Elayne Boosler's Monumental "Party of One"
By Michael Jones | May 15, 2021
Stand-up comic Elayne Boosler was talking to the legend Phyllis Diller and asked Diller how she kept going in show business, an industry steeped in sexism and putting women down. Diller’s response?
“Every morning I take two tablespoons full of shit, so that I never forget the taste.”
What an icon. Equally an icon? Elayne Boosler, who—let’s just say it—is among the best stand-up comics in American history. And as this year marks the 35th anniversary of her cable television special Party of One, it’s well worth a minute to note not only how hysterical this special still is, but also how historically important it is, too.
Elayne Boosler introduces Party of One on her 2016 box set, Timeless, which includes four of her comedy specials. She says: “Do you know why I can release a box set of four great specials of mine? Because I own them.”
And therein lies the history, tenacity, determination, and genius of Boosler, who had to birth Party of One and fight like hell to get it aired on television, then see it break new ground for female comedians.
“There were so few women in comedy… every guy working in the business was on their second special already. No woman had a special,” Boosler says. “I ended up producing my own shows with my teenie-weenie life savings.”
Party of One was her first show, filmed in 1985. And given that by the mid-80s Boosler was a household name in comedy, she thought Party of One would sell immediately.
It did not. Television executives were afraid of it. They thought it was “subversive” and “controversial.” Boosler had been touring the country for over a decade and watching male peers—Freddie Prinze, Richard Lewis, Eddie Murphy and Robin Williams among them—get multiple television specials. Yet executives at HBO, ABC, and countless other networks couldn’t handle a woman in the 1980s talking about dating, Playboy Magazine, and birth control.
Finally, a year passes and new executives arrive at Showtime and take a chance on it. In October 1986, it aired and became the first ever stand-up special by a woman comic in cable television history.
And it was so critically successful (not to mention laugh out loud hilarious) that it not only cemented Boosler as one of America’s leading comics, it rattles the heads of television execs around show business who all of a sudden realize that women stand-ups can indeed be funny and draw in audiences.
Party of One, Showtime
Within a year, HBO (who Boosler says turned her down multiple times for Party of One) created their own weekly stand-up hour for women comics, Women of the Night. For years comics like Ellen DeGeneres, Paula Poundstone, Rita Rudner and countless others were featured. (And to hear Boosler say it, how great it was to have this launching pad for women comics, and also how ridiculous it was to still name it after hookers.)
But undoubtedly Boosler’s Party of One is one of the most important comedy specials of the 20th century. Opened doors? Check. Showed how a true creative can fight for their art? Double check.
It still holds up, too. Like Boosler’s joke about being single and eating alone:
Everybody lives by themselves and they make bigger and bigger sizes of food. Does that make sense? Nobody thinks of us. The only company that thinks of us: Campbell’s Soup For One… they tried but they really rub it in. You pick it up and it says: “Directions. Heat it up. Don’t heat it up. Who gives a shit, you’re alone!”
Her joke about diaphragms:
Who invented diaphragms? Some scientist got stoned and said, “Let’s shrink a frisbee and give it to her.” You know if you wear one to the beach and get stranded, you can just sail back to your own blanket.
Or her joke about men spending the night at her apartment, only to have them expect breakfast in the morning:
They wake up and they want breakfast, and they don’t eat candy in the morning like we do. They want things like toast. I don’t have these recipes!
At the moment, you can stream Party of One on Amazon (or even better, buy an autographed DVD box set of Boosler’s comedy specials), and it’s well worth 64 minutes of your time. There’s even some terrific life advice piped in at the end from Boosler’s one-time collaborator and boyfriend (and the person who she says helped introduce her to stand-up), Andy Kaufman, that’ll leave you feeling a bit reflective and spiritual about how to move forward in this game of life.
(In the first four minutes of Party of One there is a brief appearance by Bill Cosby that’s easily fast-forwardable and isn’t part of the stand-up anyway, for those uninterested in bringing Bill Cosby back into their lives.)
And for more on Boosler, mosey on over to this NY Times piece from 2018, “The Comedy Master Who Hasn’t Gotten Her Due: Elayne Boosler,” or dive into over 90 minutes of her appearances on David Letterman that truly show her chops with an audience.
An unabashed 80s & 90s pop culture junkie, Michael Jones is a Brooklyn-based writer and co-host of the Pop Trash Podcast.