The Green Room with Paul Provenza

In the Season 2 premiere, host Paul Provenza welcomes guest panelists Ray Romano, Garry Shandling, Judd Apatow, Marc Maron and Bo Burnham.

The comics take on women in comedy, comedians in their dotage, obscure historical references, Comic-Con, Stephen Hawking, reality TV, cosmetic surgery, and they enjoy a casual smoke while Franklyn riffs on clarinet.

The panel hashes out the impact of social networking on comedians and their bookings, Janeane's ongoing passion for politics, non-sexual musical fun with Asian prostitutes, the legality of pornography, questionable bits on politically incorrect topics, dogs during the Holocaust, comedians dealing with "merch" and self-promotion, comparative Mick Jagger impressions, returns to comedy after 9/11, fun times on Marc Maron's podcast, Noam Chomsky, and drink toasts to Robert Schimmel, Greg Giraldo, and Richard Jeni.

The panel amuses itself with one of Jamie's poetic rants, takes on the Kilstein/Kilkenny's life on the road living in their car, the political bent/demographic of each comic's respective audiences, Ron's lack of work ethic, objectivist narcissism as audience polemic, Matt Kirshen's vs. Jamie Kilstein's comparative culture clash experiences, the preponderance of drunken Palin fans, the humorous potential of the Palins as comic fodder in general, Lewis's desire to violently assault Mitch McConnell, and the moral ambiguities of publicly associating with Dick Cheney and other problematic political figures.

Kumail has fun with descriptions of the stand-up comedy scene in Pakistan, the panelists reminisce about how their mothers reacted to their stand-up careers, examine the intimidation factor of Carnegie Hall, comedy as sweatshop, Rodney Dangerfield's dark side, short-order cooking versus tech support as day jobs, Margaret and Jefferey commiserate about their "Dancing with the Stars" trauma, Richard brings out the Shiite in Kumail, which turns into puns, sci-fi, and bad Larry King impersonations, followed by an abrupt left turn into Ron Jeremy's penis, proceeding to racial accuracy versus stereotyping in sitcoms, and finishing up with the upside of 9/11.

The panel circles the wagons around marijuana, riffing on the drugs Joe had to do to get through episodes of Fear Factor (2001), then celebrates Tommy's release from prison after his drug-dogless "bong bust," the comic ineptitude of DEA investigators, Paul's disappointment with Tommy's most recent film appearance, how the prison industry amounts to modern slavery, Joe goes on a pair of libertarian rants, there's fun with pot Twittering and communicating with dolphins on 11-hydroxy-THC metabolite, Rick turns into the voice of reason -- after a fashion, and spills the beans on youthful adventures as a hustler to closeted Republicans, how the political machine has changed comedy audiences, the concept of cloning Jesus and more fun with racism with Daryl Wright serving as an unwilling anti-target.

The round table moves to the 2011 Montreal Just For Laughs comedy festival, taking on issues of brothels, the Tracy Morgan incident and the role of political correctness in comedy.

The second season concludes with a second panel from the 2011 Montreal Just for Laughs Festival, highlighted by discussions on the linguistics and evolutionary biology of comedy, rednecks describing Jews, the sexual anatomy of birds, Louis C.K.'s philosophy of comedy audiences, more Comic-Con and obscure pop cultural references, nerd-ology, global technocracy, notions of critical thinking, philosophy, politics and media within comedy, comedians as potential politicians, and foisting offensive jokes onto other comedians.