In 2008, he got his own show on Comedy Central, Root of All Evil. While he takes a back seat to the episodes' guest comics, he still inserts his trademark angry rants. A number of his acts include bits of Self-Deprecation, about himself and his fellow Jewish people, sometimes edging on J Word Privileges.
And of course, Lewis Black is king of the Cluster F-Bomb, using, in his own words, the word "fuck" like a comma.
Associated tropes:
- AcCENT upon the Wrong SylLABle: One of his criticisms with the 2000 Al Gore, who said he emphasized the wrong words, like THE! and AND! and BUT!
- Alternative Character Interpretation: Invoked; in Stark Raving Black, Lewis mentioned how his father's always smiling, so he surmised he must be at peace with himself. But one of his friends once observed that Lewis's dad always looks like he's having perverted thoughts. It changed Lewis's outlook on his dad.
- Angrish: Will often lapse into this as part of his act.
- Animal Chick Magnet: As described in Nothing's Sacred, Lew tried to invoke this in college, when he adopted a cocker-terrier puppy named John-John.
- Artistic License – Economics: Discussed in one stand-up bit, where he even said he took economics in college, but couldn't explain it because he failed that course...Lewis: It wasn't really my fault; they taught it at Eight O'clock in the morning. And there is absolutely nothing that you can learn out of one bloodshot eye. After I flunked the first two tests, I grabbed the professor by the throat and said, "LISTEN, YOU PRICK! WHY ARE YOU TEACHING THIS SHIT AT THIS UNGODLY HOUR?! ARE YOU TRYING TO KEEP THIS STUFF A SECRET?!"
- Artistic License – Paleontology: Invoked. Referenced in his Red, White & Screwed special:Lewis: There are people who believe that humans and dinosaurs co-existed, that they roamed the Earth at the same time. There are museums that children go to, in which they build dioramas to show them this. And what this is, purely and simply, is a clinical psychotic reaction. They are crazy. They are stone-cold-fuck nuts. I can't be kind about this, because these people are watching The Flintstones as if it were a documentary.
- Ask a Stupid Question...: The cold open to his Black on Broadway special features this:Man: How are you doing?
Lewis: How the fuck do you think I'm doing? - Ass Shove:
- In the third Comedy Central Presents special, when discussing the 2001 Super Bowl Half Time show with *NSYNC, Aerosmith, and Britney Spears:Lewis: I happened to have a spoon handy, and I shoved it up my ass. Why, you might ask: to distract myself from the pain. Because if I'm going to hurt that much, I'm going to do it to myself. And you know what we call that: empowerment.
- He also mentioned this in Black on Broadway when discussing how uncomfortable it is riding on an airplane for fourteen hours:Lewis: What they should do, I think, just take all the coach seats out of the planes, and give everybody a five-foot stick. That way, you can sit wherever you want. You just take it, shove it up your ass, spin around. When you get bored, then after twelve hours, you can just beat the shit out of each other.
- In a third joke about this, he says it's the only practical use for a dreidel.
- And then he does a fourth joke about this when he's talking about golfers.Lewis: Better yet, why don't you just take that ball and shove it up your ass? Then try to shoot it out your pee-pee hole. If we'd spent the last fifteen years doing that at least you'd have a SKILL today.
- In the third Comedy Central Presents special, when discussing the 2001 Super Bowl Half Time show with *NSYNC, Aerosmith, and Britney Spears:
- Beat: In the Red, White, and Screwed special, Lewis talked about the Old Testament, and how that book apparently wasn't good enough for Christians (who also have the New Testament). His sentence features a long beat, though in fairness largely due to the audience reaction:Lewis: But that book, wasn't good enough, for you Christians... [audience laughs/applauds] ..........Was it? [audience laughs again]
- Berserk Button: It's long since become his schtick, it occurs in every special, and some are more intense than others. A particularly memorable one was in Red, White & Screwed when he derided the people who claimed George W. Bush was "involved" in Hurricane Katrina.Lewis: YOU JUST CAN'T FUCKING SAY THAT! YOU CAN'T! YOU CAN'T! And it's just- and there HAS to come a point, where Republicans and Democrats, where we see a piece of footage and we just agree on what the fuck reality is! And the fact is- (audience applauds) You can't show footage of a Land Rover running over a cat and then say the cat was trying to kill itself. I'm gonna need at least three days to find the note that he left.
- Black Comedy: Frequently used in his specials. In Black on Broadway, he told anyone who was thinking of traveling to New Zealand in coach to kill themselves.
- Blatant Lies:
- In the Red, White, and Screwed special, he didn't believe the universe was created in seven days, claiming that the Jews (who wrote the Bible) are good at bullshit:Lewis: This was a wonderful story told to the people in the desert, to distract them from the fact that they didn't have air conditioning.
- In Black on Broadway, Lewis is annoyed that the smallpox vaccine eventually wore off over time:Lewis: I can't believe it wore off and they didn't tell us, because that means my whole life has been a delusion. Because every day, I'd wake up, and I'd go, "Well, it's gonna suck today, BUT AT LEAST I'M NOT GETTIN' smallpox!"
- In the Red, White, and Screwed special, he didn't believe the universe was created in seven days, claiming that the Jews (who wrote the Bible) are good at bullshit:
- Bowdlerize:
- One of his routines is about how frustrating it was that he wasn't allowed to swear when he did the White House Correspondents' Association Dinner.
- Also true of his performances at the Just for Laughs Festival in Montreal, which are broadcast on network TV in Canada.
- Brick Joke:
- At least the first half of his Madness Mantra, "If it wasn't for my horse, I wouldn't have spent that year at college" tends to pop up again later in his act at the end of a different, unrelated story.
- After ranting about the cold, he switches to explaining how the economy could be improved by a public works project. His suggestion: a wall across the entire border of Canada. "Because that's where the cold air comes from!"
- Broken Record: In Red, White & Screwed, he mentioned all the movers and shakers at the White House Correspondent's Dinner (where he did his act), which included "lobbyists, lobbyists, lobbyists, lobbyists, lobbyists, lobbyists..."
- Brown Note:
- "If it weren't for my horse, I wouldn't have spent that year in college." Thinking about that sentence for more than three minutes will cause your brain to violently shut down or blood to shoot out your nose.
- When discussing the Super Bowl Halftime Show 2001 (which featured *NSYNC, Aerosmith, and Britney Spears):Lewis: What they played was not music. What you heard was the sound of chaos. I know that sounds strange, but it's true. Because I could hear the sounds of pigs being slaughtered! And women were weeping, and men were gnashing their teeth! I heard sounds that were so horrible, if I were to repeat them to you, you would flee from this room in horror!
- Call-Back: In the second Comedy Central Presents special, Lewis said that 2000 was the worst New Year's ever, because everyone was convinced Y2K would destroy the world: "Don't go outside! We don't know what's gonna happen! We don't know! There could be giant ticks everywhere!" Later, in "Black on Broadway", he mentioned the "giant ticks" again in relation to Tom Ridge talking about the terror alert levels soon after 9/11.
- Character Development: Lewis claims this was the case with God.Lewis: Now, there is a big difference between the Old Testament and the New Testament, and that is the New Testament God is really kind of a great guy. He is, especially when we compare Him to the Old Testament God, who is a prick. I don't know what happened to God over time, how He matured, if He went to an anger-management class, or maybe just the birth of His son calmed Him down. But before He had the kid, HOLY SHIT, He was out of control!
- Cluster F-Bomb:
- "I don't know if you realize, but I use the word "Fuck," so that I can think of other stuff."
- [while at the Congressional Correspondents' Dinner in D.C., he says this went through his head while onstage] "Say FUCK! Say FUCK! [to the tune of Jingle Bells] Fuck fuck fuck! Fuck fuck fuck! Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck! Don't say fuck! He said fuck! You can say fuck too!"
- Almost any one of his shows is a series of Carpet F Bombings.
- If you ask him, it's environmental: "I'll tell ya, in New York City where I've lived far too long, 'fuck' isn't even a word, it's a comma."
- According to one of his routines, it kept him from being allowed to perform at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. because someone had bothered to count the usage of the word 'fuck' in his act and determined that forty-two was too many. So he performed at the Warner Theater instead, which "has an eighty 'fuck' limit."Lewis: Forty-two fucks is too many. I wonder what the line is. Forty would've been fine, and then 'Oh, no, he's gone crazy!'
- While performing at Carnegie Hall: "I'm only allowed to say 'fuck' twelve times." He ends up using the word and its variants around 75 times over two hours.
- Comical Overreacting: His act is him being in constant overreaction mode.
- Corpsing: Occasionally, he'll get amused at something he says and smirk. He never full-out cracks up, though. An example in Black on Broadway, when discussing when he was a kid:Lewis: I could get clean water and drink it... mmm! And then go back out and play. And those were great times. (smirks)
- Crappy Holidays: In his third Comedy Central Presents special, he had a whole section on how he's disgusted at the amount of time the Christmas season gets every year, starting as early as Halloween. Nevertheless, he wanted to celebrate it as a kid, because as a Jew, he got Hanukkah instead.Lewis: First night, you get socks. Second night, an eraser, a notebook. We took the marvelous festival of giving that is Christmas and turned it into a Back-to-School holiday!
- Crawl: A pet peeve of his, as mentioned during his interview with Larry King and during Red, White & Screwed, when he said the news ticker is distracting while the newscaster is trying to talk to you: "What the fuck is that about? What the fuck is that about? What the fuck is that about?"
- The Cynic: In Stark Raving Black, he noted how many people voted for Obama because he filled them with hope.Lewis: But, I'm sixty. Fuck hope. Hope has passed me by.
- Dada Ad: What he thinks of Super Bowl ads - they're like mystery stories because you don't even know what they're selling until the end. Example: three rabbits are on a log, and one goes home and hangs himself. Buy a bike.
- Deliberately Monochrome: He had a routine about how North Koreans are the most evil people on the planet. He knows this because whenever we get footage from that country, it's in black and white. "It's not the film. These people are so evil, they have no color."
- Department of Redundancy Department: In Stark Raving Black, Lewis said about Vince Gill and Amy Grant, "You fucking fucks."
- Disproportionate Retribution: In Red, White and Screwed, he said we should put the loudest pro-abortion and anti-abortion activists in a room together and tell them to figure out when life begins and when it ends, and not to come out until they reach an agreement. If they don't, "we will kill you."
- Eagleland: Rails against the obnoxious "Greatest Country in the World" attitude with the following analogy
: "If you were in an office, and there was someone there who came in everyday and said, 'I'M THE GREATEST FUCKER HERE AND ALL YOU SNIVELING SHITS WOULD DIE WITHOUT ME! AHAHA!' I can guarantee by the end of the week, you would have killed him. And eaten him...just to try to possess his power." - Early-Installment Weirdness: Those used to his albums and hour-long HBO/direct-to-video stand-up specials might be thrown by his three Comedy Central Presents specials, since he doesn't use any strong language (the hardest words used are "son of a bitch" and "ass").
- Fridge Logic:
- Invoked. During the Black on Broadway special, he pointed out the illogical '50s educational film strips about hiding under school desks to be "safe" from a nuclear bomb:Lewis: ...And I'm sitting there thinking, the adults in the community have said that I could protect myself from A FIRE-FUCK-BALL by hiding under wood. I'm hiding under kindling. Maybe I can get some sticks so I can burn faster!
- Played with in Stark Raving Black when discussing Barack Obama being elected:Lewis: When President Obama was elected, I'll never forget the next day. Everyone everywhere said, "I can't believe this could possibly have ever happened in my lifetime," which made me wonder, who voted for him??
- Invoked. During the Black on Broadway special, he pointed out the illogical '50s educational film strips about hiding under school desks to be "safe" from a nuclear bomb:
- Good News, Bad News: Played with. In the first Comedy Central Presents special, he discussed the Monica Lewinsky scandal:Lewis: It was announced that the president of the United States may, or may not, have had oral sex with a 21-year old in the White House, and that that, and now I'm quoting, "wasn't the bad news". (audience laughs) What was the bad news?? The bad news was, he might have made her lie. (sarcastically) Ooooooh.
- Gosh Dang It to Heck!: In Red, White and Screwed, he derides people who claim that cursing is a debasing of the English language, arguing that curse words are what adults use to express anger and frustration. He doubts someone who's fired sits around all day going, "Oh, pussy-feathers. Sassafras, sassafras, sassafras!"
- Grumpy Old Man: Lewis keeps getting older and he isn't getting any less grumpy.
- Hearing Voices: In the first Comedy Central Presents special, he ranted about Bill Clinton's denial that he had sex with Monica Lewinsky:Lewis: "Can you define the word "alone"?" HE'S GOTTA KNOW WHAT THE WORD "ALONE" MEANS, HE'S THE PRESIDENT! If he doesn't know what the word "alone" means, that must mean he thinks the voices in his head are other people.
- Hope Spot: Lewis Black hates candy corn. Nevertheless, every year he tries it in the vain hope that it'll taste better. It never does.Lewis: Candy corn! Corn, that tastes like candy! I can't wait! (eats it) SON OF A BITCH!!!
- Ho Yay: Invoked: In "Red, White & Screwed", he admitted that he felt like a whore after he went through the White House Correspondent's Dinner speech without cursing once. He thought it would've been more patriotic to dress up like a woman and blow all the sailors who were shipping off to battle.Lewis: And they wouldn't have been happy, but neither would I!!!
- Hypocritical Humor: In Stark Raving Black, Lewis told the audience, "And if you're on Twitter, fuck you." Kinda hypocritical, considering Lewis has a Twitter account of his own. In his defense, he says he's only on there because his Platonic Life Partner Kathleen Madigan guilted him into it.
- If I Wanted X, I Would Y: Lewis has a pretty dim view of American taxes.Lewis: [on the tax code] If I wanted to be bored by 6,000 pages of unreadable dreck, I'd read War and Peace four times.
- Ink-Suit Actor: Anger from Inside Out may not look like him, just being a red brick with features, but many of his mannerisms are incorporated into the animation.
- Insistent Terminology: In Red, White & Screwed, he claimed "quail hunting" is the wrong term, because they're so defenseless to begin with, and thought "quail tracking" was more appropriate.
- Interspecies Romance: In Red, White & Screwed, he said that the Old Testament was designed to get the Jews to straighten up and fly right, because they were out of control:Lewis: They needed to know that marriage takes place between a man and a woman, because they were wandering into camp with camels going, "I'm in love!" I don't give a fuck WHAT you are! You can't marry a snapping turtle, asshole!
- Is Nothing Sacred?: Lewis's first book is a largely autobiographical work entitled Nothing's Sacred.
- J Word Privileges: He takes full advantage of his ability to mock Judaism. "If you have any questions about the Old Testament, there are Jews who walk among you. And they, I promise you this, will take time out of their Jewy, Jewy day to answer any questions you may have... and we will do this if, of course, the price is right."
- Large Ham: Even when you can't see him—he's the voice of the unseen Mister E on Scooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated.
- Logic Bomb: The culmination of the "if it weren't for my horse..." routine, revolving around the damage the stupidest thing you've ever heard can do as it rattles around inside your head.Then you realize someone who went to an institution of higher learning would never say something that stupid and your eyes close, and they find you dead in your bathroom.
- Long-Lived: He's gotten naturally increasing mileage about how both his parents are still living despite his own advanced age, including how their making a living will has turned out to be quite a good decision. "They've lived longer than many tortoises!"
- Los Angeles:
- Doesn't like the place. Has stories about how the first time he went, there was an earthquake, and about the time CBS flew him there to audition for a character derived from his stage persona.Lewis: Some of you are missing the point here: CBS. Flew me. To Los Angeles. To Audition. TO BE MYSELF!
- It gets even funnier when he reveals that CBS found someone else to portray him. Read: They found a better Lewis Black than Lewis Black.Lewis: Unbeknownst to me, there was A BETTER ME!!!
- Doesn't like the place. Has stories about how the first time he went, there was an earthquake, and about the time CBS flew him there to audition for a character derived from his stage persona.
- Madness Mantra: Lewis can't get a partially heard conversation out of his head.Lewis: If it weren't for my horse, I wouldn't have spent that year in college.
- Media Watchdogs:The bill also prohibits "compound use, including hyphenated compounds ? and other grammatical forms including verb, adjective, gerund, participle, and infinitive forms." Fortunately for me, they didn't include the pluperfect subjunctive. So all you stuffed shirts can just have been having had to bite me.—On H.R. 3687, intended to expand the definition of "profane broadcasts".
- Mind Screw:
- The sight of a Starbucks coffee house across the street from another Starbucks coffee house did irreparable damage to his sanity.note
- While that video is also a Mind Screw, the specific location he refers to is in Houston, Texas, down street from where long-standing comedy club the Laff Stop used to be and right next to Landmark Theatres's River Oaks Theatre.note
- Also the "If it weren't for my horse..." quote noted earlier.
- Misery Poker: Inverse example. In Red, White & Screwed, Lewis read a true story about George W. Bush visiting soldiers who were wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan, who were mostly amputees. Bush proceeded to tell the soldiers about how he had a "fight" with a tree. To quote Bush: "The tree won."Lewis: To men who have lost their limbs, he is saying this. It's my firm belief, that if you're the president... you absolutely must know where you are in the time space continuum.
- Mood Dissonance: Referenced; Lewis claims that one reason George W. Bush is nuts is because when he speaks, his words don't match his face:Lewis: You can't talk about the war in Iraq with a smile on your face. He does it constantly. You have to- if you're the president, you have to say, "We're gonna talk about the war. I must have a frowny face." The only time he can have a smile when he's talking about the war in Iraq is when you go, "Well, two Iraqis walked into a bar..."
- Morton's Fork: He wasn't impressed with either candidate in the 2004 election, and said that your choice at the polls was the equivalent of "two bowls of shit".
- My New Gift Is Lame: The reason he hates Hanukkah is that he got tiny, useless presents each day of the holiday.Lewis: It's a back to school holiday!
- New York City: "I love New York City. The reason I live in New York City is because it's the loudest city on the planet Earth. It's so loud I never have to listen to any of the shit that's going on in my own head."
- No Indoor Voice:
- Not just limited to speaking. As Jon Stewart pointed out, Black can somehow manage to yell in print form.
- At the start of the Black on Broadway special, he steps on stage before the show and does the Is This Thing On?, without a microphone.Lewis: [shouting] Check, check, check, FUCKIN' check!
- Noodle Incident: He claims to have overheard someone say "If it weren't for my horse, I would never have spent that year in college" in an IHOP, and to have been baffled, enraged, and driven to insanity. One of his rants tells of a long-winded story which ends with him repeating this phrase just before he passes out.
- No-Sell: In his Black to the Future special, there is a blonde woman sitting dead center of the front row who does not so much as crack a smile through the entire show. Once you notice her, it's quite disturbing.
- N-Word Privileges: He dislikes Christians reading from the Old Testament ("the book of MY people"), especially since he claims that their interpretations are "usually wrong".Lewis: If there's something in the Old Testament that you don't get, there are Jews who walk among you! And they- I promise you this- will take time out of their very Jewy, Jewy day, and interpret anything you're having trouble with, and we'll do this if, of course, the price is right.
- Only Sane Man: Most of his rants rail against the stupidity that the rest of the world seems to take for granted.
- Orphaned Setup:
- A recurring bit in his specials, where he will simply say a name and he won't even have to deliver the joke because the audience laughs at the name. From Red, White and Screwed:Lewis: Dick Cheney. (audience laughs) ...And that's all I've gotta say. Isn't it great that we've reached that point? You don't even have to say, "Dick Cheney, the vice president who shot his friend in the face while hunting"; I say "Dick Cheney", everybody goes, "HO HO!", and we move on.
- Also done with Michael Jackson:Lewis: Two guys walk into a bar... Michael Jackson.
- During Donald Trump's presidential campaign, and even more after his win, he's lamented that it's impossible to make jokes about the government anymore, as people laugh at a simple repeating of what someone actually said, and there's nowhere to go from there.
- A recurring bit in his specials, where he will simply say a name and he won't even have to deliver the joke because the audience laughs at the name. From Red, White and Screwed:
- Perfectly Cromulent Word: In Black on Broadway, he had a bit about how he used to be able to drink water from the hose as a kid. He said he could do it whenever he felt "thirsty", NOT "hydrated" ("they fucking made that word up!").
- Performance Anxiety: It's unknown if he actually gets this, but he made a joke about it at the start of one of his specials.Lewis: You guys are... way too excited, and that puts a lot of pressure on me, and I don't respond well to pressure!
- Pet the Dog: If you read his books, there are many moments when he sincerely praises someone or something, in contrast to his default state of rage.
- Platonic Life-Partners: With fellow comedian Kathleen Madigan.
- Poe's Law: He's stated numerous times that Donald Trump's presidency is the worst thing possible for stand-up comedy about politics, as now you simply say something a politician actually said or did, the audience laughs at that alone, and then there's no kind of further joke you can build from that.
- It started even before that. In Red, White & Screwed, when talking about Michael Brown is the head of FEMA and was a former horse show runner Note , he said:
Lewis: Why do I bother to do this for a living? I might as well just come out here, read this, and leave. - Pop-Cultural Osmosis Failure: Inverted when he was contacted by Pixar for the role of Anger in Inside Out. Pixar sent him several of their movies to watch to familiarize himself with their work, along with a letter that implied that he might not know who Pixar is. He figures that they must have thought he was some kind of recluse to not be familiar with Pixar.
- Preemptive "Shut Up": In Red, White & Screwed, he started another section by saying "Terri Schiavo." Before too many people could start booing (the audience probably thought he was going to start making fun of Terri), he clarified:Lewis: NOT Terri Schiavo the person, Terri Schiavo the event.
- Pun:
- The last joke in the Taxed Beyond Belief special had Lewis saying how to prepare for the tax season: Get in the tub and touch yourself in all your dirty places. At least this time, it won't be the government screwing with you.
- Running Gag: In the first Comedy Central Presents special, he brought up IHOP (International House of Pancakes) a few times: First as part of a main bit on how it's a favorite restaurant of his, then it's brought up again when he discussed his reaction to the president having an affair with Monica Lewinsky ("At that point, I went down to the International House of Pancakes..."), and it's brought up again when he says that he was stuck at home watching the president speaking to the UN because IHOP is his health club, which screwed up his back.
- Self-Deprecation: In the third Comedy Central Presents special, he said he watches the Super Bowl Halftime Show each year because he's an idiot. Similarly, in Red, White & Screwed, he said he watched the entire saga of Terri Schiavo because he was an idiot.
- In Red, White, and Screwed, he said that it was by the grace of God that he was able to wipe himself.
- "Shaggy Dog" Story: Flown to Los Angeles to audition to play himself, passed over for someone who the suits claimed gave a better audition, and then the show was never made anyway.
- Skewed Priorities: One of his criticisms of George W. Bush in Red, White & Screwed. He said Bush was more focused on defining marriage as between a man and woman than he was about fixing the economy, wrapping up the Iraq War, or having a better energy plan.Lewis: What did our President think was important? Queers. That's what's important! That somehow, if we could stop the gays from getting married, everything else would turn out just fine! Everything would change: There'd be solar energy! The Sunni's and the Shiite's would lay down their arms: "He stopped the Queers! I love you too."
- Speech Impediment: He tends to stutter and use the word "uh" a lot at the beginning of his shows before he gets warmed up.
- Suddenly Shouting: Black's signature style, especially when delivering punchlines.
- Take That!: Every special has at least someone or something:
- Comedy Central Presents 1: Bill Clinton, specifically his affair with Monica Lewinsky
- Comedy Central Presents 2: Al Gore, George W. Bush
- Comedy Central Presents 3: MTV
- Black on Broadway: George W. Bush, Bill Clinton (he declared both to be terrible leaders because neither took responsibility for anything)
- Red, White & Screwed: Dick Cheney, specifically his infamous hunting accident; John Kerry; George W. Bush, specifically his lackluster response to Hurricane Katrina, but also his inappropriate remarks to an amputee'd soldier; Michael Brown, specifically his role as head of FEMA during Katrina; Rick Santorum, specifically his anti-gay remarks.
- Stark Raving Black: Barack Obama (though being that this was early in his presidency, his criticisms were more reserved). Just imagine how much material he must have now.
- In God We Rust: Michelle Bachman.
- Black to the Future: As it occurred before the 2016 election, naturally we have jabs at Ted Cruz, Donald Trump, and Hillary Clinton.
- Tastes Like Purple: He once pointed out that NyQuil comes in two flavors: Red and Green... and they're the only substances on Earth that taste like Red and Green.
- Toilet Humour:
- When discussing the Super Bowl:Lewis: And let me tell you, it will continue, no matter what has happened, because of the recent events, I will guarantee that it will continue to evolve the way it has evolved. The halftime show in ten years will literally be just planes flying over the stadium, and dropping shit on people, while an orchestra plays classical music.
- In Stark Raving Black, Lewis discusses fiber:Lewis: I don't go near fiber. I had an oat muffin ten years ago, and I'm still shitting because of it.
- In Red, White & Screwed, he illustrates what it means to be a comic, specifically a topical comic performing for people he makes fun of multiple times a day:Lewis: My job as a comedian is to go into the audience and take the stick that is wedged firmly up each and every one of their asses, take it out ever so slowly, sniff it... I told you... place it back from whence it came, and then turn to them and go, "You're absolutely right. Your shit doesn't stink."
- When discussing the Super Bowl:
- Unfortunate Names: One routine on The Carnegie Hall Performance talks about some of these Lew has heard before, including Asshole (pronounced uh-SHO-la), Shithead (sha-THAYD), and Abcde (AB-sa-day).
- Vanity Plate: Appropriately, the logo for Stark Raving Black Productions includes a voice byte of Lewis griping, "It's unbelievable!"
- Verbal Tic: He often shakes his head and blubbers before delivering a punchline. One example, when discussing the Janet Jackson controversy and how many news anchors and analysts were saying the display was disgusting and vile:Lewis: It's just a tit. And none of those adjectives, blrblrblrblr, really fuckin' apply.
- Viva Las Vegas!: Lewis has an unusual experience with Vegas.Lewis: The best time to visit Las Vegas is during Christmastime, because nothing beats sitting around, watching people gamble, while they play Christmas carols. Those audiences are wonderful. Talk about the most bitter group of people on the planet Earth. For one brief, shining moment, I am Mr. Happy.
- Wardrobe Malfunction: Referenced in Luther Burbank Performing Arts Center Blues when discussing the Janet Jackson incident. He mentioned how hypocritical it was for the TV stations to keep declaring how disgusting and immoral it supposedly was, only to say "Let's get another look at it."
- Worst. Whatever. Ever!: On Y2K: "It was the worst New Year's ever. EVER! And we scared ourselves stupid, so that eight year olds, locked in closets by themselves, couldn't come up with the sick paranoid fantasies we came up with!"
- Yank the Dog's Chain: He frequently addresses his annoyance that we still don't have flying cars, as predicted in the '50s and '60s. He mentions it again in the Stark Raving Black special, where he predicts that they'll eventually develop flying cars... but it'll be after he dies. He says it'll even be referenced in the obituaries:Lewis: Noted comic Lewis Black has passed away. Funeral services Friday, room for flying cars.
- You Keep Using That Word: One of Black's many pet peeves is when people use a word incorrectly. He's said it will sometimes be pointed out to him that "a lot of people use it that way, so the meaning of the word has changed." His reaction to that is:Lewis: A lot of people [beat] are FUCKING STUPID!
- Your Costume Needs Work: He once auditioned to play a character based on himself in a friend's sitcom. He didn't get the part.Lewis: Unbeknownst to me, there was a BETTER ME!
