Entertainment

Rules of the roast

Hey there, genius, I’m surprised you can even read this.

No, I won’t apologize — in fact, that’s Rule No. 1 to a good roast.

“Stand by your material,” Friars Club favorite Jeffrey Ross teaches in his new book, “I Only Roast the Ones I Love,” in which he explains the secrets behind barbs so wicked he can lay claim to having roasted Courtney Love into rehab. “The way I wrote the book is almost like ‘The Art of War.’ The rules of roasting will help guide you through an increasingly harsh universe.”

Even a universe in which a congressman heckles the president on the House floor. More proof, Ross says, that roasting has reached the highest levels of our culture.

“What’s next, mozzarella sticks and a two-drink minimum at the State of the Union?” he jokes. “Is Obama going to say in his next speech, ‘God bless America, take care of your waitresses’ ?”

Speaking of the Joe Wilson-Barack Obama confrontation, Ross advises the importance of dishing it out only to those who can actually handle the heat while in the proverbial kitchen.

Ross gives the example of his recent appearance on “The View,” where garishly dressed guest host La Toya Jackson asked for a sample slam using her as the mark. Ross said, “You look like a hooker from ‘Battlestar Galactica.’ ” While everyone else on the show laughed, Jackson herself didn’t. In fact, she wanted to know what happens when people get mad, to which he replied, “I only roast good sports.”

Point: Ross.

Two of his favorite roasting tips include backhanded compliments (“I joked to Hugh Hefner about him having seven girlfriends because eight would be ostentatious”) and nailing two people in one joke. (When PETA-loving Pamela Anderson balked at his fur coat, Ross said, “It’s not real, we just shaved Bea Arthur’s back.”)

“What I love about roasting is that it’s brutal honesty face to face,” he says, pointing to his lines about Love from the Anderson roast, including, “You’re like the girl next door — if you happen to live next to a methadone clinic.”

And are they friends today?

“Well, I mean, after the show she definitely was friendly,” he says. “She was ready to hang out. My girlfriend dragged me out of there. The next morning, she checked herself into rehab. So roasting saves lives.”

Ross, who’s doing what he calls “speed roasting” as he travels the country on his book tour, says he does have one regret: He can’t give it to some of the most famous figures throughout recorded human history.

“Anybody accomplished is roast-worthy,” he says. “Gandhi would be the greatest roast ever. I would say, ‘Mahatma, my friend, I realize you’re on a hunger strike, but a deodorant strike also?’ ”