Amy Schumer has dismissed suggestions she may have “stolen” jokes from other comedians.
Earlier this week, in a series of tweets that have since been deleted, a trio of US comedians – Wendy Liebman, Kathleen Madigan and Tammy Pescatelli – discussed alleged similarities between their own jokes and gags told by the Trainwreck star on her Comedy Central show Inside Amy Schumer.
Schumer addressed these suggestions on Twitter last night (January 20), tweeting: “On my life, I have never and would never steal a joke.”
On my life, I have never and would never steal a joke.
— Amy Schumer (@amyschumer) January 20, 2016
She also made an appearance on fellow comedian Jim Norton’s SiriusXM show in a bid to set the record straight. Last year, Schumer was also accused of lifting material from another US comedian, the late Patrice O’Neal.
“I would never, ever do that and I never have,” she told Norton. “I’m literally going to take a polygraph test and put it on my show this season, and I promise, whatever the results are, I won’t let them cut [it]. I will show that I had never, never seen Patrice do that bit. I had definitely never seen Tammy Pescatelli do that.”
“I have to come up with so much material – my TV show, this movie, standup, specials – and I’m so careful,” she added. “And none of these things had ever reached me. And I will literally take a polygraph. And I just would never do that – like, that would be so stupid for me to do that!”
Meanwhile, on Twitter last night Wendy Liebman made light of a suggestion that Schumer had stolen one of her jokes after being provoked by a fan.
I think both @amyschumer and I like it when a man pays…for sex. #greatminds #parallelthinking https://t.co/zWQKo4Kj5F
— Wendy Liebman (@WendyLiebman) January 20, 2016
Earlier this week Schumer also hit the headlines when she called out a teenage film critic for making a sexist joke about her.