Josh Ostrovsky, aka "The Fat Jew," is stealing the spotlight — some say literally. The popular Instagram star, who has more than 5.7 million followers, has long been accused of plagiarizing the jokes he posts to his account, but backlash is at a fever pitch in the wake of news that he signed a deal with Hollywood's Creative Artists Agency (CAA).
Ostrovsky, 30, is getting virtually clobbered on social media — ironically, the very platform that made him so famous in the first place. Since The Hollywood Reporter broke the news of his CAA deal on Aug. 13, countless comedians have weighed in with their thoughts on the viral star — and they're not happy.
Patton Oswalt, for one, skewered Ostrovsky's habit of "aggregating" jokes from other people and place on his own account, without giving proper (or any) credit or attribution.
My favorite Jane's Addiction song is "Been Caught Aggregating."
— Patton Oswalt (@pattonoswalt) August 15, 2015
Always chokes me up in "Purple Rain" when Prince sings, "Baby I could never aggregate you from another…"
— Patton Oswalt (@pattonoswalt) August 15, 2015
He wasn't the only one piling on, though. Veep's Timothy Simons, Silicon Valley's Kumail Nanjiani, and Wet Hot American Summer's Michael Ian Black also spoke out.
Fat Jew was signed by CAA. They are going to ask for his ideas and he'll be like 'yeah I've got a ton' then surreptitiously open Twitter
— Timothy Simons (@timothycsimons) August 15, 2015
Can someone make a list of comedians creating original work not yet repped by big agencies so we can forward that to CAA?
— Timothy Simons (@timothycsimons) August 16, 2015
As @FATJEW once said, "I have a dream."
— Kumail Nanjiani (@kumailn) August 15, 2015
The most used phrase on articles today is "The Fat Jew could not be reached for comment."
— Kumail Nanjiani (@kumailn) August 17, 2015
To me, what makes @fatjew so funny aren't the stolen jokes he posts, but THE WAY he posts them.
— Michael Ian Black (@michaelianblack) August 16, 2015
One comedian, Davon Magwood, even wrote an open letter to The Fat Jew and other accounts like it, slamming Ostrovsky for stealing one of his tweets. "I shouldn't have to [ask] to be credited for my work, neither should other comedians or clever social media people," he wrote. "I'm not producing s–t so you can make more money off of my work, no one is."
Amid the ongoing backlash, some outlets reported that Comedy Central had dropped a pilot from Ostrovsky. However, a rep for the network told The Comic's Comic and Entertainment Weekly that it was only a "script deal that didn't proceed to pilot" several months ago (long before the CAA news), and that the network had nothing currently in the works with Ostrovsky.
He does have other projects planned, though. Per THR, he recently launched a wine brand and is working on his first book, Money Pizza Respect. He also reps brands including Virgin Mobile and Seamless, among others, and was photographed filming with Joe Jonas on the singer's new music video.
UPDATE: A source tells Us Weekly that Ostrovsky has had an agent for some time; he switched to CAA from UTA, where he'd been for three years. "It's unfortunate because he attributes photos. He always credits where he gets his jokes from," the insider tells Us of the controversy.
