Here comes the Fairness Doctrine Redux which is about as fair as declawing is to a Tabby; it has nothing to fear from the shredded couch, but it can be terrorized by a rabbit. And that's what the Dem's are - a genus of cottontailed mammals run amuck due to brainless overpopluation and hindgut digestion. Sorry Australia, maybe not the metaphor you would have liked...
Daschle calls for a new constituency of “emotionally invested” Democrat radio listeners to counteract the alleged threat to those “in public life” was as out-of-touch with the nature of Talk Radio listeners as it was with the principles that make Talk Radio work.
I’m in a unique position to piece together the elements of both his fears and his desire.
When I returned from two tours of duty in Vietnam, ready to dive back into the wild partying of the `60’s I left, the party was over. I took a job as a radio D.J. in a Northern California town and moved quickly from Midday to Mornings, by turning phone-in song requests for into brief interviews.
The power of hearing oneself, or one’s friends speaking on the radio was a media intoxication that, to this day, turns listeners into fans, fans into devotees. I took on production manager responsibilities and drove the station toward talk using this simple sensibility. As our numbers rose, we split into both AM and FM stations, and our broadcast signal fanned out to reach a much wider audience. After we boomed, I became bored with the repetition and moved to Los Angeles to follow my dream of working in Television and performing stand-up comedy.
Although it may seem like a leap from the windowless studio to the nightclub stage, to me it was just “working the microphone” again. The only difference was that the walls and distance between the audience and me was gone. This new entertainment intimacy gave me a powerful emotional interaction that can be described, but must be experienced to be fully understood.
The tenuous connection that made on-air phone interviews into personal, life-affirming declarations was now a full-on sense of shared spirituality in the comedy club. When all the elements are in play, a great comedy performance is literally on the same level as a religious rite of community.
While performing on the comedy circuit, I continued to produce television and began writing and directing for the theater. Mostly I focused on comedies because I love to hear people laugh, but regardless of the temperament of the show, I always used the audience-inclusive elements I learned in radio and comedy. This lead to grateful audiences, glowing reviews, awards, and rewards.
In 1994, one project in particular brought me back to examining Talk Radio. I was hired on to help re-work and tighten the script for Rush Limbaugh In Night School, a brilliant one-man show by Charlie Varon, and direct its opening run in San Francisco.
It was 1994 and Limbaugh was King.
Charlie Varon and I share an enormous love of `50’s and `60’s Radio personalities, especially Bob and Ray, Long John Nebel, Malachy McCourt, and Jean Shepherd. We agreed that Shepherd the best of them all, a most gifted storyteller, whose nightly show on WOR was like watching a film through a set of earphones.
Every Saturday night Shepherd would broadcast live from The Limelight Club in Manhattan. If you felt you were outside the mainstream of life, Shepherd was a godsend - a guy whose greatest talent was making his listeners feel that he not only understood their feelings of disenfranchisement, but that he shared them. I always felt as though he was talking directly to me, that we were partners in the daily struggle against the squares, the meatballs, and the conformists.
It was my pre-teen induction into a subversively absurd camaraderie, the “thinking kid’s” Mad Magazine. Shepherd died in 1999 and, in keeping with his sense loopy sense of rebelliousness, I wish him a fond, “Excelsior, Fathead!”
So, with my childhood grounding in spoken word radio, direct experience working in radio - both performing and producing, with 14 years of listening to Limbaugh climb his way to the top, and nearly a decade of listening Michael Savage strip down the Talk formula like a Marine strips down his rifle – I can say with absolute surety:
Going toe-to-toe against Conservative Talk Radio will damage the Democratic Party so severely that it may never fully recover. It is a wrong-headed leap into battle against a foe as ephemeral as the radio waves they seek to dominate.
In fact, the underlying Democratic notion that Conservative Talk Radio is a conspiracy of the GOP sets up whomever steps forward as the Great Liberal Hope to be knocked-out by a self-inflicted punch.
Here are a few key points the Democratic Talk Radio “counter conspiracy”:
The Object Of Comedy Is To Make People Laugh, Not To “Feel Good”
The therapeutic power of regular laughter is a given. What many people, and some comedians, are unable to do is separate the physical act of laughing from the performance that causes the laughter. So, in cases where the content of the material (joke, comment, story, image) is deemed to be politically incorrect by the audience, the laughter is deemed “bad” and indulging in it immediately brands the person as insensitive, racist, or worse.
Example: In the Bay Area during the `80’s there were several comedy clubs. Some appealed to local people, some to tourists, some were “white and blue collar” some were “politically sensitive.” The PunchLine was a downtown glass, brass, and ass oak furniture club that booked comics who attracted audiences of mainly local men and women with what would be considered mainstream middleclass jobs and lives. The Other Café (actual name) was a converted restaurant in the Haight district that catered mainly to what is now called “alternative” lifestyle people, fringe groups, and self-imposed outcasts.
At the PunchLine, the comedy was all over the map. Everything was fair game – sex and sexuality, politics, marriage, drugs, kids, home life, jobs, anger, prejudice, etc. There was plenty of edge, the laughs were thunderous, and the shows were raucous and packed to the walls.
The Other Café, while encouraging comics to do whatever they liked, was unfortunately saddled by a captive local audience of people who wanted something cheap to do, and at the same time carried more than a little emotional baggage into nearly every show. While hissing was almost unheard of at the Punchline, it was a common occurrence at the Other, where the audience evaluated every joke – hissing at the ones they found offensive as a warning to the comic to “steer clear.”
So, while any comic could do just about any material at the Punch, the Other was not the place to do material about race, sex, politics, or drugs – unless you represented the requisite victim group who laid claim to each issue. So Blacks joked about racism, Lesbians and Gays made light of “homophobia,” Lefties degraded the government and America, and Dopers mocked the addiction warnings of the DEA while falling further and further into addiction.
The problem was, the only comics who could consistently please all the fractious Other audiences were clowns, stooges, and prop comics, who have no point of view. The was not the case at the punch, were laughs were the currency and politics/agendas were left for safe-keeping at the entrance door.
The Other is, once again, a restaurant. The PunchLine still packs `em in.
Which leads me to my next point:
Homogenous Groups Prefer Targeted Comedy, Diverse Groups Prefer Untargeted Comedy
The interactional dynamic that shapes a crowd into an audience is a sense of shared experience with other members in the group. This feeling of social communion with strangers is the fundamental attraction of church, sporting events, concerts, and other events where people “lose themselves” in a crowd. For most of these experiences, an “us versus them” atmosphere prevails as anywhere from a benign acknowledgement of acceptable differences to a prompt for jihad and elimination of the oppressor.
Since the homogenous group has a relatively fixed point of view and a pre-disposition to place their mutual concerns first, topics tend to track closely to these areas.
In a mixed group, the overlap of shared concerns is more narrow, and subjects deemed threatening or insensitive to any sub-group must be avoided at the risk of fracturing the larger assembly.
Conservatives, by their nature, are a relatively homogenous group. Liberals, by definition, are a mixed group. Comedy that works in a nightclub is unworkable in The Big Tent.
Which brings me to:
Circuses Do Not Work On Radio
· Jesters Must Make Fun Of Both The Peasant And The King
· The Ability To Laugh At Our Shortcomings And Pain Is A Sign Of Sanity
· It Is Impossible To Build A Lasting Consensus When There Is More Compromise Than Agreement Within A Group
Thank you Existing Liberals Are Incapable Of Mixing Comedy And Vitriol - the necessary ingredients for entertaining political commentary.
Liberal leaders are currently categorically unable to build a coherent point of view consensus or audience bond, because, by definition, they exploit extreme diversity and even more extreme tolerance to build their constituency. The imagined Democratic solidarity is, in actuality, an uneasy amalgam of many groups whose goals and agendas often work at cross-purposes.
But rather than launch into an abstraction of the current Democratic stumper, I’ll give you an ironclad analogy.
As I said above, “Daschle is neither a brain, Maher is not a brain OR a brawler.” At this point in history, brainy celebrities must be able to brawl or they are marginalized as out-of-touch pundits, alienated agenda pukers, or egghead malcontents.
If Carville wasn’t the fiercest backbiting, swamphumper around, no one would listen to his stat spewing. If Hannity wasn’t “up anyone’s ass in an eye blink” no one would care about his heartfelt patriotism.
As American’s we want a fight - blood oaths and retribution and grudges - just like the WWF until a bunch of neutered males stole their initials back. Nyah, Nyah.
Well, Talk Media is a boxing ring. And there are two places to fight. Center ring and “on the ropes.” In the center ring, if you are not slugging you are dancing. Fans love slugging, but tire quickly of dancing.
On the ropes, if you are not beating the crap out of your opponent, you’re probably getting your ass thoroughly beaten.
Fans love the ropes, not as much as slugging, but most fighters spend more time on the ropes than trading haymakers. This is what Maher forgot when he thought that moving to HBO would help him. He’s a “rope fighter” not a knockout puncher. The ropes are an advantage for an “in fighter” and way too crowded for a slugger.
When Maher was on Politically Correct, the restrictions of Standards and Practices worked to his advantage, supplied the “ropes” to body punch his softball guests.
Out in the center ring of HBO he will dance, dance, dance the night away, like Lou Costello in the ring with The Bayonne Bruiser: swat, prance, crawl between legs, run in circles, and hide his head under the spit bucket.
So he is safe from a knockout blow, but there is no rope to push the opponent against. If you doubt this, take the gloves off and call in Limbaugh or Savage with the restrictions they are used to on FCC-choked AM radio.
Maher would be tapping the opponent with one hand and using the other to unload his boxers.
REAL TIME
I have several points about HBO"s Real Time with Bill Maher. I was bored to tears by the show. Maher is a Guilty Liberal and an utter phony.
1 - Tell Your Maher, Tell Your Pa
As I said yesterday, and have been saying for weeks since hearing of his HBO slot: Maher is not a brain OR a brawler. His glossy sound bites indicate content retention rather than context navigation muscle. And his threshold of self-deception is exceptionally low – he seems to believe his own hype.
Maher never went on the attack without immediately evading, and in a few instances fleeing the argument with and ill-fitting segue. The opening monologue was without a doubt the limpest, most audience manipulative pieces of crap I have ever heard. “…blah, blah, blah that’s what they get for letting a gentile do the negotiating (awkward pause waiting for laughs) And speaking of gentiles, Ms. Germany is going to Baghdad..... (???)… And speaking of urban centers in Arab countries, I hear that the Beirut Starbucks is…
I know, I know, the excuse du jour is that he’s “de-constructing the stand-up form” to add another layer of brilliance to the gag. Bullshit. De-construction isn’t shitty material - it’s great material pulled apart with élan. I counted 8 writers in the tail credit crawl and THIS is the material he premieres with? Either he doesn’t know good material from bad, or he believes he has the god-like power to turn dross into gold.
2 - Maher’s Constituency
A couple of vertigo-inducing swish pans of the audience showed that it was a small, nearly exclusively White mix of blue collar types that skewed toward the dentally challenged with a smattering of frat and sorority types placed at strategic close-up positions. At curtain, the audience’s thunderous standing ovation was alternately encouraged and dismissed by Maher as he sought to find their control knob. He didn’t and, for the rest of the show, I watch one of the poorest performances by an audience in recent history orchestrated by a guy who is known for playing to the gallery.
3 - Rohrabacher Cleans Maher’s Clock
There were also several responses from Maher that sounded exactly like Alex B. “on the run” - bait and dodge, bait and dodge, jump ship when pressed for logic, info source, or proof. Although I imagine Maher believed Rohrabacher to be a soft yet credible target, opening with this lop-sided interaction simply cut the balls off the show in a handful of sentences. Maher began with a broad, predictable conspiracy swipe at the administration but was rapidly reduced to whining “But why now? Why deal with Hussein now?” At this point he was out of gas and awkwardly tied off the interview to introduce “Feature Report” by some comic he though was funny enough to evolve up from Wednesday Night Open Mike gigs.
4 - The Feature
I can’t remember the chump’s name, but i will know him henceforth as “The Open Mic'er of Political Commentary.” A schlub with puny, obvious material. Aside from his goofy buck teeth and lip-pursing while waiting for the audience to give him the laugh he knows he deserves, this schmuck is a High School Talent Show impersonation of a Daily Show field reporter - a Steve Carrel wannabe with Rob Corddry chops. In a black sack suit yet, with a garish “look-at-me” tie to signal, “no taste here.” Wheee. A Wacky One!
He teased the piece just to give Maher “cover time” to seat his “A” list guests at the roundtable.
5 - Maher Reveals His “A” List People
During recent interviews, Maher has repeated his claim that, during his run on Politically Incorrect, he was forced to suffer the lowbrow likes of Carrot Top and other clowns who represent the basest form of comedic engagement—making people laugh. On HBO, Maher promised he would assemble the crème de la crème of intellectual assiduousness and credibility.
But rather than scoop up a contentious mix of liberal and conservative gunslingers, he brings us a tenured PoMo Brother whose claim to fame is his latest book, “I Love to Bang Black Women.” Not Cornell West with a couple of Jack Daniels under his belt, but a whiny, America hater who has spent most of his anticipated reparations on a load of Flashy-Academe clothes that say collegiate but scream Chess King.
NOTE: Let me explain this “I Love to Bang Black Women” comment. The published title of his book is “I Love to Date Black Women,” but dating is banging, attempting to bang, or failing to bang said women. “Dating a Woman” would involve Carbon 14 and a radioactive half-life extrapolation.
Next, Larry Miller, oft-cited as the Conservative Comedian as if that would make him an oddity. Every comedian who owns a home and has kids is a conservative - unless he also has way too much money, has made or is in the process of making the leap to Film, or is fucking every woman they can get their hooks on while his wifey looks the other way - probably at a nut-brown Ecuadorian fry cook.
Miller is appropriately self-deprecating for a panel but looked glazed as he tried to figure out what Maher wanted him to say next. Larry was scripted to be Falstaff but lapsed into shtick at the drop of a hat rather than working the material on the table. So rather than the stupefying inanity and playfulness of Falstaff in 1 Henry IV, Miller gives us the Sir John of 2 Henry IV, where the less flattering and entertaining elements of the character are obviously out of place.
Black clown, white clown, and finally...
America’s best-known Righty Anklebiter. Without going into a description of this Assault Robo-Bitch eager-beaver and, because Maher alluded to it at least twice during the show, she is probably there as a reward for being the whiff of arrogant, contrarian poon that keeps him “going out clubbing with her.”
Clubbing? How old is Maher? 23? 24?
Ann has all the charm of a second string Cheer Leader scrub who will never bed the quarterback, but has a horde of panting, second-string, scrub guys in her Rolodex. Her beaten-dog look has become increasingly popular along with the rise of Calvin Klein and Pro-Anorexia websites.
Ann has all the charm of a second string Cheer Leader scrub who will never bed the quarterback, but has a horde of panting, second-string, scrub guys in her Rolodex. Her beaten-dog look has become increasingly popular along with the rise of Calvin Klein and Pro-Anorexia websites.
So there you have it. The “A” list. And, wonder of wonders, Maher announces that Larry Miller is so “A” that he will be back, taking up another seat, for the next show. Somewhere Carrot Top sips his Gin Rickey in anger and dials 1-800-CALLATT.
6 – IRAQ!
Uh-huh. As much as I would like to give Maher the benefit of the doubt on why he chose this as the kick-off “A” list topic (He probably thought he would have Rohrabachers head on a pike next to the roundtable) I must again refer to the comedian with house and kids point of view. I know Maher’s act because I have an 11 year-old. I’ll substitute BED for IRAQ and it goes like this.
DAD: You have to go to bed.
MAHER: I don’t want to go to bed.
DAD: You have to go to bed.
MAHER: But I don’t want to go to bed
DAD: It’s 9:30. Time for bed
MAHER: Why? I’m not tired!
DAD: Because going to bed now will let you have a good day tomorrow.
MAHER: None of my friends go to bed at 9:30
DAD: I’m not talking about your friends. You have to go to bed.
MAHER: Why didn’t you make me go to bed at 9:30 on Saturday?
DAD: Because you could sleep late the next day. You have to be up early.
MAHER: If you were a good Dad you wouldn’t make me do things I don’t want to do.
DAD: That’s the Dad job. It sucks, but it has to be done.
MAHER: I hate you because you are not even listening to me!
What Maher and the protesters fail to realize is that they are expressing their opinion. That is our Constitutional Right to dissent. That being said, there is no right to take action beyond First Amendment dissent unless you fully support Second Amendment dissent, which Maher and his peers don’t. So they don’t like the Administrations Policy toward war and Iraq, they march and scream, and give cover to the Black Block wimps who trash businesses because their hippie parents played Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young to them when they were in utero. Uberwimps.
If the Protests and Media Silliness fails to stop the Day One Tomahawk sortie, they may continue to protest ad infinitum, unless they are willing to use the Second Amendment for precisely what it was devised for: When the government abridges individual rights or fails to represent the majority opinion of the American people, we get to terminate the lawmakers with prejudice whether extreme or matter-of-fact.
That’s what the Second Amendment is. Not a “gun nut” mistake that the FF’s overlooked. If a government - be it American, Iraqi, French, South African - abuses its responsibilities to serve the people, its congressional brains should be splattered under the rotunda. “Get us another batch of politicos, but make them clean up this glatch first so they remember who they serve.”
Liberals can’t stomach that, so Jackson and Sharpton run national extortion rackets, Hillary tongues Arafat's wife and the Lubavitcher Rebbe, Cheney makes millions building and bombing, Trafficant campaigns from a jail cell, Marion Barry “smokes” his competition, Turkey gets offered $26B for the privilege of being defended from Hussein.
Thank you for your heartfelt Anti War protests. Now, either pick up a weapon or a box of super-absorbent tampons large enough to staunch a wound from a .40 caliber round. The White Trash and Hillbillies you so vehemently despise are getting restless and sick of your anti-American affiliations, e.g., the WWP/ANSWER seditionists.
7 - Lumpy Segue # n:
Once we heard the Black Guy who Bangs Black Babes rattle off his anti-war platitudes, Ann Culter seig heils her way into the corner, and Larry Milter squeeze bits of his act into a couple of dead-air cracks, Maher abruptly shifted gears with a klunk and announced that America is addicted to Speed.
Not caffeine, diet pills, ephedrine, crystal meth, crank, dexedrine, ritalin or any other metabolism boosting compounds per se, but all of them and none of them at the same time. “Deforesting Colombia” “Starbucks Machiato’s” and Brittany Spears “White Powder Spill” are scattered across the roundtable a fair game for any and all comments (or one-liners) about drug addiction. “Maybe that’s why we’re going to war!” is the import - as though we want France and Germany to “Talk nice, when you talk to me you fucking monkeys!”
Unless I missed some crucial underground newsflash in the past few years, the Drug of Choice of a A New Generation is either marijuana or ecstasy: yielding either profound lethargy or abject disassociation.
I was under the impression that the rise in popularity of Crack displaced the Straw Sniffers and drew a dividing line in the snow - on one side societal drop-outs in a hypnotic world of thievery and intoxication, on the other, weekend snorters who are hocking themselves down to eventually join the other side.
Knowing now that the Administrations “Crack Monster” myths were clearly DEA propaganda to justify more personnel, overtime, property seizures, and exotic equipment, we are left with a sub-strata of dissolute addicts who, for the most part, are beyond the reach of both the law and government rehab handouts.
I would hardly put a tabloid cover of Brittany Spears on the screen to say Mr. and Mrs. America is so wired on cocaine that they “need to kill something to vent their energy.”
In fact, the very idea is preposterous. Approximately 127 million adults in the U.S. are overweight, 60 million obese, and 9 million severely obese. That’s 196 million people who do not fit the profile of “wired coke head.” A diet pill cause murder? Now, who is juggling the stats to make his point?
Maher hears the word “obesity” from Miller and, klunk, shifts gears like a moonshine delivery boy trying to outrun Boss Hogg.
8 - The Feature Piece
The Open Mic'er schlub launches into a wobbly monologue that uses hamfisted news actualities – looking like they were edited on a Fisher Price PixelVision console. Not only was the piece unfunny, forced, and driven up the audiences nose, it was no more than a hodgepodge of comments that have been floating around since the “Duct Tape” announcement. The Ridge over Troubled Water. A major snore.
The only bright spot was an extended joke about the death of dozens of Black “clubbers” in a Chicago night spot stampede. This hilarious bit included the terms “box cutter” “yo’ Lady” and a crude mimicking of Black teens running for their lives in the midst of a mob.
Maybe I’m hypersensitive, but his flat (amateurish) delivery combined with the smug smirk while waiting, waiting, waiting, for the audience to catch on is sufficient reason for him to be thrown in a ditch and sprayed with automatic weapons fire. I know a low-level comedian who made a cottage industry (and millions) out of his Caveman crap on Broadway, but the Foldable Australian Penises just had a successful San Francisco run, and Cats toured for the lifespan of a cat while dishing up dreck music and oh-so-gay costumes.
The Theatre's integrity in disarray? What integrity?
With the Schlub Feature neatly flushed down the comedy crapper...
9 - Maher Goes To The Phone! Apparently unfamiliar with how the technology works, Maher gets impatient and cuts off the first caller rather than wait for the connection to be completed by offering some patter or comment. He shifts to the audience and - miraculously - there is an overweight Black woman at the audience mike with a disapproving grimace on her face.
A few moments ago the audience looked like a busload from an Amish Group Home for Adults, and now, here’s a former “Queen of Egypt” preparing to drop her considerable load on the panel. “What are your feelings about affirmative action?” she huffed, glaring at Ann alone to make sure she doesn’t blow a potential date with the Black Guy WBBW. Or should I say WBBBBW?
Predictable answers, agendas and screed all around, and then... “Ladies and Gentlemen! A surprise guest, the most confrontational Black comic in the business!”
Amazingly, Chris Rock is on mike, screeching Coulter’s assertion (true) that “Bush got 600’s on his SAT” over and over. (The stat was poo-pooed by Maher as being way too high). Rock re-stated her words as “Bush got 600 on his SAT?” probably unaware that there are two scores combined (Verbal and Math) to determine the total SAT score.
Flat 600’s would put Bush at the 1200 level against a (then) top score of 1500. So he was, roughly, in the “C” student range - probably where he belongs, but certainly not at the 600 level which would have indicated that he did not get much further than the sixth grade. So, unable to find the comedy edge in regaling the president as a merely a goofy dimbulb, Rock needed to imply that he was a flunky dropout, which, paradoxically, in his world of obscenity-dependent HipHop comedy is probably the equivalent of a Doctorate.
Then, a predictable barrage of “Fuckin’ Bush, Nigga’, Nigga’, Nigga’, SAT score of 600? Nigga’, Nigga’, Nigga’, blah, blah, to read A FUCKING STOP SIGN?” With his sterling improv spit out like a mouthful of sour milk and a sincere Hollywood Hug for Maher, Rock was gone. (By the way other than two muttered “fucks” by Maher, Chris Rock’s antics were the only thing about Real Time that would not have flown on Politically Correct. More on this in the wrap-up below.)
NOTE: A dressing room prelude to the opening of the show featured Larry David doing Larry David to Maher’s impersonation of Larry David. With the addition of Chris Rock’s “just happened to stop by to yell FUCK and NIGGA’” pretense, HBO had pulled in the Big Gun comedy favors, but by contrast, simply reinforced the obvious: Maher has no comedy chops or balls. None.
10 - Then There Is The Love Interest
As much as it appears that Maher loves sniffing Coulter’s skirts as they cavort their nights away, he was positively rhapsodic about his “featured UNCENSORED comedian” a poorly thought-out and rehearsed Sarah Silverman who demonstrated several important points about contemporary comedy without ever resorting to it. At least once during her shock-laugh performance the show’s director when to a wide shot to show Maher laughing his ass off, lying across the roundtable. He was alone in this behavior.
The audience, for the most part, barked out a burst of laughter at key words and inane character shifts. The best lines, which were still teeth-gritting bad, sounded like the work of a extroverted graduate of a two-day comedy writing workshop put up by a washed-up Catskills tummler with a tumor.
By banking heavily on the power of Lesbianism, Sex Between Toddlers, Wacky Nazi’s, The Holocaust, Blacks, Mexicans, and Body Odor, Ms. Silverman did not have to have coherence, linearity, or fixed point of view. A spritz in the purest sense - a petulant child peeing on Bube’s favorite Kilim in front of the neighbors.
If her act is considered a “emerging talent” here’s what that talent suggests:
· Again, a lack of audience rapport and interaction. Ms. Silverman’s material was delivered with a coal shovel.
· Leading with a Lesbian Toddler / Pussy bit set the tone of the set - shock for shock’s sake, take no prisoners.
· No apparent structure, no confrontation, no insight, no second-level thinking - all first level associations.
· The shock material petered out and it became what was once known as “smelly pussy” jokes.
· The Holocaust is the new “Nigger” for Jewish comics. The “H” word. This is as avant as a Jock doing Locker room jokes.
· Blacks and Mexicans are fair game, but only if we portray them as innocent victims or unknowing primitives.
· Being a Cunt is a postmodern attempt at being equal to a Prick. Funny is the qualifier here. Unfunny Prick? Boring.
· Stinky, dirty Mexicans! Heehee!
Just today I read were we are about to see a wave of TV re-tread re-makes: New Monkees, New Mister Ed, New Hunter, New Hotel.... Maybe we have run out of creative ideas. Maybe Ms. Silverman is the forefront of a new wave of comedy that learns the notes, but not the melody, the beats, but not the rhythm. But it’s not much of a song. And you can’t dance to it.
11 - Rules
When out of pat soundbite comebacks, when unable to wrestle a topic onto the table, when the snappy patter veers from centerpiece to sidebar, when FUCK is not enough and the NIGGA’ has left the building, Maher’s ready to drag out his TEN COMMANDMENTS a few at a time.
Up from the bottom of the TV frame, comes a Doric Colonnade framing device for Maher’s glib talking head. Although the frontis of the graphic is emblazoned with “RULES”, we see only one rule at a time to underscore Maher’s mini rants. Provocative, yet irrelevant, pithy, yet unfunny...
The sad reality is: Maher was at the top of his game in the lukewarm puddle of Politically Correct. He crossed the line and made a name for himself being a lot more spontaneous and predatory than he actually is. Now he’s out there in the ring and the assistance of the ropes to restrict his opponent is gone. He’s in a donnybrook in an open field, like a bare-knuckler of the 19th century – no referee, no time limits, no foul.
The only thing he can to save his trembling ass is to book his Real Time shows with pantywaists and fellow travelers. Which should make for TV that will make the Politically Correct guests – including Carrot Top – seem like heavyweights.
With the Schlub Feature neatly flushed down the comedy crapper...
9 - Maher Goes To The Phone! Apparently unfamiliar with how the technology works, Maher gets impatient and cuts off the first caller rather than wait for the connection to be completed by offering some patter or comment. He shifts to the audience and - miraculously - there is an overweight Black woman at the audience mike with a disapproving grimace on her face.
A few moments ago the audience looked like a busload from an Amish Group Home for Adults, and now, here’s a former “Queen of Egypt” preparing to drop her considerable load on the panel. “What are your feelings about affirmative action?” she huffed, glaring at Ann alone to make sure she doesn’t blow a potential date with the Black Guy WBBW. Or should I say WBBBBW?
Predictable answers, agendas and screed all around, and then... “Ladies and Gentlemen! A surprise guest, the most confrontational Black comic in the business!”
Amazingly, Chris Rock is on mike, screeching Coulter’s assertion (true) that “Bush got 600’s on his SAT” over and over. (The stat was poo-pooed by Maher as being way too high). Rock re-stated her words as “Bush got 600 on his SAT?” probably unaware that there are two scores combined (Verbal and Math) to determine the total SAT score.
Flat 600’s would put Bush at the 1200 level against a (then) top score of 1500. So he was, roughly, in the “C” student range - probably where he belongs, but certainly not at the 600 level which would have indicated that he did not get much further than the sixth grade. So, unable to find the comedy edge in regaling the president as a merely a goofy dimbulb, Rock needed to imply that he was a flunky dropout, which, paradoxically, in his world of obscenity-dependent HipHop comedy is probably the equivalent of a Doctorate.
Then, a predictable barrage of “Fuckin’ Bush, Nigga’, Nigga’, Nigga’, SAT score of 600? Nigga’, Nigga’, Nigga’, blah, blah, to read A FUCKING STOP SIGN?” With his sterling improv spit out like a mouthful of sour milk and a sincere Hollywood Hug for Maher, Rock was gone. (By the way other than two muttered “fucks” by Maher, Chris Rock’s antics were the only thing about Real Time that would not have flown on Politically Correct. More on this in the wrap-up below.)
NOTE: A dressing room prelude to the opening of the show featured Larry David doing Larry David to Maher’s impersonation of Larry David. With the addition of Chris Rock’s “just happened to stop by to yell FUCK and NIGGA’” pretense, HBO had pulled in the Big Gun comedy favors, but by contrast, simply reinforced the obvious: Maher has no comedy chops or balls. None.
10 - Then There Is The Love Interest
As much as it appears that Maher loves sniffing Coulter’s skirts as they cavort their nights away, he was positively rhapsodic about his “featured UNCENSORED comedian” a poorly thought-out and rehearsed Sarah Silverman who demonstrated several important points about contemporary comedy without ever resorting to it. At least once during her shock-laugh performance the show’s director when to a wide shot to show Maher laughing his ass off, lying across the roundtable. He was alone in this behavior.
The audience, for the most part, barked out a burst of laughter at key words and inane character shifts. The best lines, which were still teeth-gritting bad, sounded like the work of a extroverted graduate of a two-day comedy writing workshop put up by a washed-up Catskills tummler with a tumor.
By banking heavily on the power of Lesbianism, Sex Between Toddlers, Wacky Nazi’s, The Holocaust, Blacks, Mexicans, and Body Odor, Ms. Silverman did not have to have coherence, linearity, or fixed point of view. A spritz in the purest sense - a petulant child peeing on Bube’s favorite Kilim in front of the neighbors.
If her act is considered a “emerging talent” here’s what that talent suggests:
· Again, a lack of audience rapport and interaction. Ms. Silverman’s material was delivered with a coal shovel.
· Leading with a Lesbian Toddler / Pussy bit set the tone of the set - shock for shock’s sake, take no prisoners.
· No apparent structure, no confrontation, no insight, no second-level thinking - all first level associations.
· The shock material petered out and it became what was once known as “smelly pussy” jokes.
· The Holocaust is the new “Nigger” for Jewish comics. The “H” word. This is as avant as a Jock doing Locker room jokes.
· Blacks and Mexicans are fair game, but only if we portray them as innocent victims or unknowing primitives.
· Being a Cunt is a postmodern attempt at being equal to a Prick. Funny is the qualifier here. Unfunny Prick? Boring.
· Stinky, dirty Mexicans! Heehee!
Just today I read were we are about to see a wave of TV re-tread re-makes: New Monkees, New Mister Ed, New Hunter, New Hotel.... Maybe we have run out of creative ideas. Maybe Ms. Silverman is the forefront of a new wave of comedy that learns the notes, but not the melody, the beats, but not the rhythm. But it’s not much of a song. And you can’t dance to it.
11 - Rules
When out of pat soundbite comebacks, when unable to wrestle a topic onto the table, when the snappy patter veers from centerpiece to sidebar, when FUCK is not enough and the NIGGA’ has left the building, Maher’s ready to drag out his TEN COMMANDMENTS a few at a time.
Up from the bottom of the TV frame, comes a Doric Colonnade framing device for Maher’s glib talking head. Although the frontis of the graphic is emblazoned with “RULES”, we see only one rule at a time to underscore Maher’s mini rants. Provocative, yet irrelevant, pithy, yet unfunny...
The sad reality is: Maher was at the top of his game in the lukewarm puddle of Politically Correct. He crossed the line and made a name for himself being a lot more spontaneous and predatory than he actually is. Now he’s out there in the ring and the assistance of the ropes to restrict his opponent is gone. He’s in a donnybrook in an open field, like a bare-knuckler of the 19th century – no referee, no time limits, no foul.
The only thing he can to save his trembling ass is to book his Real Time shows with pantywaists and fellow travelers. Which should make for TV that will make the Politically Correct guests – including Carrot Top – seem like heavyweights.
