--- title: Justin Bieber Comedy Central Roast: A History of Roasts description: How the tradition of honoring people by humiliating them got its start canonical: https://time.com/3761846/justin-bieber-history-roast/ author: Laura Stampler article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-03-30T16:00:59.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T08:03:05.543Z article:section: History og:title: How Honoring People By Humiliating Them Got Its Start og:description: How the tradition of honoring people by humiliating them got its start og:url: https://time.com/3761846/justin-bieber-history-roast/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt2d80243b7ff59099/6987859c06f2c15d39334a2c/466466756.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 3000 og:image:height: 1688 og:image:alt: Comedy Central Roast Of Justin Bieber - Arrivals og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: How Honoring People By Humiliating Them Got Its Start twitter:description: How the tradition of honoring people by humiliating them got its start twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt2d80243b7ff59099/6987859c06f2c15d39334a2c/466466756.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Justin Bieber and the History of the Roast > Sponsored content. 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They are at time.com/newsletters and are separate from a paid subscription. ## Video: Roast of Justin Bieber - Egged [Watch (HLS stream): Roast of Justin Bieber - Egged](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/Qy03B4kq.m3u8) (0:36)  _Published 2015-02-17. Roast of Justin Bieber - Egged_ by [Laura Stampler](https://time.com/author/laura-stampler/) ## Laura Stampler Mar 30, 2015 4:00 PM UTC  Justin Bieber attends the Comedy Central Roast Of Justin Bieber Justin Bieber attends the Comedy Central Roast Of Justin Bieber Jason LaVeris—FilmMagic by [Laura Stampler](https://time.com/author/laura-stampler/) ## Laura Stampler Mar 30, 2015 4:00 PM UTC On Monday night, schadenfreude-lovers can tune into [Comedy Central](http://www.cc.com/shows/roast-of-justin-bieber) to watch Justin Bieber get honored by means of humiliation. The teen-dream-turned-angsty-20-something is the latest victim/guest of honor of a comedy roast, which will air at 10pm EST but was filmed earlier this month. Though Bieber’s a very modern target, the ribbing he’ll endure is a tradition that has a century-old history. In the early 20th century, testimonial dinners held to praise an invited guest were all the rage among clubs and organizations. “They were huge,” says Barry Dougherty, historian and head roast writer for the [Friar’s Club](http://www.friarsclub.com/), the fraternal and funny organization famous for hosting roasts. “But when other organizations had these things, they would be nice. Because of our particular group of friars, who were sharper vaudevillians, they would be witty, smart and sarcastic. They would make jabs.” Dougherty says that the club, founded in 1904, probably had its first testimonial turned (not-yet-named) roast in 1907\. A 1910 headline in the [_New York Tribune_](https://www.classicfriarsroasts.com/friarsroastshistory) documented the early days of the unorthodox dinners with the headline: “FRIARS KID MR. HARRIS: Veteran Theatrical Manager Butt of Jokes at Dinner.” “It was a new thing, no one ever thought to do it before,” Dougherty tells TIME, adding that other organizations started jumping on the sarcastic bandwagon. But the dinners started to get out of hand. “\[The roasters\] kept upping the ante,” Dougherty says, and over the years the jokes got more and more extreme. “When you got to the ’40s \[the friars\] wondered if they should put the breaks on it or have a separate event, all roasting, no nice stuff.” They went with the latter. The first official roast, so named because of the many times a guest of honor would get “burned,” occurred in 1949\. The subject was French actor and singer Maurice Chevalier. While many of the roasts were initially only open to men — when Humphrey Bogart was roasted in 1955, his wife sent them a tape that played her message, “This is Lauren Bacall, the uninvited guest, you rat bastards” — they would later open their doors. Lucille Ball was roasted in 1962. In 1998, the Friar’s Club partnered with Comedy Central to air the roasts on television. While the two have since parted ways, both organizations now regularly hold roasts of their own. Though more roasts may mean more humiliation, it’s a win for the rest of us: The more celebrities we get to see cringe, the better. _Read next:_ [_Watch Justin Bieber Apologize to His Roasters for His Past Behavior_](http://time.com/3764785/justin-bieber-roast-comedy-central/?iid=time%5Freadnext) [_Listen to the most important stories of the day._](http://time.com/newsletter/the-brief/?sl%5Fautoplay=true&xid=spl-fullbrief-article) ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3761846/justin-bieber-history-roast/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3761846/justin-bieber-history-roast/"},"headline":"Justin Bieber and the History of the Roast","datePublished":"2015-03-30T16:00:59.000Z","dateModified":"2026-08-04T08:03:05.543Z","description":"How the tradition of honoring people by humiliating them got its start","url":"https://time.com/3761846/justin-bieber-history-roast/","keywords":["Newsfeed","Television","Comedy","Justin Bieber","entertainment"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt2d80243b7ff59099/6987859c06f2c15d39334a2c/466466756.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Laura Stampler","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/laura-stampler/"}],"articleSection":"History","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt2d80243b7ff59099/6987859c06f2c15d39334a2c/466466756.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Comedy Central Roast Of Justin Bieber - Arrivals","caption":"Comedy Central Roast Of Justin Bieber - Arrivals","creditText":"Jason LaVeris—FilmMagic","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/history/","name":"History"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3761846/justin-bieber-history-roast/","name":"Justin Bieber and the History of the Roast"}}]},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"Roast of Justin Bieber - Egged","description":"Roast of Justin Bieber - Egged","thumbnailUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/Qy03B4kq/poster.jpg?width=720","uploadDate":"2015-02-17T20:12:57.000Z","contentUrl":"https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/Qy03B4kq.m3u8","embedUrl":"https://time.com/3761846/justin-bieber-history-roast/","duration":"PT36S","potentialAction":{"@type":"SeekToAction","target":"https://time.com/3761846/justin-bieber-history-roast/?jw_start={seek_to_second_number}","startOffset-input":"required name=seek_to_second_number"}}] ```