Instagram sensation Josh "The Fat Jew" Ostrovsky is known for posting hilarious memes, photos and quotes to his 5.7 million followers. Now, however, he's being criticized by other entertainers and comedians for plagiarism and joke stealing, according to New York Daily News. He has more than 3,000 posts on Instagram, so one can only imagine the backlash. Ironically, the roasting is all taking place on social media.
Ostrovsky's Instagram account, @TheFatJewish, became an instant hit and it has allowed him to make an entertainment career out of it. He recently signed with CAA, Creative Artists Agency, to represent all areas, according to The Hollywood Reporter. This was when people started to really have a problem with his success, even though he already has some other projects going on, like a modeling contract, a wine brand, and is in the process of publishing his own book, "Money Pizza Respect." He even had an apparent pilot in development with Comedy Central. Despite all that he has going on, other comedians are trying to take him down.
Popular comedians like Timothy Simons, stand-up stars Patton Oswalt and Kumail Nanjiani and Buzzfeed's Ben Rosen, took to Twitter to call Ostrovsky out for signing with CAA, according to Us Weekly. He's been accused of plagiarizing in the past, apparently posting other people's jokes to his Instagram without giving the original authors any credit. Now that he's signed such a huge deal with CAA, other comedians don't want to let it slide.
Always chokes me up in "Purple Rain" when Prince sings, "Baby I could never aggregate you from another..."
— Patton Oswalt (@pattonoswalt) August 15, 2015
As @FATJEW once said, "I have a dream."
— Kumail Nanjiani (@kumailn) August 15, 2015
Hey guys @FATJEW just started a political organization. He's calling it ISIS. — Kumail Nanjiani (@kumailn) August 15, 2015
#TheFatJewishBeLike The book I wrote drops next month pic.twitter.com/ATTc2ar407 — Timothy Simons (@timothycsimons) August 15, 2015
Thanks FatJewish for straight up stealing my tweet without any credit whatsoever. pic.twitter.com/iELnQ0YHMD — Ben Rosen (@Rosen) August 14, 2015
Writer Maura Quint even posted a long Facebook status pleading that people stop following Ostrovsky on Instagram. "This guy is someone whose entire career is simply stealing jokes from Tumblr, twitter, etc.," she wrote. "He is making a living off of the hard work of other people. The people he steals from are struggling writers, comedians, etc. They would love to profit from THEIR OWN WORK but can't because this complete waste of a person is monetizing their words before they even have a chance to."
Quint then went on to explain how he's ignored people who tell him he stole their jokes and that he is just a "virus." She asked that nobody support him because he is "pure trash." She even offered to give a list of the original joke writers to follow so people could still have good content to laugh at.
For those of you who don't know, this guy, The Fat Jew is someone whose entire career is simply stealing jokes from...
Posted by Maura Quint on Saturday, August 15, 2015
"It's unfortunate because he attributes photos," a source told Us Weekly trying to defend Ostrovsky. "He always credits where he gets his jokes from." But people still aren't having it.
Comedian Davon Magwood wrote The Fat Jew, and other accounts like his, an open letter slamming them for stealing jokes. "I shouldn't have to ask to be credited for my work," Magwood wrote. "Neither should other comedians or clever social media people. I'm not producing s--t so you can make more money off of my work, no one is."
After all of this started, Comedy Central decided to make things clear about the deal it had with Ostrovsky, and it turns out this deal for a pilot that was dropped long before all of this CAA slamming, according to Entertainment Weekly. He had a script deal with the network, but "it failed to move forward to the pilot stage several months ago," a Comedy Central rep said. Comedy Central is currently not tied to Ostrovsky in any way.
