Pour one out for Drunk History.
The inventive underdog comedy has been canceled by Comedy Central after a six-season run, it was confirmed on Wednesday. The Derek Waters-hosted series had not only received a renewal for a seventh season from the network but was filming new episodes when the pandemic struck and production was shut down. During this time, though, Comedy Central has been shifting its strategy toward adult animated series, greenlighting reboots of Ren & Stimpy and Beavis and Butt-Head, and ordering Daria spin-off Jodie. With The Other Two and South Side moving to HBO Max, and Corporate finishing a three-season run earlier this summer, that leaves Awkwafina Is Nora From Queens as the network’s great live-action comedy hope.
Featuring sloshed retellings of overlooked-but-important historical moments, Drunk History began as a web series, developed a cult audience, and moved to Comedy Central in 2013. Its roster of famous guest stars — who lip-synced the dialogue voiced by an increasingly inebriated narrator — was quite impressive: Jack Black, Michael Cera, Bob Odenkirk, Bill Hader, Connie Britton, Kristen Wiig, Owen Wilson, Kumail Nanjiani, Jordan Peele, Laura Dern, John Lithgow, Jason Momoa, Courteney Cox, Maya Rudolph, Giancarlo Esposito, Parker Posey, Billie Joe Armstrong, Aubrey Plaza, Kirsten Dunst, Vanessa Hudgens, Seth Rogen, Tiffany Haddish, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Mandy Moore, and Weird Al, to name a lot. The show racked up 17 Emmys nominations over its six seasons and will compete for three trophies next month, including Outstanding Variety Sketch Series. (It won an Emmy for costumes in 2015.)
Waters — who created the show with Jeremy Konner, and was an executive producer alongside Will Ferrell and Adam McKay — has a first-look deal with ViacomCBS to develop more projects. Drunk History airs in local formats around the globe.
