, television, film
Nationality American
Alma mater University of Pennsylvania
Years active 2004–present
Genres Observational comedy, insult comedy, blue comedy
Subject(s) Gender differences, sexism, human sexuality, relationships
Notable works and roles Punk'd
The Tony Rock Project
Comedy Central Roasts
Made of Honor
Chelsea Lately
2 Broke Girls
Whitney
Love You, Mean It with Whitney Cummings
Roseanne
Website whitneycummings.com
Whitney Ann Cummings (born September 4, 1982)[1] is an American comedian, actress and producer. She is best known as the creator of the CBS sitcom 2 Broke Girls (2011–2017) and the NBC sitcom Whitney (2011–2013), appearing in the lead role of the latter. Since 2018, Cummings has been a producer and writer for the ABC revival of Roseanne.
Contents
1 Early life
2 Career
2.1 Acting
2.2 Stand-up
2.3 Television
3 Influences
4 Filmography
4.1 Film
4.2 Television
4.3 Short films
4.4 Comedy specials
5 References
6 External links
Early life
Cummings was born and raised in Georgetown, Washington, D.C.[2] Her mother is Patti Cummings, a former public relations director at Neiman Marcus at Mazza Gallerie.[3][4][2] Her parents divorced when she was 5 years old.[2][5][6] She has an older half-brother named Kevin Cummings, and an older sister, Ashley Cummings.[4][2]
She went to high school at St. Andrew's Episcopal School, Potomac, Maryland, graduating in 2000.[7]
She interned at Washington's NBC-owned television station WRC-TV as a journalist.[2][8][9] She studied acting at Washington, D.C.’s Studio Theater.[10]
Cummings graduated from the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania, magna cum laude in 2004 with a degree in Communications.[8][11]
Career
Acting
Cummings moved to Los Angeles after college and worked on Punk'd on MTV in 2004[3] and the same year starred in a low-budget thriller, EMR, which was screened at Cannes.[12][13]
Stand-up
She began performing stand-up in 2004. In 2007, Variety named Cummings one of 10 Comics to Watch in 2007.[10] In 2008, Cummings appeared in the San Francisco audition for Last Comic Standing, although she did not pass the showcase. She performed on The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien, and Last Call with Carson Daly.[citation needed]
She co-starred on The Tony Rock Project and appeared in the 2008 movie Made of Honor. She has also made several appearances on the E! show Chelsea Lately on its round table. She hosted the 2008 Sundance Film Festival Dailies.[14] She was named one of 12 Rising Stars of Comedy by Entertainment Weekly in 2008.[15]
Her television appearances have included Comedians of Chelsea Lately, Live Nude Comedy (which she created, starred and wrote for), The Very bad Show, truTV Presents: World's Dumbest..., and the Comedy Central Roasts of Joan Rivers, David Hasselhoff, and Donald Trump.[2] She released her debut stand-up album, Emotional Ninja. In August 2010, her first one-hour special, titled Whitney Cummings: Money Shot, premiered on Comedy Central. In 2010 Cummings went on tour with Denis Leary and the Rescue Me Comedy Tour to promote the show's sixth season. She also appeared with Leary on Douchebags and Donuts.[16]
In June 2014, Cummings did her second hour-long special, I Love You, on Comedy Central.[17]
Television
In 2011, two multi-camera, live-audience sitcoms Cummings created[18] were picked up by broadcast networks: 2 Broke Girls (which Cummings co-created and executive produced with Michael Patrick King) and Whitney (which Cummings starred in, executive produced, and created).[19][20] Whitney was not received well by critics,[21][22][23] and Cummings acknowledges it was a learning curve for her.[24][25][26] 2 Broke Girls ran for six seasons and was cancelled in May 2017;[27] Whitney lasted only two seasons, and was cancelled in May 2013.
Cummings had a talk show, Love You, Mean It with Whitney Cummings on E! in 2012,[28] which was cancelled after 11 episodes.[29][30]
She appeared for several episodes in Season 3 of Undateable.
In 2017 it was announced that there would be a 9-episode revival of the successful 80s and 90s sitcom Roseanne, which made its return on March 27, 2018. Cummings was one of the head writers, an executive producer, and overseer of the show's day-to-day production.[31][32]
Influences
Cummings has described her comedic influences, beginning with Paul Reiser, who she said "made these hysterical, brilliant commentary about the most mundane things and open it up to a hysterical world."[33] Other important influences for her were George Carlin. Later influences were Dave Attell—"a legend now but he’s very edgy", Lenny Bruce and Bill Hicks.[33]
Filmography
Film
Year Title Role Notes
2004 EMR CyberBunnyLilly
2007 7–10 Split Whitney the Waitress
2008 Grizzly Park Tiffany Stone
2008 Made of Honor Stephanie
2009 Why Men Go Gay in L.A.
2012 3,2,1... Frankie Go Boom Claudia
2015 The Wedding Ringer Holly Munk
2015 The Ridiculous 6 Susannah
2017 Unforgettable Ali
2017 The Female Brain Julia Brizendine Also writer and director
Television
Year Title Role Notes
2005 Half and Half Woman 1 episode
2006 Fire Guys Ponytails Pi 1 episode
2006 Trapped in TV Guide Series regular Unknown episodes
2006 What About Brian Sally 1 episode
2007 Tell Me You Love Me Louise 3 episodes
2008 Turbo Dates Sandy 1 episode
2008–09 The Tony Rock Project 4 episodes
2011–13 Whitney Whitney 38 episodes, also creator, writer, and executive producer
2011 Dave's Old Porn Guest host 1 episode
2012–13 Love You, Mean It Host 11 episodes, also executive producer
2014 Comedy Bang! Bang! Herself 1 episode
2015 Maron Herself 2 episodes
2015 The Jim Gaffigan Show Herself 1 episode
2015–16 Undateable Charlotte 5 episodes
2016 Workaholics Juliette 1 episode
2018 Crashing Herself 1 episode
Short films
Year Title Role
2006 Hooked Vanessa
2006 Life Is Short Natalie
2007 Come to the Net Whitney
2010 Successful Alcoholics
2010 In Fidelity Cindy
Comedy specials
Year Title Notes
2010 Whitney Cummings: Money Shot Premiered on Comedy Central
2014 Whitney Cummings: I Love You Premiered on Comedy Central
2016 I'm Your Girlfriend Premiered on HBO
Overview (3)
Born September 4, 1982 in Georgetown, Washington, District of Columbia, USA
Birth Name Whitney Ann Cummings
Height 5' 10" (1.78 m)
Mini Bio (1)
Whitney Cummings was born on September 4, 1982 in Georgetown, Washington, District of Columbia, USA as Whitney Ann Cummings. She is a writer and actress, known for Made of Honor (2008), Whitney (2011) and The Wedding Ringer (2015).
Trade Mark (2)
Profane, observational topics
Tall, slim appearance
Trivia (9)
Grew up in Washington, D.C.
Graduated Magna Cum Laude from The University of Pennsylvania in three years.
Is a stand-up comic.
Was named one of Variety's Top Ten Comics to Watch in 2007.
The first female comedian to perform in Dubai and Beirut.
Nominated in the Outstanding Actress in a Comedy Series, Whitney (2011), at The Women's Image Network (WIN) Awards 2012.
Was in the deleted scenes of the House (2004) episode, House: Here Kitty (2009). She played a woman named "Courtney" who was hitting on "Dr. Chris Taub" in the bar.
Best friend is Ginnifer Goodwin.
Before acting, she interned at WRC-TV, the NBC owned-and-operated station in Washington, D.C., where she was a multi-media journalist.
Personal Quotes (1)
If sleeping with people worked, I would be doing it. Do you know an example of anyone who's ever slept with a producer or whatever that has gotten them anywhere?
Filmography
Jump to: Writer | Actress | Producer | Miscellaneous Crew | Director | Thanks | Self | Archive footage
Hide Hide Writer (17 credits)
2017 The Female Brain
2 Broke Girls (TV Series) (created by - 138 episodes, 2011 - 2017) (written by - 3 episodes, 2011 - 2014)
- And 2 Broke Girls: The Movie (2017) ... (creator)
- And the Rock Me on the Dais (2017) ... (creator)
- And the Alley-Oops (2017) ... (creator)
- And the Baby and Other Things (2017) ... (creator)
- And the Dad Day Afternoon (2017) ... (creator)
Show all 138 episodes
2017 2 Broke Sluts (Video) (characters)
2017 2 Broke Girls Parody Boy/Girl (Short) (characters)
2016 Whitney Cummings: I'm Your Girlfriend (TV Special)
2016 A Lot (TV Movie)
2014 Whitney Cummings: I Love You (TV Special)
2013 2 Broke Girls: 2 Broke Girrrlllss with Sophie Kachinsky (Video documentary short) (characters)
2013 2 Broke Girls: Max's Homemade Cupcakes - Go Big or Go Broke (Video documentary short) (characters)
Whitney (TV Series) (created by - 38 episodes, 2011 - 2013) (written by - 7 episodes, 2011 - 2013)
- Cake, Cake, Cake (2013) ... (creator) / (written by)
- Alex, Meet Lily (2013) ... (creator)
- Crazy, Stupid, Words (2013) ... (creator)
- Nesting (2013) ... (creator)
- Lost in Transition (2013) ... (creator)
Show all 38 episodes
2013 2 Broke Girls: Season 2 - 2 Broke Girls at PaleyFest 2013 (Video short) (characters)
2010 Comedy.TV (TV Series) (writer - 2010)
2010 Whitney Cummings: Money Shot (TV Special documentary)
2010 Just for Laughs (TV Series) (writer - 1 episode)
- Episode #2.6 (2010) ... (writer)
2009 Live Nude Comedy (TV Series) (additional material)
2008 Comedy Central Roast of Bob Saget (TV Special)
2007 Last Call with Carson Daly (TV Series) (writer - 1 episode)
- Episode dated 4 September 2007 (2007) ... (writer)
Hide Hide Actress (33 credits)
2018 Crashing (TV Series)
Whitney Cummings
- Porter Got HBO (2018) ... Whitney Cummings
2017 The Female Brain
Julia Brizendine
2017/II Unforgettable
Ali
2016 Workaholics (TV Series)
Juliette
- The Fabulous Murphy Sisters (2016) ... Juliette
2015-2016 Undateable (TV Series)
Charlotte
- The Backstreet Boys Walk Into a Bar: Part II (2016) ... Charlotte
- The Backstreet Boys Walk Into a Bar: Part I (2016) ... Charlotte
- A New Year's Resolution Walks Into a Bar (2016) ... Charlotte
- A Box of Puppies Walks Into a Bar (2015) ... Charlotte
- A Bachelorette Party Walks Into a Bar (2015) ... Charlotte
2016 A Lot (TV Movie)
Amanda
2015 The Ridiculous 6
Susannah
2015 The Jim Gaffigan Show (TV Series)
Whitney Cummings
- Wonderful (2015) ... Whitney Cummings
2015 Maron (TV Series)
Whitney Cummings
- Marc's Niece (2015) ... Whitney Cummings
- The Request (2015) ... Whitney Cummings
2015 Whitney Cummings Gets Her Vagina Steamed (Short)
2015 The Wedding Ringer
Holly Munk
2011-2013 Whitney (TV Series)
Whitney
- Cake, Cake, Cake (2013) ... Whitney
- Alex, Meet Lily (2013) ... Whitney
- Crazy, Stupid, Words (2013) ... Whitney
- Nesting (2013) ... Whitney
- Lost in Transition (2013) ... Whitney
Show all 38 episodes
2012 3, 2, 1... Frankie Go Boom
Claudia
2011 Whitney: Whitney's Wedding Etiquette (Video)
Whitney
2010 In Fidelity (Short)
Cindy
2010 Successful Alcoholics (Short)
Denver Receptionist
2009 Why Men Go Gay in L.A.
2009 House (TV Series)
Courtney
- Here Kitty (2009) ... Courtney (uncredited)
2008-2009 The Tony Rock Project (TV Series)
- Episode #1.8 (2009)
- Episode #1.4 (2008)
- Episode #1.3 (2008)
- Episode #1.1 (2008)
2009 The Station (TV Movie)
Mia
2008 Turbo Dates (TV Series)
Sandy
- Full Disclosure ... Sandy
2008 Made of Honor
Stephanie
2008 Grizzly Park
News Reporter
2007 Tell Me You Love Me (TV Series)
Louise
- Episode #1.10 (2007) ... Louise
- Episode #1.4 (2007) ... Louise
- Episode #1.3 (2007) ... Louise
2007 7-10 Split
Whitney the Waitress
2007 Come to the Net (Short)
Whitney
2006 What About Brian (TV Series)
Sally
- What About the Fish (2006) ... Sally
2006 Life Is Short (Short)
Natalie
2006 Trapped in TV Guide (TV Series)
Series Regular
2006 Fire Guys (TV Series short)
Ponytails Pi
- Episode #1.3 (2006) ... Ponytails Pi
2006/I Hooked (Short)
Vanessa
2005 Half & Half (TV Series)
Woman
- The Big Sexism in the City Episode (2005) ... Woman
2004 EMR
CyberBunnyLilly
Hide Hide Producer (9 credits)
2018 Roseanne (TV Series) (executive producer - 9 episodes)
- No Country for Old Women (2018) ... (executive producer)
- Knee Deep (2018) ... (executive producer)
- Episode #1.7 (2018) ... (executive producer)
- No Country for Old Women (2018) ... (executive producer)
- Darlene v. David (2018) ... (executive producer)
Show all 9 episodes
2016 Whitney Cummings: I'm Your Girlfriend (TV Special) (executive producer)
2016 A Lot (TV Movie) (executive producer)
2014 Whitney Cummings: I Love You (TV Special) (executive producer)
2 Broke Girls (TV Series) (executive producer - 15 episodes, 2012 - 2013) (co-executive producer - 6 episodes, 2011 - 2012) (executive consultant - 2 episodes, 2012)
- And the Extra Work (2013) ... (executive producer)
- And the Worst Selfie Ever (2013) ... (executive producer)
- And Not-So-Sweet Charity (2013) ... (executive producer)
- And the Broken Hip (2013) ... (executive producer)
- And Too Little Sleep (2013) ... (executive producer)
Show all 23 episodes
2011-2013 Whitney (TV Series) (executive producer - 37 episodes)
- Cake, Cake, Cake (2013) ... (executive producer)
- Alex, Meet Lily (2013) ... (executive producer)
- Crazy, Stupid, Words (2013) ... (executive producer)
- Nesting (2013) ... (executive producer)
- Lost in Transition (2013) ... (executive producer)
Show all 37 episodes
2012 Love You, Mean It with Whitney Cummings (TV Series) (executive producer)
2010 Whitney Cummings: Money Shot (TV Special documentary) (executive producer)
2009 Live Nude Comedy (TV Series) (co-executive producer)
Hide Hide Miscellaneous Crew (2 credits)
2011-2013 2 Broke Girls (TV Series) (executive consultant - 45 episodes)
- And the Tip Slip (2013) ... (executive consultant)
- And the Extra Work (2013) ... (executive consultant)
- And the Worst Selfie Ever (2013) ... (executive consultant)
- And the Big Hole (2013) ... (executive consultant)
- And the Temporary Distraction (2013) ... (executive consultant)
Show all 45 episodes
2007 Comedy Central Roast of Flavor Flav (TV Special documentary) (consultant)
Hide Hide Director (1 credit)
2017 The Female Brain
Hide Hide Thanks (1 credit)
2013 The Tonight Show with Jay Leno (TV Series) (photo furnished by - 1 episode)
- Episode #21.98 (2013) ... (photo furnished by: Chelsea Handler photos)
Hide Hide Self (94 credits)
2018 Entertainment Tonight (TV Series)
Herself
- Episode #37.176 (2018) ... Herself
2018 Relationships Just for Laughs (TV Movie)
Herself
2018 The View (TV Series)
Herself - Guest Co-Hostess
- Guest Co-Hostess Whitney Cummings/Antonio Sabato Jr. (2018) ... Herself - Guest Co-Hostess
2012-2018 Live! with Kelly (TV Series)
Herself - Guest Co-Hostess / Herself / Herself - Guest
- Whitney Cummings (2018) ... Herself
- Guest Co-Hostess Whitney Cummings/Octavia Spencer/Plain White T's (2015) ... Herself - Guest Co-Hostess
- Guest Co-Hostess Whitney Cummings/Jessica Alba/Patrick J. Adams (2014) ... Herself - Guest Co-Hostess
- Guest Co-Hostess Whitney Cummings/Mark Wahlberg/Golfer Michelle Wie/Chef Daniel Boulud (2014) ... Herself - Guest Co-Hostess
- Episode dated 15 March 2012 (2012) ... Herself - Guest
2014-2018 Late Night with Seth Meyers (TV Series)
Herself
- James Spader/Whitney Cummings/Malcolm Jenkins/Alan Cage (2018) ... Herself
- Jake Gyllenhaal/Whitney Cummings/Post Malone/Quavo/Metro Boomin/Charlie Benante (2017) ... Herself
- Danny DeVito/Whitney Cummings/The Front Bottoms/Josh Freese (2016) ... Herself
- Mike Myers/Shep Gordon/Whitney Cummings/Tove Lo (2014) ... Herself
2014-2017 Conan (TV Series)
Herself - Guest
- JB Smoove/Whitney Cummings/Joel Kim Booster (2017) ... Herself - Guest
- Ice-T/Whitney Cummings/Body Count (2014) ... Herself - Guest
2015-2017 The Late Late Show with James Corden (TV Series)
Herself
- Miles Teller/Whitney Cummings/Fergie (2017) ... Herself
- Shania Twain/Tyrese Gibson/Whitney Cummings/Bastille (2017) ... Herself
- Arnold Schwarzenegger/Whitney Cummings/Gavin James (2015) ... Herself
2012-2017 Rachael Ray (TV Series)
Herself
- The Hilarious Whitney Cummings Is Back, with the Scoop on Her New Book/Ideas for Leftover Materials from Your DIY Projects (2017) ... Herself
- We've Got Four Huge Football Fans in the House, and One of Them Will Be Headed to Super Bowl 50! (2016) ... Herself
- She's Hot and Hilarious: Our Pal Whitney Cummings Is Back! Then, "Inside Edition" Host Deborah Norville Is Here (2015) ... Herself
- Top 3 Ways to Make Turkey (2012) ... Herself
2016-2017 Jimmy Kimmel Live! (TV Series)
Herself
- Chris Hemsworth/Whitney Cummings/Vance Joy (2017) ... Herself
- Whitney Cummings/Elton John (2016) ... Herself
2013-2017 Wendy: The Wendy Williams Show (TV Series)
Herself - Author / Herself / Herself - The Wedding Ringer / ...
- Whitney Cummings (2017) ... Herself - Author
- LOL/I'm Your Girlfriend (2016) ... Herself
- LOL/Whitney Cummings/Dr. Gadget (2014) ... Herself - The Wedding Ringer
- Hot Topics 4 (2013) ... Herself - Guest
2017 Ellen: The Ellen DeGeneres Show (TV Series)
Herself
- Eric Stonestreet/Whitney Cummings/Kelsea Ballerini (2017) ... Herself
2015-2017 The Joe Rogan Experience (TV Series)
Herself
- Whitney Cummings (2017) ... Herself
- Whitney Cummings (2017) ... Herself
- Whitney Cummings (2016) ... Herself
- Whitney Cummings (2015) ... Herself
2015-2017 @midnight (TV Series)
Herself
- August 4, 2017 (2017) ... Herself
- May 17, 2017 (2017) ... Herself
- Episode #4.58 (2017) ... Herself
- Episode #4.21 (2016) ... Herself
- March 14, 2016 (2016) ... Herself
Show all 7 episodes
2014-2017 Today (TV Series)
Herself / Herself - Guest
- Episode dated 20 April 2017 (2017) ... Herself
- Episode dated 20 January 2016 (2016) ... Herself
- Episode dated 30 September 2015 (2015) ... Herself - Guest
- Episode dated 27 July 2015 (2015) ... Herself - Guest
- Episode dated 27 June 2014 (2014) ... Herself
2017 Jeff Ross Presents Roast Battle (TV Series)
Herself - Judge
- Episode #2.2 (2017) ... Herself - Judge
2016 Maron (TV Series)
Herself
- The Geographic (2016) ... Herself
2016 Joan Rivers: Exit Laughing (Documentary)
Herself
2016 Whitney Cummings: I'm Your Girlfriend (TV Special)
Herself
2016 Larry King Now (TV Series)
Herself - Guest
- Whitney Cummings (2016) ... Herself - Guest
2015 All-Star Dog Rescue Celebration (TV Movie)
Herself
2015 Watch What Happens: Live (TV Series)
Herself - Guest / Herself
- Neil Patrick Harris & Whitney Cummings (2015) ... Herself - Guest
- Eileen Davidson & Whitney Cummings (2015) ... Herself
2015 The Lincoln Awards: A Concert for Veterans & the Military Family (TV Movie)
Herself
2015 The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson (TV Series)
Herself - Hostess
- Alan Cumming/Alison Brie/Joanne Froggatt/OK Go (2015) ... Herself - Hostess
- Kat Dennings & Beth Behrs/Rhea Seehorn/Bridget Everett/Ana Gasteyer (2015) ... Herself - Hostess
2011-2015 Late Show with David Letterman (TV Series)
Herself
- Oscar Isaac/Whitney Cummings/Drenge (2015) ... Herself
- Susan Sarandon/Whitney Cummings/Angel Olsen/David Sanborn (2014) ... Herself
- Ben Stiller/Whitney Cummings/Godspell (2011) ... Herself
2014 Fox's Cause for Paws: An All-Star Dog Spectacular (TV Movie)
Herself
2014 Comedy Bang! Bang! (TV Series)
Herself
- Amber Tamblyn Wears a Leather Jacket & Black Booties (2014) ... Herself
2007-2014 Chelsea Lately (TV Series)
Herself - Round Table / Herself / Herself - Guest / ...
- Live Finale (2014) ... Herself - People Who Need More Therapy
- Episode #8.124 (2014) ... Herself - Round Table
- Episode #8.108 (2014) ... Herself - Round Table
- Episode #8.89 (2014) ... Herself - Round Table
- Episode #8.60 (2014) ... Herself - Round Table
Show all 59 episodes
2014 The Approval Matrix (TV Series)
Herself - Panelist
- The Golden Age of TV (2014) ... Herself - Panelist
2014 The Jim Norton Show (TV Series)
Herself
- Episode #1.3 (2014) ... Herself
2014 Howard Stern Birthday Bash (Video)
Herself
2014 Whitney Cummings: I Love You (TV Special)
Herself
2014 Just for Laughs Presents: Whitney Cummings' Bleep Show (TV Movie)
Herself
2010-2014 The Tonight Show with Jay Leno (TV Series)
Herself / Herself - Guest
- Bill Maher/Whitney Cummings/Jennifer Nettles (2014) ... Herself - Guest
- Episode #22.13 (2013) ... Herself - Guest
- Episode #21.172 (2013) ... Herself - Guest
- Episode #21.82 (2013) ... Herself
- Episode #21.36 (2012) ... Herself
Show all 13 episodes
2013 The Pete Holmes Show (TV Series)
Herself - Guest
- Whitney Cummings (2013) ... Herself - Guest
2013 Comedy Central Re-Animated (TV Series)
Herself
2013 Big Morning Buzz Live (TV Series)
Herself
- Jason Statham/Rachael Ray/Whitney Cummings/Mary Bridget Davies (2013) ... Herself
2013 Good Day L.A. (TV Series)
Herself
- Episode dated 21 October 2013 (2013) ... Herself
2013 The Show with Vinny (TV Series)
Herself
- Whitney Cummings & Bella Thorne (2013) ... Herself
2012-2013 Quicklaffs (TV Series)
Herself
- Episode #2.16 (2013) ... Herself
- Episode #2.13 (2013) ... Herself
- Episode #2.12 (2013) ... Herself
- Episode #2.10 (2013) ... Herself
- Episode #2.6 (2013) ... Herself
Show all 7 episodes
2012-2013 Love You, Mean It with Whitney Cummings (TV Series)
Herself - Host
- Episode #1.11 (2013) ... Herself - Host
- Episode #1.10 (2013) ... Herself - Host
- Episode #1.9 (2013) ... Herself - Host
- Episode #1.8 (2013) ... Herself - Host
- Episode #1.7 (2013) ... Herself - Host
Show all 11 episodes
2012 2 Broke Girls: 2 Girls Going for Broke (Video documentary short)
Herself
2012 Kathy (TV Series)
Herself
- Episode #1.8 (2012) ... Herself
2006-2012 Last Call with Carson Daly (TV Series)
Herself
- Episode dated 27 March 2012 (2012) ... Herself
- Jason Statham/Whitney Cummings (2006) ... Herself
2012 Is This Thing on 2? The Weird Year (Documentary short)
Herself
2011-2012 Howard Stern on Demand (TV Series)
Herself
- Whitney Cummings Pressure from TV Show (2012) ... Herself
- Whitney Cummings' New Sitcom (2011) ... Herself
2011 Dave's Old Porn (TV Series)
Herself - Guest
- Whitney Cummings/Ron Jeremy (2011) ... Herself - Guest
2011 Late Night with Jimmy Fallon (TV Series)
Herself - Guest / Herself
- Episode #3.130 (2011) ... Herself - Guest
- Episode #3.141 ... Herself
2011 Ladies Night Out (TV Series)
Herself
- Ladies Night Out (2011) ... Herself
2011 The Marilyn Denis Show (TV Series)
Herself
- Episode #1.129 (2011) ... Herself
2011 Give It Up for Greg Giraldo (TV Movie documentary)
Herself
2011 Comedy Central Roast of Donald Trump (TV Special)
Herself - Roaster
2011 Denis Leary & Friends Presents: Douchbags & Donuts (TV Movie)
Herself
2010 MTV New Year's Bash 2011 (TV Movie)
Herself - Host
2010 Whitney Cummings: Money Shot (TV Special documentary)
Herself
2010 Just for Laughs (TV Series)
Herself - Comedian
- Episode #2.6 (2010) ... Herself - Comedian
2010 Comedy Central Roast of David Hasselhoff (TV Special)
Herself - Roaster
2010/I Just Like Us (Documentary)
Herself
2010 A Night of 140 Tweets: A Celebrity Tweet-A-Thon for Haiti (Video)
Herself
2010 The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien (TV Series)
Herself
- Ricky Gervais/Bryce Dallas Howard/Whitney Cummings (2010) ... Herself
2009 Comedy Central's Hot List (TV Movie)
Herself
2009 The Very Funny Show (TV Series)
Herself
- Henry Cho & Nick Thune/Danny Bhoy & Whitney Cummings (2009) ... Herself
2009 World's Dumbest (TV Series)
Herself
- Drivers 12 (2009) ... Herself
2009 Comedy Central Roast of Joan Rivers (TV Special)
Herself - Roaster
2009 Live Nude Comedy (TV Series)
Herself
- Episode #1.2 (2009) ... Herself
2007-2009 Comics Unleashed (TV Series)
Herself
- Episode dated 11 May 2009 (2009) ... Herself
- Episode dated 30 May 2007 (2007) ... Herself
2009 Comedy.TV (TV Series)
Herself - Host
- Episode #1.6 (2009) ... Herself - Host
- Episode #1.5 (2009) ... Herself - Host
- Episode #1.4 (2009) ... Herself - Host
- Episode #1.3 (2009) ... Herself - Host
- Episode #1.2 (2009) ... Herself - Host
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2008 Cheech & Chong: Roasted (TV Special)
Writer
2008 Down and Dirty with Jim Norton (TV Series)
Herself
- Episode #1.1 (2008) ... Herself
2008 The Movie Preview Awards (TV Special)
Herself - Presenter
2007 What I Learned About... From the Movies (TV Series)
Herself (2007)
2007 Hollywood Nocturnal (TV Movie)
Herself - Host
2007 Festival Dailies (TV Series)
Host (2007)
2007 Sundance Film Festival Dailies (TV Series)
Herself
2006 Golden Trailer Awards (TV Special)
Herself - Presenter
2006 Close-Up (TV Series)
- George Clooney (2006)
- The Best of Close Up (2006)
- Jennifer Love Hewitt (2006)
- Kelly Clarkson (2006)
- America's Sweethearts (2006)
2006 101 Incredible Celebrity Slimdowns (TV Mini-Series)
Comedian
2006 Sundance Film Festival Dailies (TV Series)
Herself - Host
2005 It's So Over: 50 Biggest Celebrity Breakups (TV Movie documentary)
Comedian
2005 Glamour's 50 Biggest Fashion Do's and Don'ts (TV Movie)
Herself
2005 Minding the Store (TV Series)
Herself
2005 101 Even Bigger Celebrity Oops (TV Movie documentary)
Herself
2004-2005 Best Week Ever with Paul F. Tompkins (TV Series)
Herself
- Star Wars Premiere, Apprentice Finale and More (2005) ... Herself
- Episode #3.14 (2005) ... Herself
- New Pope Elected, American Idol and More (2005) ... Herself
- Episode #3.12 (2005) ... Herself
- Baseball Opening Day, Desperate Housewives and More (2005) ... Herself
Show all 28 episodes
2005 Love Lounge (TV Series)
Herself
- The Naked Truth (2005) ... Herself
2005 50 Steamiest Southern Stars (TV Movie documentary)
Herself
2005 40 Celebrity Weddings and a Funeral (TV Movie documentary)
Comedian
2005 VH1 News Presents: Plastic Surgery Obsession (TV Movie documentary)
Comedian
2004 My Coolest Years (TV Mini-Series documentary)
Herself
2004 50 Most Outrageous TV Moments (TV Movie)
Herself
2004 E! 101 Most Awesome Moments in Entertainment (TV Movie documentary)
Herself
2004 50 Most Wicked Women of Primetime (TV Movie documentary)
Comedian
2004 MDN (TV Series)
Herself
- Episode #1.6 (2004) ... Herself
2004 ESPN 25: The Headlines (TV Mini-Series documentary)
Herself
2004 Punk'd (TV Series)
Field Agent
- Episode #3.3 (2004) ... Field Agent
2003 Sundance Film Festival Dailies (TV Series documentary)
Host (2006)
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2018 Entertainment Tonight (TV Series)
Herself
- Episode #37.180 (2018) ... Herself
2013-2014 Chelsea Lately (TV Series)
Herself - Wrestler / Herself
- Episode #8.46 (2014) ... Herself - Wrestler
- Episode #7.146 (2013) ... Herself
Whitney Cummings may be this year’s most unnerving success, having launched two network sitcoms, an unheard-of achievement for a newcomer. On “Whitney,” which airs on NBC, she stars as a version of herself; with Michael Patrick King, she’s the co-creator of “2 Broke Girls,” on CBS. In October, both shows were picked up for full seasons (though “Whitney” was recently shifted to a different night), and “2 Broke Girls” is a genuine ratings hit.
I wish I could feel good about this, because, in superficial ways, Cummings is everything I love. She’s a young female in a field dominated by middle-aged white guys. She’s a standup comic who writes her own jokes. With her tomboy glamour, she suggests a sensibility that echoes back to Rosalind Russell: the sardonic brunette, as incarnated more recently in Roseanne, Janeane Garofalo, Sarah Silverman, Sandra Bernhard, and Tina Fey. Alternately deadpan and lacerating, this persona risks alienating the audience, a quality that also happens to be the signature of male sitcom auteurs, including Larry David and Louis C.K. (If you aren’t alienating anyone, maybe your jokes don’t go far enough.)
Cummings has attracted lots of vitriol online, in part because she fits into another subset of female comedians: she’s this year’s sexy-girl hate magnet. Olivia Munn filled that role last year, and Chelsea Handler before her, and Silverman before her. These performers diverge widely—I adore Silverman and can take or leave Munn; Handler bugs me—but they share some traits. They’ve got dirty mouths and model-skinny looks. They get accused of sleeping their way to the top. With varying degrees of satirical intent, they play the slut card instead of the quirky card. It’s a tactic that can backfire (and repel women), but there’s an argument to be made for being threatening rather than “adorkable.”
The problem is that “Whitney” is a terrible show, though in ways that resonate with our culture’s debates about women and humor. Like so many comedians on TV, Cummings plays an off-brand version of herself, an acerbic photographer with a live-in boyfriend. She resists pressure to marry; she and her dude bicker over household habits; they party with friends at a local night club. But, while Cummings is lacerating and deadpan, her fictional avatar reminds me less of Roseanne, or even of Silverman, than of someone much older: Lucille Ball.
This may sound like blasphemy to anyone who loves Lucille Ball, the woman who pioneered the classic joke rhythms that Cummings so klutzily mimics. (“Whitney” is taped multi-camera style, with a live audience hooting and aww-ing.) Cummings has none of Ball’s shining charisma or her buzz of anarchy. Yet she does share Lucy’s rictus grin, her toddler-like foot-stamping tantrums, and especially her Hobbesian view of heterosexual relationships as a combat zone of pranks, bets, and manipulation from below. “This is war,” Whitney announces, before declaring yet another crazy scheme to undercut her boyfriend, and it might as well be the series’ catchphrase.
In Ball’s era, this was a depressing but subversive perspective: it was exciting simply to see a woman clown, even if she always lost, even if she was literally spanked for her rebellion. But, in the age of “Bridesmaids” and “Parks and Recreation,” “Whitney” ’s battle of the sexes feels off, airless—self-loathing disguised as self-assertion. It’s particularly unfortunate because, in theory, Cummings is a fascinating figure. In 2010, on the cult comic Marc Maron’s “WTF” podcast, Cummings talked about her background as a twelve-year-old runaway, a teen model neglected by her dysfunctional family. Maron crassly noted that some might say that, as an attractive woman, Cummings should have nothing to complain about—or be funny about. “That you’re attractive!” she shot back. “And that your uncle tried to fuck you when you were ten.” “Whitney” was in development at the time, and Cummings talked about her desire to take risks with her routines (those polished bits, with their tactical, “Am I right, ladies?” punch lines), adding vulnerability and candor.
This promising vision falls flat on “Whitney.” Like Cummings, the fictional Whitney is scarred by her parents’ multiple divorces. She regards sex as a form of scorekeeping. From her boyfriend’s perspective, and from her own, Whitney is a buzzkill so fearful of abandonment that she’s at once cold and smothering, a neat trick. Occasionally, one of these routines hits pay dirt (as when Whitney role-plays a naughty nurse, then makes her boyfriend fill out insurance forms), but most of the time it feels as if Whitney had torn out every article in Cosmopolitan, chewed them up like a hamster, and built a nest. This is alienating, sure, but it’s also dank, a dead joke, from an older style of female comedy—I’ll say I’m ugly before you can.
In one episode, Whitney accuses her boyfriend (the hangdog Chris D’Elia, who plays a dot-com millionaire) of a thought crime: he has glanced at another girl. Because he won’t admit it, Whitney gives him the silent treatment, which upsets him until he realizes that he no longer needs to listen to her. When Whitney catches on, she decides that the best punishment is to talk endlessly: about whether she’s fat, about different shades of blue paint, about getting her period. She’s parodying and confirming sexist ideas all at once, which is pretty much the ethos of the series. (It reminds me of “Glee,” which likes to insult fat people and then sing songs about how wrong it is to bully them.)
Whitney’s friends talk like amateur sociobiologists. Men “are way too proud and stubborn to ever admit they’re wrong.” They fight, since “they used to kill each other for meat and women, but, you know, they’ve got nothing left now that you can get both things online.” Women are conniving and dull. The show feels startlingly retro and cruel next to the warm, effortless boy-girl gangs that dominate series like “Happy Endings,” “How I Met Your Mother,” and even the hilariously filthy “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia.” Yet in later episodes of “Whitney” the mood becomes less caustic (you can practically hear the network notes), which only makes things worse. Whitney’s boyfriend calls her his “best friend,” the audience awws, and the show, which has so little heart, loses even its cold, dark soul, as Whitney morphs from Lucy into Harriet, the patient and boring wife.
“2 Broke Girls” is a better show, maybe because there’s no Lucy in the mixture. Instead, Kat Dennings’s Max is a baby Roseanne, with a touch of Laverne. Like Roseanne, Max is a waitress who insults her customers, a poor girl who walls herself off with defeatist sarcasm. Beth Behrs plays Caroline, a spoiled heiress who becomes Max’s roommate and co-worker. Cut off from her trust fund (her dad was jailed for running a Ponzi scheme), Caroline seems helpless at first, but her entitlement turns out to be a kind of superpower—she believes that she and Max deserve a better life. The two launch a cupcake business. At the end of each episode, a number rolls up onscreen: the dollars they’ve saved toward their future.
On Twitter, a sitcom observer pointed out that the version of Whitney on “2 Broke Girls” would hate the version of Whitney on “Whitney,” and that’s accurate, and not just because one of them is in the ninety-nine per cent and the other is in the one per cent. “Whitney” ’s Whitney vibrates with prudish anxiety, and her darkest jokes are about how ugly sex is. (At one point, her boyfriend cajoles her to do a lap dance, knowing that she’s taping them on a hidden camera; she does a great stiff parody of one, disgustedly licking her finger and planting it on her nipple.) In contrast, Max is a kinky romantic. She gets turned on when her crush feeds her celery. She swoons over hipster abs, talks about orgasms, and—with clockwork shock—she also cracks approximately one rape joke per episode, in a way that suggests that she’s speaking from experience.
Many people are put off by these coarse gags, and it’s true that a lot of them fizzle. Yet they’re also the riskiest part of “2 Broke Girls.” Max seems like something new for network television, a defiantly sexual young woman who is not a slutty sidekick. She’s got the traumatic background that Cummings alluded to in her interview with Maron, but it’s not her defining characteristic: she has hidden creativity, plus a legitimately mordant sense of humor. This nasty sensibility can pay off, as when Max confronts a group of uptown suits chanting “Service! Service!” from their booth. “You heard your bro,” she zings one of the frat boys. “Service him.”
There’s plenty to dislike about “2 Broke Girls,” especially the ensemble, which is conceived in terms so racist it is less offensive than baffling. The girls’ Korean boss, Han (Bryce) Lee, talks funny, is short and sexless, and wants to be hip; the black cashier is played by Garrett Morris, who should sue for the limp gags he’s fed; and the horny Eastern European cook has punch lines such as “Once you go Ukraine, you will scream with sex-pain.” The setting is equally phony: Brooklyn subways do not look like something out of “The Warriors.” But there’s so much potential here it kills me—a deep female friendship, raw humor about class, and a show that puts young women’s sexuality dead center, rather than using it as visual spice, as in some cable series about bad-boy antiheroes.
“2 Broke Girls” could improve; sitcoms often start slow. Still, it’s hard to advise anybody to place a bet on Cummings. These days, the best network comedies are too good for viewers to grade newcomers on a curve, out of gratitude for a bit of representation, a slice of the power pie. And if some folks get mad at Cummings for taking up two slots? That’s not an unreasonable response. As Liz Lemon, on “30 Rock,” once put it, “Women are allowed to get angrier than men about double standards.”
Whitney Cummings: The First Time I Hung Out With Wolves
By WHITNEY CUMMINGSJAN. 30, 2018
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The comedian Whitney Cummings has directed her first movie, “The Female Brain.” It’s due out on Feb. 9. Credit Photographs by Elizabeth Weinberg for The New York Times
Last year my dad died. I’m not sure how I scored in terms of my weird grieving process, but let’s just say it included a lot of yelling at inanimate objects and Googling videos of baby elephants. I couldn’t remember to eat or sleep, but for some reason, I could remember that my friend Paul Scheer once told me about a wolf sanctuary he’d been to. I had instantly said I’d go, but in the kind of self-deluded way you agree to do a cleanse or sign up for a spartan race.
My dad’s death made me realize that in terms of work, a lot of the heavy load I was taking on came with a subconscious intent to get his attention, so when he died, my need to be productive also died a little, too. Suddenly, nothing mattered, and my schedule opened up.
The sanctuary idea kept resurfacing. I wanted to be around beings that understood death, that wouldn’t ask me how I was doing, and wolves seemed like the perfect company. I had every reason not to go: I could barely get out of bed, and six months earlier, I had had my ear bitten off by a dog to the point where it hung off my head like a door-knocker earring. Even though it had been artfully reattached, the idea of toothy-faced things near my head set off alarm bells.
But the death of a loved one has this amazing ability to transmogrify fear into complete numbness, sometimes even courage. My dad used to refer to himself jokingly as a lone wolf, and because of my borderline feral behavior while eating, my friends have a running bit that I was “raised by wolves” — thematically, it all seemed to make perfect sense.
A couple of days after the funeral, I asked two of my most tolerant, patient friends — my college bestie, Niki, and my comedian pal Kevin to accompany me to Palmdale, Calif., home of lots of sketchy IHOPs, a tremendous amount of asphalt and the Wolf Connection sanctuary. The night before, I went into a wormhole of wolf photos for inspiration, but nothing prepares you for seeing a real one, much less touching one. So much of what we look at now is airbrushed, laced with a complimentary filter and color-corrected, but encountering a wolf in the flesh makes you realize how all those ersatz finishes, meant to improve the image, actually kind of ruins it. In the quest to make things flawless and beautiful, we remove the grit and spirit, the qualities that actually make them interesting. It was breathtaking to see wolves free of pixels, without a comments section, or being reduced to “likes.”
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I assumed I’d be watching the wolves from 20 feet away, squinting through glass and chain-link fences, desperately trying to get a selfie. No, no. At Wolf Connection, you go right into the enclosures with the animals. I was surprised that their hair was so coarse, that their musty smell was actually calming, and that I did not wet my pants.
Each wolf was doing something different. One was digging, one was pacing, one was howling, one was eating, one was grooming itself, one was sleeping, one was hiding, one was hanging out in its den, one was digging on top of its den and one was intently and seemingly menacingly staring at us.
Cate Salansky, our wolf expert and guide, asked me, “Which one do you think is the alpha?”
Duh, I thought. This woman really took me for an idiot. “The one who’s howling,” I said. “That’s obviously the leader.”
“Nope.”
All right, I thought, then it must be the one that is eating.
Wrong again.
I went on to guess every wolf except the alpha. Turns out, the alpha wolf can usually be found sleeping. Sleeping. Didn’t it need to bark and growl and intimidate people to show everyone that it was the alpha? No; overcompensating is more of a people thing. Ages ago, I read somewhere, probably in a self-help book I bought after a nasty breakup, that truly powerful beings don’t need to prove how powerful they are. This made no sense to me until I saw it in action with the wolves. When you’re truly in control, you don’t need to tap on people’s shoulders constantly to remind them how in control you are.
Cate explained to me what every role in the pack entails. I was especially fascinated by the way the current alpha trains the burgeoning alpha, as if it were so at peace with death that it instinctively knew to train its replacement. That was the kind of surrender I needed to navigate the grief in my chest. It also comes in handy in a business where you constantly feel as if you were being replaced by people who are younger and prettier and got famous by posting bikini pictures on Instagram.
My ego doesn’t love being wrong, so I snooped around for some information that would make me seem less incorrect about the alpha thing. I know quite a bit about dogs, and some of the rescued wolves at the sanctuary had been bred with dogs. I tried to figure out a way to manipulate the conversation to a topic I know something about. I asked, “Which ones have the highest dog content or the highest wolf content?” I could tell that she was asked this question a lot. “Do you give them blood tests to find out which are more wolf than dog?”
Cate explained that they don’t give the wolves blood tests. They focus on their behavior. Some wolves were not raised with other wolves, so they never learned certain behaviors, and some that looked less like them were raised with wolves and hence more wolflike. Hang out with a wolf, and you’ll become more like one.
I had just spent two years putting all my time and sweat into making “The Female Brain,” a film that explores how much of our behavior is nature versus nurture, and after five minutes with wolves, it all made sense. The death of a parent tends to make you wonder if you were destined to follow in his footsteps or repeat his mistakes, but the wolves showed me that maybe the apple can fall far from the tree.
In a culture that makes me feel that I have to compete, audition, peacock, post and posture constantly, observing the effortless functionality of the wolf pack pushed “Pause” on those impulses. The alpha wolf showed me that when I’m feeling as if I need to work more, make more, fight more or tweet more, maybe the best thing I can do for myself and everyone around me is to go take a nap.
Whitney Cummings
The comedian has directed her first movie, “The Female Brain,” to be released on Friday, Feb. 9.
A version of this article appears in print on February 4, 2018, on Page AR7 of the New York edition with the headline: I Hung Out With Wolves.
Whitney Cummings reveals eating disorder struggle
By Fox News
October 6, 2017 | 8:55am
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Whitney Cummings reveals eating disorder struggle
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Comedian Whitney Cummings revealed in her newly released memoir that she struggled with an eating disorder for years.
The stand-up comedian, co-creator and co-writer of the CBS comedy “2 Broke Girls” wrote her first memoir titled “I’m Fine … And Other Lies.” In it, she discusses the mistakes she made in her life and the years she battled an eating disorder.
The comedian wrote from ages 14 to 18 her diet consisted of “rice cakes, apples and nonfat yogurt,” People reported.
“I became irrationally terrified of fat,” Cummings wrote.
The writer said she became “alarmingly thin … I looked like the shadow of Jared Leto” and her hair started falling out, but she could not stop her weight obsession.
“It was as if I were looking in a funhouse mirror that makes your hips comically large. I literally could not see myself how others did,” Cummings wrote.
After she moved to Los Angeles at age 19, her eating disorder continued but she started binge-eating.
“Binge eating disorder is a severe, life-threatening and treatable eating disorder characterized by recurrent episodes of eating large quantities of food (often very quickly and to the point of discomfort); a feeling of a loss of control during the binge; experiencing shame, distress or guilt afterwards; and regularly using unhealthy compensatory measures (e.g., purging) to counter the binge eating,” the National Eating Disorder Association describes on its website.
AP
Cummings said she would find herself covered in wrappers when she woke up because she would eat in her sleep.
“Sometimes I was even sticky from whatever weird sauce I blindly poured down my throat,” Cummings wrote.
The comedian said she was able to conquer her disorder with the help of her friends. Cummings said her eating disorder derived from her low self-confidence. She still has trouble with food some times but hopes her experience will help others.
“The other good news about my overcoming an eating disorder and putting some weight on is that it makes you look about ten years younger,” Cummings wrote. “People keep asking me if I’ve gotten a facelift and I’m like, ‘Nope, just got that extra side of guac.’”
Cummings’ next project is the HBO comedy “A Lot” which she will star in and executive produce.
Whitney Cummings Delves Into the Dark Stuff Beyond Donald Trump Dick Jokes and Sitcom Stardom
Daniel Kohn | October 3, 2017 | 6:32am
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Six years ago, Whitney Cummings was on the brink of major mainstream success. Two shows she created — Two Broke Girls, co-created with Michael Patrick King, and her eponymous sitcom Whitney — had just premiered on major networks, thanks to her early success doing stand-up on late-night TV and appearing on Comedy Central roasts. One of those was the 2011 roast of then-buffoonish businessman Donald Trump.
“I think it should be a general rule that if you’ve been on a Comedy Central roast, you shouldn’t become president,” she quips over the phone ahead of the release of her new book, I'm Fine ... and Other Lies (Penguin Random House, $27), and a three-night stint at Largo. “I made jokes about his flaccid dick and now he’s our president, and now I have to live with that. The joke is on us, I guess.”
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Even at the time of her introduction to a wider audience, the comedian was suffering from a severe crisis of confidence. With Whitney floundering (she says she should have done a multicamera show on CBS and the result could have been more promising), Cummings had to learn quickly and at a young age (she was 29 when it first aired) how to be the boss of the show. She often found herself in uncomfortable situations — including giving critical notes and firing staffers.
“Everybody hates the boss no matter how nice you are,” she recalls of running the show. “It was completely the opposite of what I was trying to do, which was getting people to laugh at you and love you. Being a comedian and getting your own show is very challenging because of the motive of what gets you into comedy in the first place and to have high tolerance for other people’s discomfort, which I didn’t have.”
In what could have been a precursor to today’s culture wars, having a loud, successful female lead wasn’t what people were looking for in a network sitcom. If dealing with corporate pressures served as a check on her success on a macro level, she was dealing with a number of personal issues that plagued her for years as well.
“I really tried to do this disruptive, subversive thing,” she says of Whitney. “I tried to do a gender reversal where Chris D’Elia’s character had all of the traditionally female characteristics of being calm, collected and settled down. Mine had the male qualities, which were reckless, commitment-phobic. To see the same stereotypical characters over and over again seemed to be insulting to viewers.”
Contrarily, 2 Broke Girls became a hit and ultimately landed in syndication. Dealing with the failure of Whitney and subsequently E!’s Love You, Mean It With Whitney Cummings — “I thought I was going to do this incisive show with like Michael Moore and Malcolm Gladwell; instead I got Snooki," she says — forced her to re-evaluate what success meant to her.
“What’s the point of having a show on the air if you don’t believe in [it] or are miserable?” she says. “I realized doing the wrong show is way worse than having no show because you feel fake and phony. It’s a terrible feeling.”
Throughout her turbulent television career, Cummings continued to journal and write about things she tried to make sense of in her life. She didn’t know it at the time but those entries would become the blueprint for her first book. In I’m Fine ... and Other Lies, she chronicles — albeit with her trademark sharp humor — low self-esteem, a severe eating disorder and professional ups and downs in a fashion that feels removed from her acerbic stage persona.
“Writing the book was a nightmare,” she admits. “It was a truly harrowing experience to say the least. I thought [that] since you hear all these romantic stories about writing a book that it would be great. Then, you remember that most of these authors had clinical depression or were alcoholics, and you get it. These are all of the stories and material that I never felt comfortable talking about onstage because I was too embarrassed and didn’t want to say this stuff while making contact with strangers. It was definitely the hardest thing I’ve ever done.”
The book may be hitting shelves today, but writing — especially humor writing — has been Cummings’ coping mechanism since she was a teen. Her tough persona made writing about her insecurities and darker moments a challenge, but she decided that if she wrote about her demons in this manner, maybe it would help others feel better and get help.
“In my late 20s, I realized being crazy isn’t cute in your 30s and I couldn’t stop,” she says. “I knew I had to get ahead of that. Although the stories are really dark, I do come out all right on the other end. I found that when I was trying to not be crazy, hearing about other people's trials and tribulations with mental health issues, eating disorders and addiction made me feel better.”
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SHOW ME HOW
After a couple more stand-up specials, Cummings is now the executive producer and a writer on the Roseanne reboot. Similar to how 2 Broke Girls presented what's like to be poor, young and living in a big city in a way that resonated with people, putting Roseanne back on the air, she says, is a way to get a middle-class family back on TV.
As she hits the road with a bunch of friends including Neal Brennan, Cummings' shows are going to revolve around her new book. The tentative plan includes podcast-style "In Conversation" types of shows, and will continue that way depending on the audience’s enthusiasm. But once the tour is over, Cummings is going to tape another hourlong special and return to a much-changed TV landscape that could be more receptive to a powerful female lead.
“I’ve spent so much of my life hiding my flaws and weaknesses because I didn’t think anyone wanted to see them, and I was embarrassed of them,” she says. “It made me realize that people don’t just want funny. With so much on going in the news right now, and so many people in a lot of pain, I don’t think people want jokes and me to only talk about my bad relationships. No one is talking about mental illness, and it’s comedians that are pushing the envelope and talking about something that people are pretending isn’t happening.”
Who Does Whitney Cummings Think She Is? The prolific TV star/creator helms her first feature, The Female Brain
Lacey Rose
Hollywood Reporter. 424.6 (Feb. 7, 2018): p23+.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2018 e5 Global Media, LLC
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/
Full Text:
Whitney Cummings was right around 30 when her mother and father suffered strokes within two years of each other. Desperate to understand what went wrong, she began devouring neurology books, which led her to Louann Brizendine's The Female Brain. While it would do little to aid her parents, the book profoundly changed the comedian's understanding of herself. "I remember feeling an overwhelming sense of relief," she says, "and a lot less crazy." Now Cummings, 35 and a prolific TV creator (2 Broke Girls, Whitney), has spun the tome into a rom-com (out Feb. 9 via IFC Films), enlisting Neal Brennan (Chappelle's Show) to co-write and lining up Sofia Vergara, James Marsden and the NBAs Blake Griffin to join her onscreen. That her directorial debut, a film centering on empathy between the sexes, arrives in the heat of the Time's Up moment isn't lost on the D.C.-reared Ivy Leaguer, also a showrunner on ABC's Roseanne revival. Though the movement has Cummings reconsidering some of her early experiences in comedy ("Because of the rejection you get and how tough you have to be ... I didn't realize some sexual harassment I had dealt with"), she says stand-up remains "the only place I'm comfortable. It's where I oxygenate."
Your financier, Black Bicycle's Erika Olde, had to persuade you to direct The Female Brain. Why? There are tectonic plates moving in our business but--and this is my shit that I need to work on--I still have a bit of shame around raising my hand and being the boss. Our society has this way of going, "Don't shine too bright, know your place." So the idea of being in a position of domination made me [uncomfortable].
By 28, you had already created two TV shows. You didn't get comfortable then?
I definitely learned, but there was also a bit of, "She's doing too much and we don't like it."
Who's the "we"?
My @ replies on Twitter? (Laughs.) There was a bit of, "Who does she think she is?" And people get mad at you. I thought my dreams were coming true, then someone was like, "Don't listen to them." I'm all, "Who's them?" I had no idea. I do think things have changed, even in the last six months, but there's this idea of, you don't get to achieve too much [as a woman] without losing friends and people not liking it. And I've definitely had male counterparts [for whom] people were like, "Fucking awesome, dude, that's so cool. You're killing it." There's not a lot of, "Who does he think he is?"
You got your start writing for Comedy Central roasts. In 2011, you roasted Donald Trump.
With every roast, it's all fun and games until you're up there, and then people's feelings always end up getting hurt. But his feelings did not get hurt. I remember being like, "Wow, he's loving this."
And net-worth jokes were off-limits?
Oh yeah. At every roast, something's off-limits. I love that it wasn't his daughter or his wife, it was his money.
Please Note: Illustration(s) are not available due to copyright restrictions.
"One of the big conversations I'm trying to have onstage right now is that to be pro-woman, you don't have to be anti-man. Saying all men suck makes you look like an idiot," says Cummings, photographed Jan. 26 at Harlowe in West Hollywood.
Styling by George Kotsiopoulos Wolk Morais jacket, vest, trousers, shirt and tie, Christian Louboutin shoes.
Caption: Griffin with Cecily Strong In The Female Brain.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Rose, Lacey. "Who Does Whitney Cummings Think She Is? The prolific TV star/creator helms her first feature, The Female Brain." Hollywood Reporter, 7 Feb. 2018, p. 23+. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A529863356/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=697d7baf. Accessed 22 Apr. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A529863356
Get to know Whitney Cummings: a cheat sheet on the comedian, who can now add "author" to her resume
Los Angeles Magazine. 62.10 (Oct. 2017): p82.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2017 Emmis Publishing L.P. dba Los Angeles Magazine
Full Text:
BORN
* Washington, D.C., 1982
LIVES IN
* Los Angeles
HOW SHE GOT STARTED
* At 22, Cummings landed her first stand-up gig at Hollywood's long-gone M Bar. She parlayed a flair for self-deprecation into writing jokes for Comedy Central Roast.
YOU KNOW HER FROM
* Whitney, which she created and starred in, and 2 Broke Girls, which she cocreated with Sex and the City's Michael Patrick King. She's since had specials on HBO and Comedy Central.
THE BOOK
* As far as funny memoirs go, I'm Fine... and Other Lies (October 3) is pretty earnest. Cummings uses borderline-insane life experiences--doing time behind bars in Guatemala, for one--as a springboard for poignant self-reflection.
FUN FACT
* Before she was famous, Cummings was a cast member on MTV's Punk'd and pranked celebs like the Rock and Julia Stiles.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Get to know Whitney Cummings: a cheat sheet on the comedian, who can now add 'author' to her resume." Los Angeles Magazine, Oct. 2017, p. 82. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A507965992/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=1f5f16bd. Accessed 22 Apr. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A507965992
I'm Fine ... and Other Lies
Courtney Eathorne
Booklist. 114.2 (Sept. 15, 2017): p9.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2017 American Library Association
http://www.ala.org/aboutala/offices/publishing/booklist/
Full Text:
I'm Fine ... and Other Lies.
By Whitney Cummings.
Oct. 2017. 288p. Putnam, $27 (9780735212602). 791.45.
Cummings, comedian and cocreator of the TV show Two Broke Girls, spent her twenties climbing to success in the Los Angeles field of funny. She has written for numerous television specials, garnered acclaim for her own recorded stand-up routines, and even, if only for a short time, boasted a network sitcom with her first name as the title. Now, a much wiser Whitney fulfills a childhood dream and invites readers to explore the bizarre inner workings of her brain via the pages of this book. Cummings' crisp comedic voice is the driving force behind each essay, wherein the author regales with tales of the danger of self-deprecation and constant people pleasing. Her anecdotes are intimate and messy; she writes with candor about disordered eating, sexual assault, and the time her recently rescued pit bull turned on her. Though Cummings cautions against her former methods of deep codependency, she acknowledges that her imperfect journey delivered her safely to a present state of empowerment. Fans will find a newfound trust and respect for this familiar voice.--Courtney Eathome
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Eathorne, Courtney. "I'm Fine ... and Other Lies." Booklist, 15 Sept. 2017, p. 9. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A507359779/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=e4f075a5. Accessed 22 Apr. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A507359779
Cummings, Whitney: I'M FINE...AND OTHER LIES
Kirkus Reviews. (Aug. 15, 2017):
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2017 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Full Text:
Cummings, Whitney I'M FINE...AND OTHER LIES Putnam (Adult Nonfiction) $27.00 10, 3 ISBN: 978-0-7352-1260-2
A witty memoir detailing the misfortunes of a Hollywood comedian, actor, and writer.Dedicated to the voices in her head who told her she could never write a book, Cummings' debut offers what she deems is "a whole book's worth of yummy, humiliating schadenfreude" as well as "mortifying situations that'll make you feel way better about your own choices." It's an extremely self-deprecating assault on a laundry list of proclivities, insecurities, and intimate fears many readers will easily relate to. A problematic journey along the "yellow brick road of healers" results in a few opening chapters rife with ineffective therapists, pointed neuroses, and a bold admittance of chronic co-dependency, about which the author wrote in Lena Dunham and Jenni Konner's newsletter, inspiring the book. Cummings writes about the misogyny of the stand-up comedy industry (and its audiences), her perfectionist tendencies, egg freezing, her 15-year struggle with anorexia (which included bouts of "sleep eating"), a surprise scoliosis diagnosis, and a horrifying attack by her pet pit bull. While all of these situations had disastrous potential, the author takes the sting out of each with deflective humor and straight-up honesty, humility, and a keen sense of humanity. Akin to the inner-critical narrative voice of Amy Schumer, Cummings' observations expectedly tackle the uncomfortable and the embarrassing, including a somewhat overanalyzed encounter with drunk guys in a Las Vegas hotel hallway and an illuminating cross-cultural lesson with Middle Eastern women about wearing headscarves. Occasionally, the author brushes up against some painful truths that even she seems surprised to have publicly admitted, such as her debilitating issues with body dysmorphia and self-esteem. After years of anxiety and denial about everything from heckled stand-up gigs to asymmetrical breasts, Cummings seems content that she can now openly admit that becoming truly happy and satisfied with life is a continuous work in progress. A zippy, unabashed narrative confronting personal adversity with an equal mix of humor and sincerity.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Cummings, Whitney: I'M FINE...AND OTHER LIES." Kirkus Reviews, 15 Aug. 2017. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A500364932/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=cd338e76. Accessed 22 Apr. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A500364932
I'm Fine... and Other Lies
Library Journal. 142.11 (June 15, 2017): p16a.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2017 Library Journals, LLC. A wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
http://www.libraryjournal.com/
Full Text:
After getting her start as a stand-up comic and then breaking out with her wildly successful CBS sitcom 2 Broke Girls (she's the creator, writer, and executive producer), Whitney Cummings has seen a few things and is turning to the written word to tell us all the stuff she doesn't say on stage.
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978-0-735-21260-2 | $2700/$36.00C | 100,000 Putnam | HC | October
* 978-0-735-21262-6 | fi AD: 978-0-525-49762-2
MEMOIR
Social: @WhitneyCummings RA: For fans of Lena Dunham, Amy Schumer, and Chelsea Handler
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"I'm Fine... and Other Lies." Library Journal, 15 June 2017, p. 16a. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A495668254/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=2e22ee9e. Accessed 22 Apr. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A495668254
What You Should Know About: Whitney Cummings
Julie Miller
Vanity Fair. 58.2 (Feb. 2016): p66.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2016 Conde Nast Publications, Inc.. All rights reserved. Reproduced by permission of The Conde Nast Publications Inc.
http://www.vanityfair.com/
Full Text:
Byline: JULIE MILLER PHOTOGRAPH BY PATRICK ECCLESINE
What You Should Know About
WHITNEY CUMMINGS
A PANOPLY OF ECCENTRIC BIOGRAPHICAL DATA RE: TV'S BROKE GIRL MADE GOOD
By the time Whitney Cummings was 28, the Ivy League-educated comedian had two shows on network television- Whitney, the NBC sitcom in which she also starred, and 2 Broke Girls, the CBS series she co-created, now in its fifth season. Despite this impressive stat, and the fact that the Georgetown, D.C.-born brunette put herself through the University of Pennsylvania in three years, graduating magna cum laude in communications, she is quick to note that her rise from the Comedy Central Roast ranks was the product of "workaholic fear." With her latest HBO stand-up special, I'm Your Girlfriend, airing January 23, the successful wit cracks wise about her life, comedy, and compulsions.
SHE CREDITS her "tumultuous" childhood with helping shape her career path. (Parents Patti, who worked in public relations for Neiman Marcus and Bloomingdale's, and Eric, a venture capitalist, divorced when Whitney was five.) But, she adds, "everyone comes from damage-comedians just advertise it."
THE YOUNGEST of three children in a Catholic family, Cummings recalls holiday dinners during which everyone would communicate by mocking one another-preparing her for future evenings roasting the likes of Joan Rivers and Donald Trump on Comedy Central.
ONE OF her first jobs was working as an informal model in department stores and local fashion shows-at which she was so terrible, she says, "they would literally only call me if someone got sick."
EVEN SO , the five-foot-ten-inch comedian paid for college by modeling at the King of Prussia Mall, outside of Philadelphia, walking around in discount clothing and directing customers toward sales.
SHE MADE her stand-up debut at 22, during a storytelling show at the since shuttered M Bar, at Fountain and Vine, in Hollywood. It went well, but the three years after did not as she struggled to find her authentic comedy voice.
DESTROYING HER Lexus hybrid-by accidentally filling it with diesel fuel on the first day she drove it-led her to a comedy "aha" moment: "Oh, my failures, I can use them to make money."
SHE STORES her comedy brainstorms on her iPhone 6S in the Notes and Voice Memos apps, and transcribes them each night into a document. "I'm a geek about doing my homework and writing everything down."
HAVING MOVED around a lot as a child-including a stay with her aunt and uncle in Virginia when she was 12-Cummings sought residential serenity in Studio City, California, and now boasts of her 818 area code.
ONE BEDROOM is devoted to her dogs-Ramona, a pit bull, and Frankie, a Great Dane she thought was a pit bull when she rescued him as a puppy. She feels at peace around dogs because, she says, "I don't feel judged. I don't feel the need to be defensive or funny."
ALLERGENS INCLUDE dust (so severe she had to tear out her carpets), tomatoes, intimacy, and, according to one allergist, gluten. In response to the last, she told her doctor, "I don't have time for that."
HER BIGGEST splurge, once her shows were picked up, was health insurance-which she used to finally see a neurologist about her chronic migraines.
LAST YEAR , at 32, she had her eggs frozen. "I feel like I was dating people just because I was on a deadline," she says.
IN ADDITION to discussing the above in her new special, Cummings covers dating-a subject she researched by going on as many blind and Tinder dates as she could for romance and, yes, comedy material: "It's not my fault that dating and entertainment are now synonymous."
SHE JOINED Tinder with the attitude " 'This is stupid! I would never use this!' Two weeks later, you're addicted to it and can't stop."
A DIE-HARD Sex and the City fan, Cummings spent $800 of the $900 in her bank account on a pair of Christian Louboutin black suede Peanut wedges for her first meeting with Michael Patrick King, the show's writer, producer, and director, in 2010.
SHE PLANNED to return the shoes afterward but foiled her reimbursement scheme by sweating through the soles. Fortunately, the meeting went well and the two co-created the aptly titled 2 Broke Girls .
STILL A broke girl at heart, her favorite distraction is online "window" shopping: "I'll shop for 45 minutes; then I get to the checkout, where I have to put in my credit card, and I just close the window."
SHE IS adapting Maureen Dowd's book Are Men Necessary? When Sexes Collide for an HBO pilot in which she will star. The book centers on a subject she is interested (and experienced) in: successful women having a difficult time finding guys.
HER FAVORITE book, The Female Brain, by Louann Brizendine, is the basis for a screenplay she is writing with fellow comedian Neal Brennan.
SHE HOPES her career slows down eventually because "that means I've learned to say no and am comfortable enough to not need professional accomplishments to feel good about myself."
IN 10 years, Cummings would be happy to have "kids and dogs ... and someone to take care of the kids and dogs ... and stand-up specials where I talk about how much I hate them."
"I'M A GEEK ABOUT DOING MY HOMEWORK."
@vf.com To watch Whitney Cummings PREDICT the future, go to VF.COM/FEB2016.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Miller, Julie. "What You Should Know About: Whitney Cummings." Vanity Fair, Feb. 2016, p. 66. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A441217874/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=26559e2a. Accessed 22 Apr. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A441217874
Whitney Cummings: comedian Whitney Cummings talks about her fascination with Tinder and why she thinks it just might be genius
Emma Bazilian
ADWEEK. 55.25 (June 23, 2014): p34.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2014 Adweek, LLC
http://www.adweek.com
Full Text:
What's the first information you consume in the morning? Digg and Huffington Post tend to be my first news sites. If I have some time, I'll go to Salon and Slate, and then I'll begrudgingly go to Deadline. If I'm going to be honest, I go straight to Gilt. It's perfect; I'm groggy, I haven't had my coffee yet, so I buy things I don't need.
What are your go-to social media platforms? I'm on
Instagram, Twitter, and that's really it. I didn't get into Vine, and I'm not on Facebook. I did join Tinder, though. Please let everyone know that I'm available and on Tinder!
Have you been on any Tinder dates? Not yet. I first joined because I went to a wedding and everyone was on it, and as a comedian, it's my job to know how people are dating. Eventually I stopped hearing people say, "I went on a Tinder date" as a joke, and started hearing, "I met my fiance on Tinder." Now I kind of do it as an experiment so I can talk about it onstage, but it's also really compelling, to say the least.
Have you seen anyone you know on there? Oh, all the time! It's so funny. But, to me, it's just like a microcosm of the real world.
We walk into a bar and say, "Yes, no, yes, no." I half think it's the apocalypse and half think it's genius.
What other apps do you use?
I use the TED app a lot. If I have some downtime, I'll try to educate my goddamn self.
Who do you follow on Twitter?
Seth Rogen's funny. And Adam McKay, the director, always tweets interesting news stories. He does my news collecting for me, basically. Louis C.K, uses Twitter to make a difference. Like when TMZ posted a video of Tracy Morgan's car accident, Louis used Twitter to petition them to take it down.
What TV shows do you watch?
I love It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. I feel like people take it for granted because it's such a reliable, funny show. I'm a big fan of 2 Broke Girls, no bias there. I also watch a lot of documentary shows like the Sundance series The Staircase. That was bananas.
What's on your reading list?
I'm reading Super Sad True Love Story by Gary Shteyngart. Usually I read nonfiction--as a stand-up, you always want to be jamming science and neurology stuff into your head--but every sentence in Super Sad True Love Story is a work of art. I also read a lot of self-help books, but I'm not going to tell you about them!
How about just your all-time favorite self-help book? Getting the Love You Want by Harville Hendrix is so good. It has the worst title ever, but it's a game changer. I give it to all my friends.
How do you wind down before bed? Funny you should ask because my doctor actually just prescribed to me that I can't have my phone in my bedroom within 30 minutes of going to sleep. Looking at your phone produces cortisol and adrenaline, which keeps you up. So now I'm going back to reading a book before bed.
[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
Specs
Age 31
Accomplishments Comedian and actress (her Comedy Central stand-up special, Whitney Cummings: I Love You, premieres June 28 at 11 p.m./10 c); co-creator of the CBS sitcom 2 Broke Girls
Base Los Angeles
Caption: 2 Broke Girls
It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia
Is available on Tinder...
Groggy morning purchases on Gilt
Bazilian, Emma
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Bazilian, Emma. "Whitney Cummings: comedian Whitney Cummings talks about her fascination with Tinder and why she thinks it just might be genius." ADWEEK, 23 June 2014, p. 34. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A373035270/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=8027959c. Accessed 22 Apr. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A373035270
Whitney Cummings: familiar latenight face goes for 'Broke'
Glenn Whipp
Daily Variety. 313.35 (Nov. 18, 2011): p18.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2011 Penske Business Media, LLC
http://www.pmc.com/
Full Text:
If you watched Comedy Central or latenight talkshows, you probably knew Whitney Cummings before her face became ubiquitous via the full-court press promotional campaign NBC launched this fall for her eponymous comedy, "Whitney."
And, yes, now Cummings is everywhere, both as star and creator of "Whitney," as well as continuing her behind-the-scenes work as co-creator of CBS' freshman comedy series, "2 Broke GMs."
[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
Since both shows have been picked up for full-season orders, the one place you won't be seeing Cummings much is at the comedy clubs where she made her reputation for biting, observational humor.
"The whole thing is definitely crazy," Cummings says of her newfound notoriety. "I mean, just look at my last name. It's great for standup, but I have no business being on network TV."
Both shows reflect the 29-yearold comedienne's strong generational point-of-view on relationships, sex and navigating the world at large. "Whitney" is naturally the more personal reflection of Cumeming's sensibility, a direct outgrowth of her standup routine.
"I've been developing this material for years," she says. "I'm just going with what I know is funny, what I know works and what's 100% my voice."
Whipp, Glenn
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Whipp, Glenn. "Whitney Cummings: familiar latenight face goes for 'Broke'." Daily Variety, 18 Nov. 2011, p. 18. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A274953578/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=582b2752. Accessed 22 Apr. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A274953578
Whitney
Brian Lowry
Variety. 424.6 (Sept. 19, 2011): p84.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2011 Penske Business Media, LLC
http://variety.com
Full Text:
SERIES; NBC
Thurs. Sept. 22, 9:30 p.m.
Whitney Cummings is one of the new flavors of the fall season, with a hand in producing two fledgling sitcoms--CBS' "2 Broke Girls" and "Whitney," an NBC sitcom in which she also stars. The eponymous show, however, gets off to a decidedly tepid start, built around the title character's unmarried relationship to her longtime boyfriend, which is thrown for a mild loop by attending a wedding. With Cummings offering a quirky but not particularly compelling presence and scant support around the central couple, viewers who sample this post-"The Office" entry might experience their own fears of commitment.
CREDITS: Filmed in Los Angeles by Stuber Pictures in association with Universal Media Studios. Executive producers, Whitney CummIngs, Scott Stuber, Quan Phung, Betsy Thomas, Barry Katz, Andy Ackerman; director, Aekerman; writer, Cummings. 30 MIN.
Whitney Cummings, Chris D'Elia, Zoe Lister-Jones, Dan O'Brien, Maulik Pancholy, Rhea Seehorn.
Lowry, Brian
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Lowry, Brian. "Whitney." Variety, 19 Sept. 2011, p. 84. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A269027189/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=8bd814ca. Accessed 22 Apr. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A269027189
Whitney Cummings
Stacy Dodd
Daily Variety. 290.12 (Jan. 17, 2006): p6.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2006 Penske Business Media, LLC
http://www.pmc.com/
Full Text:
Comedian Whitney Cummings ("Best Week Ever," "Punk'd") will return to Sundance Channel as the host of "Festival Dailies," the cabler's coverage of the 2006 Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah. Show will air as a nightly half-hour program Jan. 20-29.
Cummings covered the 2005 Sundance fest for "Festival Dailies" and has recently appeared on David Spade's "The Showbiz Show."
Dodd, Stacy
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Dodd, Stacy. "Whitney Cummings." Daily Variety, 17 Jan. 2006, p. 6. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A141996859/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=c9c5a8d0. Accessed 22 Apr. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A141996859
Whitney Cummings: new double-threat has hand in 'Whitney,' '2 Broke Girls'
Robert Abele
Born: September 04, 1982 in Washington, District of Columbia, United States
Nationality: American
Occupation: Actor
Daily Variety. 311.50 (June 14, 2011): pA5.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2011 Penske Business Media, LLC
http://www.pmc.com/
Full Text:
Is television kinder to funny women than other media? Whitney Cummings clarifies the issue.
"I would say women are kinder to funny women than TV," she says, "because we have to write roles for ourselves if we want to have funny roles on TV."
She's her own best example, since the D.C.-born 28-year-old stormed the upfronts this year by landing two laffers as writer-producer on the fall schedule: NBC's "Whitney," starring herself and based on the caustic, observant relationship humor in her stand-up act, and CBS' "2 Broke Girls," a collaboration with Michael Patrick King.
"I have a lot to say, and a lot to get out, so the more shows the better," says Cummings. "I just felt there was an absence of strong, funny women running with the ball on TV, and I will stop at nothing to make sure there are more!"
A dark-haired dynamo who's become a "Chelsea Lately" panel fixture and roast circuit success, Cummings credits an early gig on "Punk'd" as a lesson in the merits of unforced comedy.
"It's a prank Show, and if you're trying too hard to be funny, you give it away," says Cummings. "The key was to be grounded and real and honest. I'm so grateful for that."
It's a laugh-getting ethos she wants to bring to the primetime sitcom.
"No one loves jokes more than I do, but normal human beings don't talk in jokes," she says. "The formula that works for me when it comes to TV writing is to put people in funny situations, then think, 'What would someone really say?'"
[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
Abele, Robert
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Abele, Robert. "Whitney Cummings: new double-threat has hand in 'Whitney,' '2 Broke Girls'." Daily Variety, 14 June 2011, p. A5. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A260137258/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=0c6f6966. Accessed 22 Apr. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A260137258
Whitney Cummings Always Packs Her Duct Tape
Nell Mcshane Wulfhart
The New York Times. (Jan. 7, 2018): Lifestyle: p2(L).
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2018 The New York Times Company
http://www.nytimes.com
Full Text:
The comedian Whitney Cummings is used to being on the road, starting back when she regularly visited 80 cities a year to perform stand-up comedy. Her book ''I'm Fine ... and Other Lies'' was published in October. The film ''The Female Brain,'' which she wrote and directed, will be released on Feb. 9.
Ms. Cummings has mastered the art of travel, from maintaining her skin care regimen on the plane to the ideal hotel sleep routine. She is a self-defined ''psycho'' about miles programs (she has ''more miles than I'll ever be able to use'' and likes the JetBlue credit card because ''their customer service is unbelievable''). And she's learned to be unusually productive when she flies.
''Being on the plane is my catch-up time,'' she said. ''I write thank-you notes. I read. I write stand-up jokes. For writing stand-up, I have to have a little bit of anger and frustration to be motivated to do it. Stand-up for me comes from kind of a hostile engine. And by the time I've done the airport and gone through PreCheck and fought with nine people and had luggage stub my toe, I'm ready to write.''
She's not shy when it comes to what she calls ''owning her space'' on the plane. ''I'm in the television and movie business and I want to know what people are interested in, so I'll slowly, creepily, walk down and look at everyone's computer screen to see what they're watching. If I hear someone laughing I'll go back and see what they're watching.''
She's also a self-appointed enforcer of good plane behavior. ''If someone's being too loud, I'm the person who's like, 'Can you keep it down a little bit?' I'm that guy. I'm walking around, I'm the sheriff making sure everyone is in line. There's nothing worse than someone watching a movie without their headphones on.'' But she takes pity on new parents. ''I used to complain about crying babies. But a friend with kids told me that your life is so much worse if you're the one with the crying baby. So now if someone has a baby who won't stop crying, I send them a drink.''
Here's what she takes on every trip.
Resistance bands
''I work out on planes. I put resistance bands around my knees and open and close my knees to kind of exercise my legs.''
NuFACE toning device
''It's a micro-frequency thing. You have to put a little gel on it and it electrocutes your face and I do it on the plane. It's a little machine that's like a facial on the go. It kind of looks like a cellphone and if I'm too embarrassed I'll talk into it so it looks like I'm on a conference call.''
Woolite
''I get little packets of Woolite and I do laundry at the end of the trip so I'm not coming back with dirty clothes, because that's my nightmare. The night before I leave I'll just put detergent in the bath and clean all my clothes, hang them in the shower, and come home to all clean clothes.''
Ostrich pillow
''It's like a big headband full of beads and it blocks out noise and sound. If I'm sleeping on the plane it's the only thing that works for me. It looks ridiculous -- it's not going to make you a bunch of friends or get you a husband -- but it's amazing.''
Duct tape
''I have a problem with lights in the room. I can't sleep if the TV has a red light or the AC has a green light. I bring a little bit of duct tape or Band-Aids and I stick them over all the lights in the room so it's dark enough to sleep.''
Aromatherapy
''I have this Tata Harper roll-on oil called Love Potion and I put it on before I go to bed in my home and on the road. I just put a little bit under my nose and go right to sleep.''
Diptyque candle
''I take the travel-size rose-scented one. I really set up a romantic vibe for myself.''
Edibles
''I think it's illegal that I travel with them but I don't care. I take those before bed. I used to take Lunesta and Ambien and it was making me crazy -- I'd wake up the next day and I'd have ravaged the minibar; I'd have an $80 bill. I'd send emails to ex-boyfriends. So I take the weed candies if I'm having trouble sleeping.''
CAPTION(S):
DRAWINGS (DRAWINGS BY ESTELLE MORRIS)
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Wulfhart, Nell Mcshane. "Whitney Cummings Always Packs Her Duct Tape." New York Times, 7 Jan. 2018, p. 2(L). General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A521686838/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=24591986. Accessed 22 Apr. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A521686838
The Female Brain
Teo Bugbee
The New York Times. (Feb. 9, 2018): Arts and Entertainment: pC6(L).
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2018 The New York Times Company
http://www.nytimes.com
Full Text:
Romantic comedy conventions get a brain scan in this new movie directed by the comedian Whitney Cummings. Ms. Cummings also stars as Dr. Julia Brizendine, a newly divorced neuroscientist who observes brain activity as a way to study gender. While Julia uses work to dodge dating, her long-married study subjects, Lisa (Sofia Vergara) and Steven (Deon Cole) have become more platonic than romantic. In Julia's other case studies, Lexi (Lucy Punch) can't stop nit-picking her boyfriend, Adam (James Marsden), and Zoe (Cecily Strong) has let professional stress seep into her marriage to a basketball player, Greg ( Blake Griffin of the Detroit Pistons.)
As the couples stumble through their daily frustrations, the film occasionally pauses to overlay a brain chart on the action, lighting up the glands and lobes Julia deems responsible for their behaviors. According to Julia's funny phrenology, Lexi criticizes Adam's hair and skin because her pituitary gland releases endorphins when she grooms, and Lisa adjusts a dangling bedroom mirror because her amygdala registers fear faster than Steven's.
''The Female Brain'' is a fictionalized adaptation of a nonfiction book of the same title by the neuropsychiatrist Louann Brizendine. Armed with scientific conviction, the movie pits men's minds against women's with no room for overlap, and no room for those identities that exist outside the male and female categories. With tender performances and dubious conclusions, this story is best appreciated as an explanation for why people seek out the false comfort of gendered pseudoscience. But by fitting characters into formulas, ''The Female Brain'' fails to observe the flexibility of human experience.
Not rated. Running time: 1 hour 38 minutes.
CAPTION(S):
PHOTO: Whitney Cummings, the director and star of ''The Female Brain.'' (PHOTOGRAPH BY IFC FILMS)
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Bugbee, Teo. "The Female Brain." New York Times, 9 Feb. 2018, p. C6(L). General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A526830920/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=9ed5cc1f. Accessed 22 Apr. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A526830920
DRUGGED UP WHITNEY CUMMINGS FORGOT ALL ABOUT UNFORGETTABLE AUDITION
World Entertainment News Network. (Apr. 20, 2017):
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2017 COMTEX News Network, Inc.
http://www.comtexnews.com
Full Text:
Apr 20, 2017 (WENN via COMTEX) -- Actress WHITNEY CUMMINGS won her role in new drama UNFORGETTABLE while high on pain medication after undergoing treatment to freeze her eggs.
The 2 Broke Girls co-creator reveals she was recovering from the procedure when she got a call from her agents urging her to try out to play Rosario Dawson's supportive best friend in the movie.
Whitney was supposed to be on bed rest, so she recorded her audition from the comfort of her own home and sent in the footage to director Denise Di Novi.
However, the actress, who is known for her kooky behaviour, had forgotten all about the film by the next morning, because she had been so drugged up when she agreed to shoot the tape.
"I put myself on tape in my house, and the next day they (her agents) call me and they're like, 'They (filmmakers) love the audition,' and I was like, 'What audition?'," the 34-year-old told U.S. breakfast show Today. "I was on Percocet and Oxycontin, and I literally was like, 'Uh oh', and went through my phone and saw 40 videos where I had been doing auditions in my house..."
Despite her concerns, Whitney is convinced the numbing of her comedic senses worked wonders for the role: "I think it did help my audition that I was in so much pain that I couldn't really make jokes," she added to People magazine. "I just was able to play it very seriously because I thought I was on the edge of death."
Whitney was then called in to meet Denise in person, but she wasn't sure whether the filmmaker would still like her to portray Ali if she wasn't high.
"I was like, do I take Percocet again, before I go in for the (proper) audition...?," she laughed on Today. "The only reason I came off like the supportive, nice friend was because I was on drugs, so then I just had to fake the rest of my way!"
Whitney previously revealed she was freezing her eggs so she could control her own fertility future in 2015, two years after splitting from filmmaker Peter Berg. (MT/WNVTO&PE/)
(c) 2017 WORLD ENTERTAINMENT NEWS NETWORK. All global rights reserved.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"DRUGGED UP WHITNEY CUMMINGS FORGOT ALL ABOUT UNFORGETTABLE AUDITION." World Entertainment News Network, 20 Apr. 2017. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A490296888/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=9c25f685. Accessed 22 Apr. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A490296888
Whitney Cummings is mad about stand-up and bringing it to Irvine Improv for 5 shows
Orange County Register (Santa Ana, CA). (Oct. 21, 2016): Business News:
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2016 The Orange County Register
http://tribunecontentagency.com/
Full Text:
Byline: Jackie Moe
Oct. 21--Actress, comedian and producer Whitney Cummings is annoyed, and she's not afraid to say it.
Cummings, who co-created the Emmy Award-winning CBS sitcom "2 Broke Girls" with "Sex and the City" writer and director Michael Patrick King, describes her comedy as "basically all about things that annoy me and what I feel the need to whine about."
So what annoys her? "Pretty much everything," she says with a laugh, though she feels that her frustration comes from a rational place.
"Someone once said that comedy is basically people who are obsessed with injustice, and I really think that's the case for me," Cummings says. "So what annoys me the most is when I see and feel things that are unjust."
The Los Angeles native is involved in many projects: She consistently tours, does one-hour stand-up specials on HBO and Comedy Central, and is directing her first feature film, "The Female Brain," based on neuropsychiatrist Louann Brizendine's book and set for release next year.
Cummings will return to the Irvine Improv for five shows through Sunday.
Cummings also wrote, produced and starred in the NBC sitcom "Whitney" before it was canceled in 2013 after a two-season run.
She says the many ups and downs of her career have helped develop her comedy through the years.
"A lot of times, my stand-up comes from things that hurt my feelings or things that have damaged me," she says. "You know, comedy, at least for me, comes from a pretty vulnerable place and, ultimately, if I'm not going to laugh about it, I'm going to cry about it. So I'm going to choose laughing."
Many female comedians have talked about challenges in the comedy field because of their gender, but Cummings doesn't feel she has experienced any oppression. As a close friend of female comedians including Chelsea Handler, with whom she regularly appeared on the former E! talk show "Chelsea Lately," Cummings says she feels like this is the "best time to be a woman in comedy."
"I really can't complain about being a woman comedian. I mean, being a female is hard, period. But all of my female friends in comedy are successful, so it's hard to say that we are still in rough times," she says. "I do want kids, though, and at 34 and being on the road all the time, it's hard to do both. But that's no harder than any woman who has a job and wants to balance everything, and I'll figure it out."
The former model feels that one of the most important parts of her career is keeping everything fresh. With no set plan or comedy routine, Cummings says, she enters the stand-up stage each night with trust that the evening will be interesting and spontaneous for her audience.
"If you want to see someone lose their mind onstage, this is the place," Cummings says. "My past work usually doesn't foreshadow any of the work that my next show is going to be like. I keep them all pretty different, so people who have seen me before will definitely be seeing something they haven't already experienced."
Contact the writer: jmoe@ocregister.com
___
(c)2016 The Orange County Register (Santa Ana, Calif.)
Visit The Orange County Register (Santa Ana, Calif.) at www.ocregister.com
Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
By Jackie Moe
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Whitney Cummings is mad about stand-up and bringing it to Irvine Improv for 5 shows." Orange County Register [Santa Ana, CA], 21 Oct. 2016. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A467235497/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=719cb80d. Accessed 22 Apr. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A467235497
Entertainer Whitney Cummings Says 'We Can Do Better' for America's Homeless Dogs and Cats
PRWeb Newswire. (Mar. 17, 2016):
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2016 Vocus PRW Holdings LLC
http://www.prweb.com or www.vocus.com
Full Text:
LOS ANGELES (PRWEB) March 17, 2016
Comedian, actress and writer Whitney Cummings is perhaps best known as the co-creator of the CBS series "2 Broke Girls" and creator/star of 'Whitney' but this lady with a sailor's mouth has some truly choice words about how we need to do more to help the homeless dogs and cats in America's shelters.
"I'm always surprised when someone is impressed that I rescued my dogs, because quite frankly, they rescued me," Cummings said. "People look at me like I'm some hero when it's literally the least I can do. More than three million dogs and cats die in shelters a year. That statistic is unacceptable to me, and quite frankly, embarrassing to our culture. We can do better. Shelter dogs are as beautiful, as sweet, and as loving as dogs you can buy from breeders - and as an added bonus, adoption fees are far less expensive. I support Best Friends and their work to promote shelter pet adoption because we should and we can Save Them All."
According to national statistics, each day more than 9,000 dogs and cats die in the nation's shelters. Best Friends has brought increased awareness to how people can get involved in the solution by adopting, and spaying/neutering their pets, donating, volunteering and sharing this message with their friends.
Cummings joins Danny Trejo, Carrie Ann Inaba, Denise Richards, Nils Lofgren, Josef Newgarden, Amanda Seyfried, Cecily Strong, Maggie Q, Elisabeth Rohm, Lisa Edelstein, Tricia Helfer, Emmy Rossum, Michelle Beadle , Jack and Suzy Welch, Mike Rowe and Allison Janney among other luminaries participating in Best Friends' photo campaign featuring celebrities posed with their personal rescued dogs and/or cats in support of the Save Them All call to action.
About Best Friends Animal Society(R)
Best Friends Animal Society is the only national animal welfare organization dedicated exclusively to ending the killing of dogs and cats in America's shelters. A leader in the no-kill movement, Best Friends runs the nation's largest no-kill sanctuary for companion animals, adoption centers and spay and neuter facilities in Los Angeles and Salt Lake City as well as lifesaving programs in partnership with more than 1,400 rescue groups and shelters across the country. Since its founding in 1984, Best Friends has helped reduce the number of animals killed in American shelters from 17 million per year to an estimated 4 million. By continuing to build effective initiatives that reduce the number of animals entering shelters and increase the number who find homes, Best Friends and its nationwide network of members and partners are working to Save Them All(R).
To become a fan of Best Friends Animal Society on Facebook go to: http://www.facebook.com/bestfriendsanimalsociety
Follow Best Friends on Twitter: http://twitter.com/bestfriends
Read the full story at http://www.prweb.com/releases/2016/03/prweb13274904.htm
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Entertainer Whitney Cummings Says 'We Can Do Better' for America's Homeless Dogs and Cats." PRWeb Newswire, 17 Mar. 2016. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A446560001/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=6d4e9187. Accessed 22 Apr. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A446560001
NBC's new sitcom, 'Whitney' just a placeholder show
UWIRE Text. (Feb. 23, 2016): p1.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2016 Uloop Inc.
http://uwire.com/?s=UWIRE+Text&x=26&y=14&=Go
Full Text:
Byline: Kevin Pacione
While the commercial previews for 'Whitney' may seem convincing, it doesn't cover up the fact that 'Whitney' isn't that great of a series. It just seems like NBC needed a TV series to fill in the 8:30 slot to replace 30 Rock until midseason (due to Tina Fey's pregnancy).
'Whitney' is about a couple, Whitney (Whitney Cummings) and Alex (Chris D'Elia), who have been together for three years. Despite having a solid relationship, Whitney is not ready to get married any time soon. In the series premiere, Whitney and Alex are invited to a wedding. Whitney wears white, but Alex tells her she can not wear white to a wedding because of the bride will be wearing white. Whitney then decides to dress in yellow, only to find out that the bride is also wearing that color. This was one of the main highlights of the pilot.
Aside from the wedding, Whitney tries to spice up her sex life with Alex by role-playing as a nurse. Alex goes along with it, but doing so causes him to get a concussion when he hits his head right on the counter. Whitney takes Alex to the emergency room, and the rest of the episode proceeds to go farther and farther downhill.
In general, 'Whitney' does not stand out as a new series. The humor doesn't feel original. It consists of and gags we've all seen before in other classic comedies like 'Friends' and 'That '70s Show.' If NBC keeps producing episodes like this, 'Whitney' may soon be cancelled, just like the NBC show 'Love Bites,' which only ran for eight episodes.
There is a possibility that 'Whitney' can turn around and prove the viewers wrong. Many shows on television now, like 'Happy Endings' and 'Parks and Recreation,' started with a rocky season but eventually improved. However, it is doubtful that 'Whitney' will join these ranks.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"NBC's new sitcom, 'Whitney' just a placeholder show." UWIRE Text, 23 Feb. 2016, p. 1. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A444172239/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=a47b5e9d. Accessed 22 Apr. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A444172239
Feeling 'too skinny,' Whitney Cummings gains 25 pounds
UPI NewsTrack. (July 28, 2015):
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2015 United Press International
http://www.upi.com/
Full Text:
Byline: TOMAS MONZON
NEW YORK, July 28 (UPI) -- On Monday, Actress and comedienne Whitney Cummings spoke about her recent 25-pound weight gain when she visited NBC's Today show.
Cummings, 32, said she felt too skinny before gaining 25 pounds, saying being on television confused her and made her look like she was passing away.
On the show, she wore a black jumpsuit that showed off her figure.
The actress also cleared up questions about her fuller face, linking it to the weight gain. She added that she has been using an LED machine called NuFace to lift and tighten the skin on her face.
She joked with Today hosts Hoda Kotb and Kathie Lee Gifford about having purchased her new face on eBay, and added weight gain is something no one likes to do anymore.
Cummings also said that much advice to girls in present times is that of losing weight, adding that a woman must pick between her butt or her face, and saying she picked her face.
Cummings is currently on a comedy tour and slated to do an HBO special in August.
By TOMAS MONZON
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Feeling 'too skinny,' Whitney Cummings gains 25 pounds." UPI NewsTrack, 28 July 2015. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A423402161/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=2d70910e. Accessed 22 Apr. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A423402161
Why Whitney Cummings' Dick Jokes Are Important
The Daily Beast. (June 25, 2014):
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2014 The Daily Beast Company LLC
http://www.thedailybeast.com
Full Text:
In her new Comedy Central special, 'I Love You,' the comedian may deliver her most controversial message yet: It's OK for women to act like women.
Whitney Cummings wants to set the record straight on a rumor that's followed her--followed all of us, really--around for the past few years.
"There was this rumor going on for a while that men like strong women," the comedian tells me. "Remember that?" she asks, her voice soaked with sarcasm. "No, men like Asian porn where women are cheerleaders with ball gags in the mouths. They don't like women with opinions."
Cummings is a bit of a special authority on the matter. She is a woman with strong, provocative, and deceptively intuitive opinions. And she has, in the past few years, been given a rare platform from which to deliver them--one with more reach than a comedian's typical standup microphone, but from which she became keenly aware of our reluctance to hear them.
She created, wrote, and produced the lightning-rod NBC sitcom Whitney, which was canceled after 38 episodes and countless critical debates last year. She's still involved with the CBS hit 2 Broke Girls, the hit CBS comedy she co-created with Michael Patrick King, and often appears as a panelist on Chelsea Lately, a show which, along with her blistering takedowns at the Comedy Central roasts, served as the most significant early boost to Cummings' career.
On Saturday, Cummings will premiere a new stand-up special for Comedy Central, titled I Love You. Deeply personal, blush-inducingly ribald, and, at times, almost uncomfortably frank, I Love You trumpets what might be Cummings' most controversial opinion yet: It's time that women stop being afraid to be women.
"We're in this weird time where feminism worked really well," Cummings tells me. "My girlfriends are super strong and have their shit together. They have awesome jobs and have houses. But they feel, and I feel, that they can't act the way that a 'stereotypical woman' would, in ways that guys wouldn't like."
There's the notion, Cummings says, that, "'I can't be emotional. I can't be weak. I can't cry. I can't be vulnerable. I can't ask for help, because I don't want to let down my gender.' There's a lot of shame around those kinds of things. So the stuff that I'm doing is to say that it's OK to be sensitive. It's OK to ask for help. It's OK to cook a meal for your man--you're not unraveling feminism."
It just so happens that she's impersonating a flaccid male penis on a stand-up stage for a special that's being broadcast on national television while doing it.
There's much to be appreciated in the media landscape today when it comes to reforming the portrayal of women, away from unattainable ideals and tired stereotypes in order to reflect back a healthier reality. As such, Cummings could certainly be counted as a soldier in the movement among female comedians and creatives to end the pop-culture mandate that women should strive to "have it all," but instead take special pride in celebrating themselves as is, warts and all.
The likes of Lena Dunham, Mindy Kaling, and Tina Fey deservedly soak up a lot of the credit on that mission, for creating female character who embrace bodily imperfections, normal neuroses, personality flaws, and other, less lofty things, like an affinity for junk food. Cummings, however, has proven far more controversial and arguably less palatable than her contemporaries. Perhaps it's because she's decided, as important as a guilt-free Cheetos binge is, to talk about the more uncomfortable things. The sex stuff.
We're all still so uncomfortable with the sex stuff. And we may even be uncomfortable with those who aren't.
In fact, right before Cummings rang me last week for our interview, the open-space newsroom I work in--usually the volume of a dull roar--quieted to eerie silence, which is not exactly the environment I was hoping for to conduct an interview about a comedy special in which Cummings mimics a variety of orgasms, imitates the aforementioned penis, and discusses sex and relationships with a bluntness I wouldn't typically (or ever) be comfortable with my coworkers overhearing.
"What is your family? Did you grow up Catholic or something?" Cummings asks when I inform her in a hushed whisper how nervous I was to discuss these things when the office was so quiet. She obviously nailed it--I grew up in a very Irish Catholic family. "There you go," she says. "So you have shame around this kind of stuff."
As it happens, Cummings had a similar upbringing, first attending Episcopal, and then Catholic school. "There was so much repression around me," she says. "There was so much transgression but everyone was repressing it all and pretending it wasn't happening. There was lot of promiscuity in my family, but everyone was pretending that they were pious and perfect. I felt like I was getting lied to so much."
Any reasonably self-aware comedian can probably pinpoint the experiences in their lives that led them to that career path. Count Cummings among them. "I got so exasperated by shame and guilt when you're doing perfectly normal things that we all do, but are lied to about, that I started doing it for a living," she says. "The truth is actually where I feel safe. Talking about sex, or the stuff we all do but are taught to feel ashamed of, is where I get the most oxygen."
Because Cummings is an open book when it comes to talking about sex, and because she talks about it a lot, her comedy perspective is frequently reduced to "the girl who tells sex and dick jokes." It's a woefully superficial reduction of what Cummings is doing. Yes, she tells sex and dick jokes. But as she told New York magazine in 2012, "I just want them to have a bigger impact. I want those pussy jokes to mean something."
Two years later, she's still on that crusade, and her comedy is still being misunderstood. Even after I Love You, that might still be the case.
"A lot of these bits might seem like dick jokes or vagina jokes, because they have that in it, but that's not what I'm really saying," she says. "Like orgasms. I do a big section in the show about orgasms and how hard it is for a woman to have them, which I think a lot of women have shame about. So I do a thing where I show what an orgasm really looks like. Someone might boil that down to, 'Oh that's a vagina joke, or a sex joke.' But that's not what it's about. It's about standing up for yourself, having power, and being honest."
It's not just matters of the bedroom that Cummings feels she needs to be a bit of an ambassador for women on. She's also combating through comedy what she's calls "the new c-word" that's being used nonsensically and unfairly against women: "crazy."
In I Love You, she jokes that for guys to be called crazy, they "gotta be naked in an alley jerking off on a dead pigeon singing Bible hymns." But for girls to be called crazy, "we just gotta send you two text messages in a row."
It's all part of a double standard that, she thinks, sadly lingers when it comes to the way society has permitted women to be treated. It's shaming them into acting a certain way. It's calling them "the c-word" when they're just acting rationally. (Seriously, if a strange girl is texting you at midnight, how is your girlfriend crazy for asking who it is?)
She's experienced the double standard personally. "When I was doing press for Whitney, critics were commenting on my appearance, saying I was shrill, saying I was needy," she says. "Stuff they would never say about guys in a review."
Cummings' experience with Whitney was an interesting one. It premiered on a fall TV slate that was overly primed for think pieces and dissection. Three new series--Whitney, 2 Broke Girls, and New Girl--premiered at the same time, championing young, independent women. That same season, a crop of sitcoms debuted--Last Man Standing, How to Be a Gentleman, and Man Up--each signifying the emasculation of men.
It was embarrassingly easy to cheer the trio of female-centric sitcoms, not just for their collective message but because the male-focused alternatives were so terrible. But of the three go-girl comedies, Whitney was creatively the weakest one when it debuted, and therefore--and perhaps a bit unfairly--it got a brutal lashing from critics. But as Cummings points out, much of that criticism had little to do with the actual comedy of the series, in which she played a commitment-phobic woman in a serious relationship.
This is when Cummings realized that it was time to debunk that "people like strong women" rumor.
"I think most actresses, especially at the time I was doing Whitney, were more vulnerable or feminine, and then I kind of came on yelling, and with a lot of opinions," she says. "I think what a lot of people missed on the show, which I think was compelling and hopefully will be appreciated at some point, is the role reversal. I thought it was interesting that the guy on the show had more of the traditionally female qualities and I had more of the male qualities. I thought it would be interesting and subversive. Like, 'Let's talk about gender roles!' And people were like, 'Why is she yelling?'"
Sometimes, though, it takes a strong woman with strong opinions and a strong voice--she may even need to yell--to change people's minds.
"I don't set out every day to start a revolution," she says. "I think, for me, if I was to have a goal, it would be to take a little bit of the shame away from being human."
by Kevin Fallon
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Why Whitney Cummings' Dick Jokes Are Important." Daily Beast, 25 June 2014. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A429331445/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=15ed9577. Accessed 22 Apr. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A429331445
WHITNEY CUMMINGS SUFFERED MELTDOWN OVER TV SHOW
World Entertainment News Network. (July 18, 2013):
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2013 COMTEX News Network, Inc.
http://www.comtexnews.com
Full Text:
Jul 18, 2013 (WENN via COMTEX) -- Comedienne WHITNEY CUMMINGS suffered a meltdown while working on her now-defunct TV sitcom after a wave of negative criticism left her grappling with self-esteem issues.
The stand-up struggled to deal with the pressure of starring in her own show Whitney, which she created and co-wrote for two seasons before it was axed in May (13), and she admits she should have undergone therapy to deal with her issues.
She tells U.S. radio host Howard Stern, "I think that my self-esteem took a big hit doing a television show. Starring in a TV show, you really begin to hone in on your flaws and begin to see them where they don't exist...
"I wish I had known that therapy is very important when doing a show and (it's important to) look at the monitor. I kinda had a 'manic break'. I am basically a filthy comic from the club and then I went to being judged like an actress or model would be. That was really hard."
Breaking down in tears, Cummings also told the shock jock she was devastated when her fellow comedians turned nasty after she landed her own TV series: "I'm gonna get emotional. It was crazy because there was such a negative backlash that felt really personal. I think that as someone who didn't really have a family unit growing up, comics were like my family. As soon as I got the show, I felt like everyone was against me." (PAW&LR/HWSTRN/ZN)
(c) 2013 WORLD ENTERTAINMENT NEWS NETWORK. All global rights reserved.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"WHITNEY CUMMINGS SUFFERED MELTDOWN OVER TV SHOW." World Entertainment News Network, 18 July 2013. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A337156446/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=9119d970. Accessed 22 Apr. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A337156446
Whitney Cummings drops out of comedy night
UWIRE Text. (Apr. 18, 2013): p1.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2013 Uloop Inc.
http://uwire.com/?s=UWIRE+Text&x=26&y=14&=Go
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Byline: Will Drabold
By
Will Drabold
Update 5:26 p.m.:
Possibly hoping to not lose any fans at one of the top party schools in the country, Whitney Cummings has tweeted an apology to Ohio University.
"Ohio University, I'm so sorry I had to drop out of the show tonight," Cummings said on her Twitter account. "I got very sick and you don't deserve to catch my diseases. So bummed."
The show will go on with Jim Gaffigan, Kenan Thompson and no replacement for Cummings.
Doors open at 6:30 p.m. and the show starts at 7:30 p.m.
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Update 4:31 p.m.:
Whitney Cummings will not be paid the $42,000 she was set to receive for performing at the Convo tonight, according to Andrew Holzaepfel, associate director of the Campus Invovlement Center.
After losing the show's opening act, the CIC decided to stick with Jim Gaffigan and Kenan Thompson instead of trying to bring in a last-second opener, Holzaepfel said.
"I don't anticipate people not being in a fuss about her not showing up and demanding their $5 back," said Zach George, president of OU Student Senate.
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Whitney Cummings, a well known stand-up comedian with a sitcom on NBC, will not be appearing at Ohio University tonight.
Cummings dropped out of tonight's show in the last hour "due to illness," said Andrew Holzaepfel, associate director of the Campus Invovlement Center.
Holzaepfel said the show is still on-time for tonight, set to start at 7:30 p.m. Doors open at 6:30 p.m.
"$5 for Gaffigan and Kenan - absolutely," Holzaepfel said about losing his opening act.
Holzaepfel said the line-up may be adjusted to add a last second replacement but did not elaborate on whether or not that will occur.
Cummings was set to be paid $42,000 for her appearance.
Follow The Post for updates.
To read our preview of the event, click here.
dd195710@ohiou.edu
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Whitney Cummings drops out of comedy night." UWIRE Text, 18 Apr. 2013, p. 1. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A336970427/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=697f855f. Accessed 22 Apr. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A336970427
For Whitney Cummings, Good and Bad Ratings News
Adam Kepler
ArtsBeat: The Culture at Large.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2013 The New York Times Company
http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/
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Byline: ADAM KEPLER
With three shows in two years, the comedian faces a mixed ratings bag.
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http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/02/15/for-whitney-cummings-good-and-bad-ratings-news/
By ADAM KEPLER
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Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Kepler, Adam. "For Whitney Cummings, Good and Bad Ratings News." ArtsBeat: The Culture at Large, 15 Feb. 2013. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A318979595/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=14d77e30. Accessed 22 Apr. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A318979595
Whitney Cummings lands E! talk show
CNN Wire. (Apr. 30, 2012):
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2012 CNN Newsource Sales, Inc.
http://news.blogs.cnn.com/tag/the-cnn-wire/
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Byline: Tomika Anderson, Special to CNN
(CNN) -- Make room on the couch for another new talk show host!
E! has announced plans to roll out a weekly gab-fest entitled "Love You, Mean It with Whitney Cummings."
The comedian's latest vehicle, on the heels of her tepidly-received NBC sitcom, "Whitney," will be "a weekly medley of witty commentary featuring Whitney's take on everything from the biggest pop culture and celebrity happenings, to life, relationships, sex, and more," the network says in a statement.
Cummings will host the show with just a "microphone and her laptop," but will also be "joined by celebrity guests and comedian friends."
"Love You, Mean It with Whitney Cummings" will air Wednesday nights in conjunction with Joel McHale's "The Soup" later this year, and Cummings will executive produce the project with fellow funny woman Chelsea Handler.
"I'm really excited to be able to say (almost) whatever I'd like on TV again," Cummings said of the announcement. "So thanks, E!" Looking forward to it!"
But the comedian/actress isn't the only one thanking the network - so are Mary J. Blige, Kevin Jonas of the Jonas Brothers and Nigel Lythgoe.
Jonas and his fairly new bride, Danielle, are set to invite fans on an intimate journey with them into their New Jersey home after two years of marriage, just as the Jonas Brothers prepare to head back into the studio to record their latest album. "Married to Jonas" kicks off in August.
But before that, R&B star Mary J. Blige takes the plunge into reality TV for "Opening Act." She'll join producer Antonina Armato from Rock Mafia and famed TV producer Nigel Lythgoe in a search for untapped talent via the Web.
They'll then invite amateurs in to audition for a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to open up for a musical superstar, while exploring their lives behind-the-scenes.
That show debuts in July.
Tomika Anderson, Special to CNN
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Whitney Cummings lands E! talk show." CNN Wire, 30 Apr. 2012. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A288187361/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=7d5889a1. Accessed 22 Apr. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A288187361
Book Review: “I’m Fine… and Other Lies” by Whitney Cummings
Posted on November 6, 2017 by paulafreedman Posted in Emotions, Fear, Health, mental health, Self-Awareness, Therapy, Uncategorized, WellbeingTagged acceptance, authenticity, awareness, control, mental health, reading, vulnerability, women's issues
Reading tends to be very “all or nothing” for me—I’m either totally consumed, turning pages for hours on end and ignoring the world around me and internal cues for food or sleep until I’m done, or I’m noncommittal, absent-mindedly skimming paragraphs until I inevitably abandon it to collect dust on my nightstand with all of the other “I’ve been meaning to finish that!” novels. To me, the sign of a good book is not “I can’t put it down until I KNOW what happens!” and it’s not “I’ll finish it eventually, if I have the time.” It’s that healthy middle ground, much like romantic relationships. Neither codependence (“I can’t live without you!”) nor too much independence (“I’m not even interested in connecting with you”) is consistently satisfying.
Perhaps you’ll find it ironic that I was able to enjoy a book about codependency while (for once) maintaining my healthy dependence and independence needs. As a story, it contained just enough psych-y content to appeal to my inner nerd, and just enough comedy to appeal to my inner self-care coach. It was engaging, satisfying, but not so consuming that I lost all ability to stay connected to my own priorities and identity. As far as book-relationships go, “I’m Fine” quickly became a lasting, rewarding love. So I wanted to share the love, by writing my first-ever book review. Here goes!
In case you’re not familiar with her work, Whitney Cummings writes, produces, and does stand-up comedy. I’ve been a big fan of hers for several years. What’s always endeared her to me is her tendency to “plug” therapy (thanks for the free marketing, girl!) and to use humor as a way of coping with the dysfunctions of the human condition.
A lot of memoir-type books I’ve read have bugged me (and ended up as ex-lovers in the dusty nightstand pile) because the author tries too hard to sound self-actualized, taking on an annoying “wannabe-wise” tone in an effort to artfully conclude the general storyline of “I used to be naïve in how I handled life, and then I overcame some challenges.” Whitney writes like she’s in her 30s, and she is in her 30s. She’s not pretending like she’s 80 years old and has it all figured out, nor is she dwelling in adolescent insecurities. She takes semi-frequent breaks from her “I used to be so clueless” shtick to actually give herself credit for the growth and insights she has worked to gain, but she doesn’t succumb to the urge to tie it up neatly with a happily-ever-after type ending.
Whitney (I can’t bring myself to get formal and call her Ms. Cummings, sorry) demonstrates what happens when someone moves from being a blind, passive recipient of life experiences to being a self-aware, active shaper of her own reality through intentional choices. As a psychologist, I am grateful for her honest account of her experiences with several types of therapies. She also admits several times that she often rejected an idea or treatment approach (especially in her adolescence and early 20’s) because she wasn’t yet ready to have her defenses challenged. THANK YOU FOR OWNING THIS! I get so irritated when people say, “I tried therapy, but it didn’t work for me.” People, it works if you work it! So if someone’s in denial, nothing’s gonna change. Psychologists aren’t psychics or magicians. Though Whitney has apparently tried her hand at consulting psychics and magicians, too, which made for some fascinating early chapters. Anyway, I digress.
I also enjoyed her evaluations of what worked and didn’t work for her in the process of healing from various hurts. After all, mental health treatment is not one-size-fits-all. There are so many theoretical models and approaches out there. Vera, the therapist with whom she ended up finally forming a meaningful therapeutic relationship, sounded like a total badass; she was clinically well-versed, and fluent in Whitney’s language, helping her recognize the “addictive” patterns of her codependency and eating disorders.
Self-acceptance is a major theme in “I’m Fine.” Whitney’s exploration of how she developed and then healed from an eating disorder will hopefully shed light on an often-misunderstood constellation of symptoms, and the unhelpful thinking and mixed messages that are so easily internalized. Her honesty about struggles with “ED” is beyond refreshing. The media masterfully perpetuates an absurd mixed message, glorifying the woman who acts so totally chill and just LOOOVES eating carbs, and yet is constantly pulling up the waistband of her roomy size zero jeans, equating slimness with chillness and worthiness. I have lots to say about this ridiculousness, but I will have to save my rant for another time to stay on topic.
My point is, Whitney doesn’t fall for the BS of mixed messages and she actually talks about the monster life-sucker that is the “quest for physical perfection.” She calls herself out for sometimes buying into a disempowering cultural norm, and gives us all a reality check in the process. Her overall message is that it’s not only allowed, but truly vital for us all to meet our own basic human needs for food, water, love, and self-respect.
Speaking of basic human needs, Whitney also gives a shout-out to “inner-child work,” which is an element of therapy that can be so powerful in developing self-esteem. Basically, the premise is that humans actually age like trees. Remember how they taught us in school about how to tell how old a tree is? When you cut the trunk horizontally, you can see all of the “rings” in its cross-section. Each ring grows around the one within it as the tree ages. We’re like trees; every age contains every previous age within it. If we go down really deep, we’re all housing an inner five-year-old. When there’s a control-type issue (addiction, eating, OCD, perfectionism), it can often be traced to unmet childhood needs, so the inner child is still scrambling to get “adult you’s” attention.
In Whitney’s case, she learned to deny her needs from a young age, so as an adult she only felt in control if she was denying her needs. She learned that this was the only way to be worthy of love and belonging. For example, food is a basic need. Believing it is “bad” or “wrong” to eat is not only self-destructive, it’s downright mean. When she learned to “re-parent” her inner five-year-old, she was able to live more wholly and let go of old insecurities. That’s why I love this framework: most people can get on board with the fact that it’s pretty atrocious to act like an asshole towards a five-year-old. When you start to see that’s what you’ve been doing by self-punishing (forcing yourself to exercise, cursing yourself for eating the extra slice of pizza, forcing yourself to stay at the office till 11pm instead of getting much-needed sleep) you’re more inclined to soften up. A five-year-old doesn’t care about her weight; she just wants to enjoy life. She doesn’t care about your promotion at work; she just wants you to come home and play with her. We can all benefit from the reminder that we’ve each got a little kid living inside of us, just looking for love and acceptance, so we don’t need to be so damn hard on ourselves or each other.
One area left me wanting more: I still have so many questions about the specifics of her childhood. If she had chosen to share more details about what went down in her early childhood, it could have given the reader a richer picture of how her core beliefs were shaped. However, at the end of the day, my insatiable curiosity about the human condition aside, she certainly exposed insecurities and fears that most of us lack the courage to reveal, so I can’t blame her for choosing to gloss over some details. She gave us enough info to connect the dots, and I respect her decision to not be a completely open book. Yeah, pun intended, I couldn’t resist 🙂
I often struggle as a relatively young psychologist with “imposter syndrome,” fantasizing about the day when I’ll feel like an “expert.” Stories like Whitney’s remind me that I actually hope the opposite is true. I hope I never wake up one day thinking I know exactly how to handle things. That would feel robotic. I’m human and therefore I’m a messy work in progress. I struggle to practice what I preach. I get whispers from the demons in my head. I get caught up thinking I need to be “fine,” and thinking it’s my job to make other people “fine” as well, which it’s obviously not. Insecurity and self-doubt are all just part of the deal, and that’s okay.
“I’m Fine” is a hilarious and raw reminder that life gets ten billion times more rewarding when you stop pretending to be fine. I hope this book will serve as an example of the awesomeness that can come from authenticity, owning your shit, and opening up about mental health struggles. If you read it and want to share your reactions, please feel free to do so in the comments below! Oh, and if this book made you realize you’re not “fine” or it inspired you to seek therapy, I’m here for that, too.
Book Review: I’m fine…and other lies by Whitney Cummings
Public Service Announcement: DO NOT sit down with a beverage and attempt to read this book, especially a hot beverage, you WILL end up with aforementioned beverage spit sprayed all over you when you burst out laughing. I may or may not know this from personal experience.
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I really enjoyed this book, it’s the kind of witty, self-deprecating humour I can really get behind. I will be honest and admit that I didn’t know who Whitney Cummings was prior to hearing her on the Joe Rogan Experience, but after reading this excruciatingly honest, and hilarious memoir I will be checking out her stand ups.
The dedication gives you an insight into what you’re in for: “For all the voices in my head who told me I could never write a book, this book is for you”.
Cummings has run the gamut of awful experiences in her life and I loved that she said the book contains “mortifying situations that’ll make you feel way better about your own choices”, now this might be make me a terrible human, but it honestly did, it’s comforting to know that I’m not the only f*ck up around. The book leads readers through ten chapters, each detailing yet another bold admittance, through a series of interesting, but ultimately ineffective line of therapists, psychics, doctors and other self-help “professionals”, including one surgeon affectionately referred to as Dr Smegma. Cummings also writes of her crippling co-dependency, which sees her making a lot of questionable life decisions, including almost dying when snowboarding to impress a guy to almost ending up in a Guatemalan prison to impress another.
Cummings then goes on to detail her experiences and thoughts about sexism, her extremely personal egg freezing journey, a scoliosis diagnosis, love addiction and her long standing eating disorder.
It was after this chapter that I really started to feel bad about whinging about my own struggles, which pale in comparison to hers. But it’s not over yet, Cummings then goes on to detail her experiences with boobs (or lack thereof) and her decision to undergo corrective surgery, her crippling headaches, having her ear ripped off by her pet pit-bull and finally her enlightening experience of doing stand up in the Middle East.
While these topics and her stories vary from heartbreaking to horrifying (especially the picture of her ear – post pit-bull attack), the skillful way Cummings is able to inject her brand of humour, sincere humility and common humanity into the stories is admirable and she is in a much better place now and is optimistic about her future while still admitting she’s a work in progress (aren’t we all!).
I’M FINE…AND OTHER LIES
Posted by Jess on February 27, 2018
Short, simple review…
I recently purchased a book on Audible, I’m Fine…And Other Lies by Whitney Cummings. Whitney, an actress and comedian, shares her experience with codependency by offering pretty hilarious, ridiculous, entertaining, and at times, sad, stories. She includes a bit about her dating history, growing up, her expereince with addiction, and rewiring her brain from codependent thinking, patterns, and behavior.
Personally, I appreciated how funny and vulnerable this book was. There were times when she cried as she recounted times in her past. This made the book much more endearing to me as I appreciate anyone who shows authentic emotions/responses. It also made me consider a how insidieious codependent TPB (thinking, patterns, and behaviors).
She offered insight on the subconscious, red flags to pay attention to in relationships, how to honor and respect yourself, how taking responsiblity for others’ feelings and anticipating their needs are major signs of CODEPENDENCY.
The part that I enjoyed and have participated in with friends is the part where she asks the reader to consider four things. Play along…
Thinking of your favorite animal. It can be ANYTHING so be original (i.e. honey badger, whale, swan, etc.). Now think of THREE ADJECTIVES to describe this animal. Jot it down. Got it? Cool. Moving on…
Now, think of your favorite article of clothing. Again, it can be anything (i.e. beanie, boot, hoodie, etc.). Now think of THREE ADJECTIVES to describe this article of clothing.
Think of your favorite body of water (i.e. a glass of water, a tub filled with water, a swimming pool, an ocean, a stream, etc.). Now think of THREE ADJECTIVES to describe this body of water.
Lastly, imagine yourself in a white room, no windows, or doors. Think of THREE ADJECTIVES that describe this white room or how you feel…
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Ok, the first represents how you see yourself.
The second represents how others see you.
The third represents how you view sex.
And the last represents how you view death.
So…how did you do?
Even if you didn’t do, that’s totally fine.