White House Correspondents' Dinner: Michelle Wolf and 4 Other Women Who Hosted | THR News - video Dailymotion

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As 'The Daily Show' star Michelle Wolf prepares to take on the annual D.C. event, take a look back at the four females who came before her.

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00:00On April 28, The Daily Show's Michelle Wolf will take to the stage to host this year's

00:04White House Correspondents Association dinner, becoming only the fifth woman to do so.

00:08The annual dinner, put on by White House journalists, started in 1921, but female

00:12journalists have only been able to attend since 1962, in large part through the efforts

00:16of Helen Thomas, who pushed President Kennedy to pressure the event organizers into

00:20changing their rules. Wolf, who in December put out her HBO comedy special Michelle

00:24Wolf, Nice Lady, will be following the work of her Daily Show colleague Hassan Minaj,

00:28who hosted last year. For the second year in a row, President Donald Trump will not attend

00:32the event, unlike chief executives in the past. In honor of Wolf's hosting gig,

00:36The Hollywood Reporter is highlighting the four trailblazing female comedians who have

00:39hosted the dinner before her. In 2015, Saturday Night Live star Cecily Strong, who is now

00:44well-known for her Melania Trump impression, led the night just months before Trump

00:47announced his surprise presidential bid. Among recent news events were protests that

00:51erupted in response to the death of 25-year-old African-American Baltimore resident

00:55Freddie Gray at the hands of local police. Strong didn't shy away from the issue,

00:58quipping,

00:59Let's give it up for Secret Service. I don't want to be too hard on those guys.

01:03You know, because they're the only law enforcement agency in the country that will

01:06get in trouble if a black man gets shot.

01:09At the first White House Correspondents' dinner following the inauguration of President

01:12Barack Obama, Wonder Sykes ignited controversy for her pointed jokes about the

01:16president's critics. For example, the Emmy-winning writer for The Chris Rock Show took aim at

01:20Sean Hannity, noting that the Fox News host had offered to be waterboarded for charity.

01:24Elaine Boosler had already become one of the first women to receive her own one-hour

01:35comedy special when the White House Correspondents' Association chose her to

01:38headline the dinner.

01:40Bill Clinton had just been elected president, and Boosler had choice words for his

01:43predecessor George H.W. Bush. On Bush's lack of support for an automatic weapons ban, which

01:48he claimed could infringe on the rights of hunters, Boosler said,

01:51I think if you need a hundred rounds to kill a deer, maybe hunting isn't your sport.

01:55In a 2015 interview with Elle, Boosler remembered her time hosting a dinner and the importance of

02:00comedy in trying political times like this.

02:02The worse something is, the more the public needs to see it through the lens of humor to make it

02:06more understandable, less intimidating, less apocalyptic. Everything horrible demands

02:10comedy, and nothing is more horrible than the U.S. Congress these days.

02:14Paula Poundstone was the first woman ever to host a dinner nine years after the tradition

02:18of comedian performances began in 1983. Poundstone, who first came to prominence through a series

02:23of stand-up specials on HBO and her political commentary on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno,

02:27trailblazed a path for politically-minded female comics.

02:31Frustratingly, the next day, news reports focused on her clothing instead of her comedy.

02:35I think that might have been the one time that I ever thought about the fact that I was a woman,

02:39Poundstone said to Elle, because would they have done that for any other performer?

02:43To read more on the women who have hosted the White House Correspondents Dinner, head to THR.com.

02:48For The Hollywood Reporter News, I'm Lyndsey Rodrigues.

White House Correspondents' Dinner: Michelle Wolf and 4 Other Women Who Hosted | THR News

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