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Jeff Ross went to prison and a riot broke out. A laugh riot that is. His “Jeff Ross Roasts Criminals: Live at Brazos County Jail” premiered on Comedy Central last night.
Ross, best known as Comedy Central’s roast master for celebrity roasts, decided to go to a prison, get to know the inmates there and do a show with them.
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Ross wrote about his experience in a blog on the Huffington Post. The comic explained that while he did the show for the comedy, he also learned a lot about the problems in the American criminal justice system.
“I admit I roasted these people for sheer entertainment purposes — but also to get myself a glimpse into the American prison system. It’s broken. We say we’re a free country but we lock up more people than anywhere else on Earth. Almost two MILLION American children have a parent locked up right now. We have more jails and prisons in America than colleges and universities.”
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“All this is still hard for me to comprehend. What’s happening in this country? Wayne Dicky, the jail administrator who proudly allowed me access to his facility, told me that American jails are de facto mental health facilities. Back in the seventies many psychiatric hospitals were shut down. Now all those people needing mental help wind up in jail instead. I freely walked around the cells and dorms and saw the insanity first hand. We tuck so many damaged people away and forget about them — like human dust.”
He tweeted to his fans and the prisoners alike, “ENJOY THE SHOW EVERYBODY! I’m so happy to be living in the free! Sending ya’ll lotsa love from #Bonnaroo BUT THINKIN OF THOSE LOCKED UP.”
I you missed the hilarity, don’t worry, it will be shown plenty of times again on Comedy Central.
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Ross also stopped by Bill Maher’s show Friday night. The two talked about the problem with the criminal justice system in the U.S, but they also agreed on Jerry Seinfeld. They said that if Seinfeld is not politically correct enough for college audiences then there must be something really wrong with kids these days.
Read the JBN story on Seinfeld here.
See the clip of Ross on Maher’s Real Time:
