1) The biggest crime here is that this is a craptastic impression of New York's governor. I mean, really, he doesn't sound shit like David Paterson. Fred Armisen is officially just screwing with me now.
2) And is he really going to play every non-fat, notorious black man? Because he sincerely isn't good at it. Really. Darrell Hammond, a white man, does an outstanding Jesse Jackson impression despite the handicap of not being an actual black man. Almost makes me forget how annoyed I am over SNL not employing any black people. That's how good it is. Almost.
So what is your DEAL, Fred? Why are your black people so lame? I thought we were getting somewhere with the last Obama "Cool" sketch. I really thought you were improving. And now this abomination.
3) It goes without saying that Lorne Michael's needs to DIVERSIFY his staff, but ... whatever. We all know SNL isn't Mad TV and when they do hire any minorities they don't know what to do with them, and by "minorities" I mean the occasional black person, half black person, Latino and whatever Fred Armisen is (I believe he's part Lebanese). Asians Bobby Lee and Aasif Manvi need not apply.
If they're not going to take the integrated world seriously I don't know why they just won't make the whole show Kristen Wiig and Andy Samberg. Or just Andy Samberg. Or just this digital skit here, shown in a loop for perpetuity. (I also love this one, and this one, and this holiday themed one and especially this one.)
4) New Jersey bashing: The one liners and put downs were funny, but, once again, what did that have to do with David Paterson?
5) Gov. Paterson has a lot of funny things about him that are fair game (some of which he, himself, has made fun of). While the Mr. Magoo shit Armisen did was in poor taste, I wasn't surprised because this is comedy. Mocking the blind gets cheap laughs. But the real thing that annoyed me was how they made it seem like Paterson couldn't do his job. No one as far as I've heard or read has ever said Paterson was unprepared to take on the job. Both Democrats and Republicans and Illinois were pretty happy to see him take the post because Paterson is considered to be highly intelligent, self-deprecating and pragmatic. Alluding that he's incompetent to do his job even though he was dully elected as the replacement for former New York Gov. Elliot Spitzer, made no sense.
Much like how Armisen's original portrayal of Barack as a clueless neophyte didn't make any sense based on who Obama is and how he actually carries himself. But maybe this is the default here. All black politicians are comically unprepared even if they are not in real life. Insert joke.
Hardy, har-har! Lame, SNL! Lame, Fred Armisen! LAME!!!
Black professional party girl Genevieve Jones with Alex Logsdail and Kate Werble at the Guggenheim Young Collectors Council 2007 Artist's Ball, New York, 13 December 2007. (Photo from Art Review by Tyler Coburn)
Yes, Virginia, you CAN Rent-A-Negro for your holiday party! Yes you can!
Now that Obama has been elected, a tipster inside a PR firm tells us, clients are demanding "an increased number of African Americans added to the guest list" at their holiday parties. In the spirit of hope! The email can't really be "verified," but appears genuine and is just too important not to share. This firm has even assembled an official internal "Diversified Holiday Guest List," in which they rank the top 10 acceptable black socialite attendees, in order of desirability. Uh... yes we can?
Yes. Bringing your new, sparkly, hopeful (and paid for) black BFF to a swanky holiday function is now the fresh, dope, chill thing to do. After all, you can't purport to live in the post-racial era if it's still just you, Heidi Montag and the rest of the Gossip Girl crowd at the party getting tipsy on Cosmos, Mojitos, Mochatinis and Manhattans. That's not post-racial at all. But paying black socialites Genevieve Jones and Maggie Betts to hold back your hair while you hurl is the bee's knees! No one will ever accuse you of being racist again. And how could you be? You paid black people to be at your party! You're the Rainbow Coalition and a United Colors of Benetton ad French kissing Barack Obama rolled into U2's "One!"
All of this made me think of Damali Ayo's oft misunderstood, satirical/socio-political Web site and book, both entitled "How To Rent A Negro." On the site Ayo offered rates for blackness rental for everything from having living proof that you can't be racist because you have black friends to charing $100 for "hair touching."
Created back in 2003, it's almost like Ayo fortolled of the Obama era, where black people would finally be paid for answering annoying questions ("Do you tan?") and being told you look just like that one other black person the clueless tool you work with knows.
On my Facebook page I described this all as falling back into the appropriation of ourselves for our "uniqueness," re: "not whiteness," we have going. I basically said we're furniture. Black people have a history of being treated like furniture (or horses or luggage or pick your object that can be bought and sold), but it's only been in recent history where we've been able to cash in on this phenomenon. So, like Ayo joked -- half seriously -- if people are going to appropriate your cool the least you can do is get a check out of it. Think of all the times we were the only Negro at the party for free?
But remember these wise words from a fictional stripper named Diamond, my would-be rental social black butterflies -- make that money, but don't let the money make you.
Now if you don't mind, I need to put up my "Rent A Black Snob" service where I will gladly go to your parties and insult/mock your blackness impaired friends, all in a faux upper crusty accent!
It only took Fred Armisen and SNL a year, but they finally did a Barack parody that made sense and was funny (I do enjoy 1960s Rat Pack vibes). This is largely because they finally gave (fake) Barack a personality other than have him play the foil or straight man to Amy Poehler's Hillary Clinton and Darrell Hammond's John McCain. I am interested to see where they will take this new, Lithium-like approach to Obama's modus operandi.
It's a vast improvement compared to their spoof of the second Obama v. Clinton debate where Armisen simply repeated back everything Darrell Hammond's Tim Russert said as if Obama were incapable of independent thought. Parody is, after all, supposed to be rooted in some truth and I don't know anyone who thinks Barack is a dullard. This spoof at least got at something that both fascinates and maddens people about Barack, his unflappability.
I guess it would be too much to ask Dave Chappelle to come back.
This doesn't mean that I don't think comedians David Alan Grier and DL Hughley deserve their own shows ...
What am I saying? They're the last two black comics who should have their own shows. Katt Williams should have his own show before these two and I'm not even a fan, so ... seriously cable networks -- Grier and Hughley?
It's not that I didn't think they could pull off a good show. I know they can't pull off a good show. I watched most of Grier's Chocolate Newsand Hughley's DL Hughley Breaks the News through my fingers.
Both have the ability to be funny in their moments, but I don't think Grier's been funny since he stop directly working with someone for "Wayans" as a last name. And Hughley, to me, has never been funny. I've always found his comedy mean spirited, petty and unimaginative. (But he was really nice that one time I interviewed him for work!) But Comedy Central and CNN did not ask me which black comics would be good at a politically-based comedy show.
(Aisha Tyler, anyone? She's smart and funny. Anyone! Did they even bother calling her? Chris Rock? Steve Harvey? Wanda Sykes? -- Non sequitor: God, I'd LOVE to watch Wanda Sykes do a political comedy show with Aisha Tyler. They could invite Monique and do an all black girl parody of The View. Jasmine Guy could play the Barbara Walters character! Wait ... no one steal my show idea!I have to make some phone calls! -- Marlon Wayans could do a show. Hell, even Sinbad or Arsenio Hall would have been good and both those guys need a second bite at the apple.)
But nope, no one asked me. So this is what we have:
A recent skit from Grier's "Chocolate News" on "Thugs Against High Gas Prices."
A clip of DL Hughley talking to Freddie Mac, not the mortgage giant, but "Ashy Larry" as Freddie the Mac Daddy of Federal Loan Financing.
Both shows are "edgy," and by edgy I mean profane because, really, that's appears to be the only kind of edgy that matters. Grier, while not exactly Eddie Murphy, manages to pull off playing a multitude of characters, but seeing him still makes me think of In Living Color and thinking of In Living Color only makes me wonder if Chocolate News would be more palatable to me if it was Damon and Keenan running the show again? Wouldn't it be better to see seven black performers with a job rather than two? Or to just see all those Wayanses hire themselves to put on a show again? Yeah, "Little Man" was an embarrassment, but I say, c'mon, TV, give them another chance! They can be good again!
As for Hughley's show I was amazed by the "shut your mouth bitches" line from Ashy Larry, if only because I'm watching CNN. It's one thing to be wild and raunchy on Comedy Central, home of everything raunchy in comedy, they have no morals. They show Sarah Silverman with a potty mouth and a bed-wetting problem, South Park and that gross Kenny Versus Spenny thing that I hope to dear God was canceled.
Seeing Grier play a transsexual whose boob keeps popping out is actually at home in that environment. But Hughley is his own island on a network that is primarily about straight news. And it is surreal and painful to watch actual reporters interact with Hughley as opposed to joke reporters like the ones on Chocolate News and The Daily Show. Real reporters are not funny and I image the ones who showed up for Hughley's premiere episode were wondering why CNN was wasting their news gathering time? You work hard, you pound the pavement, you pester sources and you beg your producer for camera time and this is what they give you?
Hughley seems out of place on the network, even if he did get a newsworthy nugget out of yet another defecting Republican, this time former Bush press secretary Scott McClellan who said last week that he is voting for Barack Obama on Hughley's show. I hate to say this, but ... Glen Beck's show made more sense. Now, I don't like Glen Beck and Beck has run off to FOX News, leaving his old gig at CNN Headline News, but Beck was/is supposed to be funny and did a political/news-of-the-day interview show that didn't make me want to drink Drano. It would have made more sense for CNN to find someone not necessarily like Beck, but someone with his basic skills set, like Whoopi Goldberg, Dennis Miller or Lewis Black, heck, Eddie Murphy might do it if you ask nice enough, but someone who has the ability to be funny and can also pull off a decent interview.
Naturally, I wasn't the only person "amazed" by Hughley's show. Dr. Boyce Watkins (and many other critics, primarily black) are pretty much ready to grab the pitchforks and torches and send DL back to the comedy plantation from wince he came.
In the following clip, Watkins shouts out every black comedian as being cool-to-great with the exception of Hughley who he says he's never been impressed by.
"You don't bring a gun to a baby shower. You don't put a liquor sign in a church," Watkins gripes, before getting into the flip side of it, that CNN has had many black commentators and journalists, yet the first African American to get their own show on CNN is DL, a comedian. Watkins name drops Roland Martin, mentioning that he's been on a regular on CNN for a while yet has no show.
Um ... yeah. I noticed that too.
Here's Watkins' rant in full where he declares DL America's latest "nappy headed ho" in reference to statements DL made during the infamous Don Imus/Rutgers Women's Basketball team scandal. (Fast-forward to 1:52 minutes in to skip Watkins rambling about his recent trips around the country.)
Officially, as a lover of the First Amendment and a believer in our often messed up free market economy, I am all for Grier and Hughley getting the same opportunities to humiliate themselves and other black people on television just as countless individuals have done before. Their shows might get better. It might pave the way to Aisha Tyler eventually having her own show, but I'm probably not going to make the point to pencil in Hughley and Chocolate News as must-see-TV unless something revolutionary happens in the writing of the shows. These shows were not made for me.
Which takes me to Watkins' other concern about DL -- that this show, much like CNN's "Black In America" and DL's statements about Don Imus, aren't for or about black people -- that this is humor insulting black Americans to delight a non-black audience. Is Watkins right? Whereas I, the women at What About Our Daughters and Watkins saw something of concern, David Zurawik, a critic with The Baltimore Sun, thought the premiere showed promise.
(I)t looks like CNN could have a winner in its new comedy show, D.L. Hughley Breaks the News. And more important, Saturday night television and its audience could be enriched by Hughley's engaging and non-conventional take on American life -- if the cable channel gives the production time to mature and find its voice.
Is this a case of black Snobs like myself and Watkins being too hard on a pair of successful black comedians or is this yet another case of great for the performer, bad for all of blackness played out in front of a live studio audience yet again?
Funny, yet depressing, then hopeful, but still ... a touch depressing. Nothing like seeing almost everything wrong about the last eight years summed up in a two minute parody of one of Anheuser-Busch's most famous advertisement campaigns. No matter how you feel about either candidate, I'm so glad there's no way I'll wake up on Inauguration Day 2009 and Georgie Porgie Destroy-Everything-I-Touch Puddin'-n-Pie will be there with his hand on the Bible ... again. That said ... OBAMA '08! (Courtesy of reader Nalia).
When a reader sent me a shout on Facebookabout this story I just knew it had to be a hoax. Unfortunately for Republican veep candidate Sarah Palin, it is not. She got Punk'd by some wacky Canadian comics.
Oh Canada, indeed!
Posing as French President Nicolas Sarkozy, the Masked Avengers got all kinds of Crank Yankers on their Alaskan neighbor and it quickly goes from funny to sad to scary as no matter how out of bounds the duo gets Palin does seem to realize she's being played. Even when they bring up the "documentary"/Larry Flint porno starring her doppelganger or banging Sarkozy's model/pop star wife Carla Bruni, she just keeps agreeing and going along until they finally fess up to who they are.
Gawker'sAlex Carnevale writes, "From the sound of it, even the Masked Avengers got a little spooked at how seriously they're being taken here."
A: Thank you very much. You know my wife Carla would love to meet you, even though you know she was a bit jealous that I was supposed to speak to you today.
P: Well, give her a big hug for me.
A: You know my wife is a popular singer and a former top model and she's so hot in bed. She even wrote a song for you.
P: Oh my goodness, I didn't know that.
A: Yes, in French it's called de rouge a levre sur un cochon, or if you prefer in English, Joe the Plumber...it's his life, Joe the Plumber.
P: Maybe she understands some of the unfair criticism but I bet you she is such a hard worker, too, and she realizes you just plow through that criticism.
A: I just want to be sure. That phenomenon Joe the Plumber. That's not your husband, right?
P: That's not my husband but he's a normal American who just works hard and doesn't want government to take his money.
A: Yes, yes, I understand we have the equivalent of Joe the Plumber in France. It's called Marcel, the guy with bread under his armpit.
I don't know if taking time out for Saturday Night Live in the middle of a heated campaign was a smooth move for John McCain, but it was a hilarious move.
Reliving some of his SNL glory days, John McCain did a great parody of John McCain (including the nervous blinking, but I don't think he was doing that on purpose), with Tina Fey as Sarah Palin, perfect as ever ... going rogue by threatening to never leave the national stage. It's either the White House or "the white Oprah." Brava and bravo, Fey and McCain.
McCain was also pretty good on the Weekend Update segment introducing new political moves like "The Double Maverick" and "The Sad Grandpa" in which he said the strategy was to whine that Obama would have plenty of chances to be president and it was McCain's turn. Once again, what will SNL do once this is all over? The comedy show will be doing a special election episode on Monday on NBC.
The show also had some fun at MSNBC's Keith Olbermann expense. The sketch was a bit wordy and ran long (just like My Fair Keithy). It was also more than eight minutes and starred the evenings co-host Ben Affleck who kept cracking himself up while trying to shout all his lines. It eventually hit the funny button hard when Affleck did a cheesy send up of Olbermann's sometimes self-righteous "Special Comments" by making it about him trying to get a three bedroom apartment that wouldn't take him because he owned a cat. A fluffy, white, fey as all get out, cat.
There was even a sketch of "The View" and while it wasn't as good as the above three, if you closed your eyes Kristen Wiig's Elisabeth Hasselbeck was so good it was horrifying. Fred Armisen's Joy Behar was both right and wrong and one-dimensional and Joy's not that bad. As for Kennan, your Whoopi sucked, but you're the only black person on the show. I guess you can only do so much with what they give you. And Casey New Girl What's Your Face? That was a Jennifer Aniston parody? Was that the ONLY celeb they could think for you to do (or the only celeb you could do)? Lame, new girl. Very lame.
It seems the brain of the Republican Party is now horrified at the monster they helped create. Where will they go now? David Frum, David Brooks, Scott McClellan, Christopher Buckley, Christopher Hitchens, Peggy Noonan, Kathleen Parker, Charles Krauthammer (even though he still hates Obama), ringleader George Will -- the list goes on and on and they all blame, Alaskan Snow Bride Sarah Palin, but as Colbert drolly points out -- really? The party's been off the rails for years now. This is the excuse you're using?
On Larry King Live last night Larry King and CNN political map guru John King mentioned that the rift over Palin could lead to a break-up of the party. When Larry King asked the female Republicans on his panel about this I agreed with them in that I don't see this happening.
But I do see a mass purging coming if John McCain loses (or wins). A sort of Spanish Inquisition for modern conservatives, only instead of being drawn and quartered or waterboarded, they'll just be exiled to Berkley, Calif. or Greenwich Village, NY or the other anti-America parts of America.
I hope you like Gay Pride parades and spoken word poets, Peggy Noonan. Wherever those exist is where the RNC is setting up the concentration camps.
On BBC Two'sGraham Norton Show, British actress Thandie Newton and comedic actor Ricky Gervais did their own reading of Larry Flynt latest opus, the Hustler produced porno flick, "Nailin' Palin."
The trio are surprised to find that the prono is actually a somewhat cleverly written satire ... with unclothed boobs, references to Lance Bass and a lot of other NSFW tidbits. In the above clip, Newton proves herself to be a good sport and that her cornball American accents are getting better and better. First she smirked her way through Condoleezza Rice's verbal ticks and mawking in "W." and here she is doing her own version of Gov. Sarah Palin.
The skit was sort of funny, but lacked a lot of edge. To bring Maya Rudolph back to play Michelle Obama, but to just have her do what they typically would have her do (sing something silly) seemed lazy. They basically didn't bother to find something humorous about Michelle or her personality or the chemistry between her and Barack. Michelle does have a personality after all, but the writers seemed to sidestep that all together. (Out of fear maybe? Lack of creativity?) I did enjoy the House Democrats singing "Our House" and Kennan Thompson as Rev. Jeremiah Wright singing, "White devil be crazy." The term "white devil" is really more of a Nation of Islam thing, but I'll let that one slide.
But there was an over all lack of bite. I really don't think the Dems are that bland where they couldn't find something to skewer. They have an easy time embracing the slickness that is Slick Willy, but Bill Clinton, like George W. Bush, is pretty easy to lampoon. Both of their flaws are so close to the surface. Michelle and Barack aren't obvious foils, but ... really ... I could have written something better. I don't know why they just don't go full bore into the sometimes over-seriousness and self-importance of the campaign. I very much enjoyed The Daily Show's spoof of Obama's bio video at the DNC entilted, "Barack Obama: He Completes Us." When the "Circle of Life" started playing from "The Lion King" I fell out of my chair laughing.
But that's The Daily Show.
That said ... this last clip, for me, was the funniest thing on the show Saturday night. I totally went to college with that stereotype: the white quasi-Rastafarian, stoner, hackysack kid with the filthy white boy dreadlocks. That guy ... very easy to make fun of, indeed.
SNL alum Chevy Chase, who thinks Sarah Palin bombed on "Saturday Night Live". "Quite frankly, it's a big mistake to let her go on," Chevy told Access Hollywood at the Give Food a Chance benefit in New York. "What was brilliant about ['SNL' chief] Lorne [Michaels] was that he had nothing written for Sarah and that apparently she cannot improvise herself out of a paper bag!...
"On 'Weekend Update,' that was her big chance," he said. "Nothing."
But Chevy was critical not only of Sarah's comedic chops, but of the political campaign of her running mate, Sen. John McCain.
"The management behind McCain's campaign has been dumb. This has only helped accentuate the problem of his judgment in choosing, in such a cynical way, a candidate like Sarah Palin for vice president. I think the last thing that they would want right about now is to have the rest of America knowing all that... to have her be seen on 'SNL,' certainly never there. If anything, you just want her to be seen just from a distance."
Chances are if you read this blog you are considering voting for Barack Obama, my fair Hopey McChangey for president. Good for you. But no doubt, you may be exhibiting some symptoms of campaign fatigue as you wait for John McCain and Sarah "2012" Palin to come up with something sexier than Joe the Plummer to distract the populace. But why so serious? Sure, this is a really important election with big issues and our country is in dire straits. That doesn't mean you don't deserve a little chuckle.
Rather than my usual menagerie of weird items with Barack's face on it for sale, this Tuesday, with two weeks until the deed is done, enjoy the lighter side of the bitchiest political ever. Don't forget to wear your anti-crazy amulets to keep Rep. Michele Bachmann from branding you as "unAmerican!" this Halloween! Joseph McCartney LIVES!
Here are some sad little cookies an overseas reader Lesa sent me regarding a pro-Obama function in London. As I wrote her, "Why do those poor cookies look like they have an Obama stamp stuck to them with Elmer's Glue. I sure it's just icing, but ... very Elmer's Glue." I think I'll pass on a bite.
Out of all the things I've noticed about John McCain in the debates is how much the man blinks. He often looks insane, his eyes fluttering away every time Obama moved his lips. With every utter and stutter from Obama, McCain's eyes went a-flutter. Sometimes in amusement, sometimes in frustration, sometimes in befuddlement and sometimes for no reason at all.
But that didn't stop me from wondering what the hell was going on ...
Top Ten Reasons Why John McCain Blinked So Much During the Debate
1. He has no sweat glands and it is his way to cool. Re: Eye panting 2. Chronic dry eye? 3. He was inspired by that guy from The Diving Bell and the Butterfly 4. He was blinking Morose Code to Cindy McCain, "Need to buy more Depends!" 5. He was flirting with the moderator. 6. It was 127 failed attempts of Sarah Palin's patented "wink." Just couldn't get it right. 7. He was having a minor stroke 8. He is secretly one of Snow White's Seven Dwarfs -- McBashful (McBashful has an alter ego called McBitchy. He was there Wednesday night too.) 9. He was catching the vapors 10. He was flirting with "his friends."
