"Funniest Comedian CARLOS MENCIA vs RICK MERCER"

CARLOS MENCIA

Ned Arnel Mencia (born October 22, 1967), known professionally as Carlos Mencia (and previously Ned Holness) is a Honduran-born American comedian, wri...

Ned Arnel Mencia (born October 22, 1967), known professionally as Carlos Mencia (and previously Ned Holness) is a Honduran-born American comedian, writer, and actor. His style of comedy is often political and involves issues of race, culture, criminal justice, and social class. He is best known as the host of the Comedy Central show Mind of Mencia which produced four seasons before being cancelled in 2008. Around this time, Mencia received several accusations of plagiarism and joke-stealing in his stand-up routines. In 1988, Mitzi Shore, owner of The Comedy Store, suggested that Mencia change his first name from "Ned" to "Carlos" in order to appeal to the Mexican audiences. Mencia performed at venerated LA stand-up venues such as The Comedy Store and The L.A. Cabaret. His success in these venues led to appearances on The Arsenio Hall Show and Buscando Estrellas, where he attained the title "International Comedy Grand Champion." Then, in 1994, Mencia was chosen to host HBO's latino comedy showcase Loco Slam. Mencia followed up Loco Slam by hosting Funny is Funny! on Galavision in 1998. He would continue to do stand-up, including a very successful tour in 2001 with Freddy Soto and Pablo Francisco, "The Three Amigos." Mencia also did two half-hour specials on HBO, the second of which won him a CableACE Award for Best Stand-Up Comedy Special. After the release of his first comedy album by Warner Records, Take A Joke America, Mencia performed his break-out performance on Comedy Central Presents in 2002. By the time his career began to take off in the early 2000s, Mencia was also working as an actor doing guest appearances in the television shows Moesha and The Shield, and starring in the film Outta Time and the animated show The Proud Family. In 2002, he performed on "Comedy Central Presents." In March 2005, Comedy Central announced Mencia's own half-hour comedy show, Mind of Mencia. The show mixed Mencia's stand up comedy with sketch comedy, much like Dave Chappelle's Chappelle's Show. The show achieved moderate success in its first season and was brought back for a second season in the spring of 2006, becoming Comedy Central's second highest-rated program behind South Park.

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RICK MERCER

Richard Vincent "Rick" Mercer OC (born October 17, 1969) is a Canadian comedian, television personality, political satirist and author. He is best kno...

Richard Vincent "Rick" Mercer OC (born October 17, 1969) is a Canadian comedian, television personality, political satirist and author. He is best known for his work on the CBC Television comedy shows This Hour Has 22 Minutes and Rick Mercer Report. He is the author of four books, based on content from the television shows. Mercer has received more than 25 Gemini Awards for his work on television. In 1992 he began to work with former CODCO members Cathy Jones and Mary Walsh, and fellow Newfoundlander Greg Thomey, to create a new television series for CBC Television which became This Hour Has 22 Minutes. In the first eight seasons of 22 Minutes, Mercer provided some of the show's signature moments, including an Internet petition (on the 22 Minutes website) to force Canadian Alliance leader Stockwell Day to change his first name to Doris. Mercer's tightly scripted and performed two-minute "rants", in which he would speak directly to the camera about a current political issue, shot in a style similar to those Denis Leary used in MTV commercials, quickly became the show's signature segment. In 1998, he published a book, Streeters, which compiled many of his most famous 22 Minutes rants. It quickly became a national bestseller. In 2007 he published his second book, Rick Mercer Report: The Book. In November 2010, Mercer contributed a rant he had previously recorded in 2007 on the subject of teen bullying in high schools to Dan Savage's It Gets Better Project. One of Mercer's trademark comedy routines on 22 Minutes was Talking to Americans, in which he would travel to a major American city or institution and conduct on-the-street interviews with average Americans regarding Canadian politics, the weather, etc., often with hilarious results as the subject's ignorance about Canada was illustrated. One famous example saw Mercer asking Americans' opinion on whether Canada should change its "20 Hour Clock" to the 24-hour one used by the United States. He received approval from citizens and from the Governor of Iowa, Tom Vilsack. On another occasion he got the support of Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee in calling on Canadians to save the "National Igloo". Mercer made international headlines in 2000 when he pulled a Talking to Americans stunt on then-presidential candidate George W. Bush. He successfully got Bush to answer questions about non-existent Canadian Prime Minister "Jean Poutine". Bush was not amused at the time, but he did make a joking reference to this incident during his visit to Canada in 2004. In the same US election campaign, Mercer asked Democratic candidate Al Gore to promise to visit the "Canadian capital city" of Toronto after his election. Gore did not question Mercer's incorrect identification of the capital of Canada. In 2001, Mercer co-produced a CBC special based on Talking to Americans, which attracted 2.7 million Canadian viewers—the highest-rated television special in Canadian history. Later, the respected ABC News program Nightline would devote a show to it. This was his last major project related to 22 Minutes—at the end of the 2000–2001 season, he announced his departure from that show. It was rumoured that he had decided to leave because of friction between Mercer and co-star Mary Walsh, although other reasons include focusing on his other television show, Made in Canada. Talking to Americans was nominated for a Gemini Award, but following the 9/11 attacks, Mercer declined the nomination.

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