Jo Koy justifies his sexist Globes jokes: I praise and shine light on women

Sadly, one of the biggest stories of the week was about Jo Koy completely bombing as host of the Golden Globes. Koy was apparently hired to host the show ten days beforehand, whereas most awards-show hosts get months to prepare. The Globes did give him a budget to hire writers though – he apparently worked with three writers for eight days to create that completely gross, sexist and offensive opening monologue. We know all of this because the LA Times interviewed Koy after he bombed, and it’s all just… in poor taste. I get that he’s been in comedy for decades and maybe his stand-up is good, but his excuses for those terrible jokes fall flat. It might be better for him to say “yeah, I really f–ked that up, I hope my career recovers and please let me apologize for all of those sh-tty jokes.” Instead, we’re getting something else. Some highlights from this LA Times piece:

Lack of preparation: “We were still writing up until they said we’re live. Absolute cold reads, never got a chance to work out anything. And this is not an excuse, I’m just trying to paint the picture because I don’t think people understand, in any situation, how is that geared towards winning? If you were to write that situation down on a piece of paper and go, ‘Do you want to do this?’ I guarantee everyone would be like ‘No.’ I’m happy I did it because I did accept that challenge.”

The grade he would give himself for his Globes performance: “I think I did well given the circumstances. I don’t want to give myself a rating because that’s subjective, you can give me whatever rating you want. I’m gonna give myself an A-plus just based on the courage [to do it]. I’m going to hit it over the head a million times, whoever you can think of in your head that could have done it, I’m telling you right now they said no and I didn’t. I looked at it in a different light. The history of the show is 81 years. That’s 81 hosts and some repeated. I’m the first Asian to ever solo host. It’s 2024, I’m the first out of 81 years. Sandra Oh was the first co-host, but I was the first solo host. Imagine if someone said yes before me, we’d still be at the 82nd Golden Globes and still no Asian as a solo host, so if I didn’t say yes, there still would never have been.

How he threw his writers under the bus mid-monologue: “I love my writers. I love all three of them and I shouted them out. And I told them like that was a moment right there where I’m just grasping. I love them and I can’t stop talking about them in every interview. They busted their ass, man. There’s a lot of greats that make rookie moves. That was a rookie move. Those writers are dope and that was not my intention at all. They were amazing, they had my back and I need to make sure I fix that and I will, I always will.”

The Taylor Swift joke: “I didn’t understand the Taylor [Swift] tiff. Mind you, that one was just getting rewritten 50 million times, never ran it through, all the way up until we had to walk out. It’s just weird, where do you place it, and and we kept hammering it and cutting it down. But the whole intention of that joke was to make fun of the NFL. It’s like, the cool thing about the [Golden] Globes is we don’t need to do cutaways for ratings. What hurts the most is me just supporting Taylor, I support her, I love her work. I got nieces that I bought tickets for. There’s no ill intent in that joke. The joke is about the NFL and how they keep using cutaways to [her]. And it’s an obvious reason why. I’m not saying anything that no one’s saying,and it’s obvious what that joke was. It’s about the NFL. It’s like out of everything that has happened this is the one you choose to go after. I didn’t understand why because it was fun when I walked out. Robert De Niro was dying, like, and I’m looking at him and his wife was smacking his back and smiling and laughing and he was laughing. And when I did the whole thing about him being 80 he loved it. And that was fun. I was like, man, this guy’s so much fun. And then I did that [Swift] joke and I’m like, what just happened?

The Barbie joke about “boobies”: “Then just the reaction to the Barbie joke. The things that are being said, it’s just like, man, I don’t think you understand who I am as a person, you know what I mean? Because if you’ve ever seen me, you’ll see just how much I praise and shine light on women, from my ex-wife to my mom. My whole goal is to try and change that type of narrative and just that look of being part of a divorced family. I’m telling a joke — what happened to society where we can’t even joke with each other anymore. I bought the movie. I supported the movie. Yes, that’s the story that that doll needed. And I’m glad because now there’s people that look like my mom that can support that.”

[From The LA Times]

When you get to the point where you’re saying “what happened to society where we can’t even joke with each other anymore,” it’s over. Just pack it up. Just apologize and say “I f–ked up, my bad.” He’s still twisting himself in knots trying to justify a screw up. Let me be clear, I actually agree the producers did him dirty by hiring him so last-minute, just as I’m sure his writers did him dirty too. But he’s the face of it, and he either wrote or agreed to all of those lines. The sh-t about “a plastic doll with big boobies”? The jokes about Prince Harry and Meghan? “Because if you’ve ever seen me, you’ll see just how much I praise and shine light on women, from my ex-wife to my mom.” Sure, that’s why you made cheap, sexist jokes??

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.

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