Comedy Central’s roast of Boston cops is a surprisingly positive look at the BPD
The one-hour special offers way more than jokes.
Five minutes into Jeff Ross Roasts Cops, the new one-hour Comedy Central special that the comedian filmed with the Boston Police Department and that aired Saturday night on the cable TV station, Ross starts floundering. Hard.“You guys also have a rich criminal history in this town,” Ross tells the assembled BPD officers. “You had the Boston Tea Party here, Whitey Bulger is from here, Tom Brady is from here.”Some of the assembled officers smile, while others jeer.“Oh, come on,” Ross says. “That one really let the air out of the room, huh?”“Let’s be real,” Ross continues. “If Whitey Bulger’s name had been Blacky Bulger, they would have caught him a lot quicker.”Silence.When the comedian put out a request to 30 police departments nationwide to participate in a cop roast in 2015, only Boston gave him permission, according to Ross. But that doesn’t mean Boston gave him a warm reception. Ross blamed the uncomfortable beginning to his special on a notice posted in several stations and circulated among officers. The memo, which Ross highlights in the show, labeled him a “cop hater” for attending a protest against police brutality in New York City.
However, the rest of the one-hour special is considerably less contentious. Similar to 2015’s Jeff Ross Roasts Criminals, in which Ross spent time with inmates at the Brazos County Jail in Texas, the show is more of a documentary than a pure roast. Ross goes on ride-alongs with members of the BPD, takes pizza to the officers on break, talks to residents of the city’s housing projects who don’t trust the police, and tells plenty of jokes along the way.
The special also features interviews with BPD Commissioner William Evans, who told The Boston Globe that while he hadn’t heard of Ross, he was encouraged by the comedian’s approach to the special.
“When we had conversations with Jeff and he explained how his whole idea was to explain the human side of police officers, and with everything going on in this country, I thought it was a good opportunity,” Evans told the Globe. “And that’s what we’re continually trying to do out in the community, is make people aware that we’re not bad guys.”
For Ross, the experience was a chance to hear from real officers about what they think about the charged atmosphere surrounding their profession.
“It’s always the loudest voices that get heard,” Ross told Boston magazine. “I started talking to the softer voices, the more reasonable, open-minded voices on both sides. I happen to think that Commissioner Evans is one of those people. He’s soft-spoken, but he makes sense.”
You can watch a series of clips from the episode on Comedy Central’s website, or watch the full episode online if you have a cable subscription.
Check out a (slightly NSFW) clip of Ross’s “rapid-fire roast” of BPD members below.
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