That's really what I have to talk to you about, Jon. The "young thing." It makes me fear for your future. Because, you see, I get glimmers of authentic wit from you. You did a bit about Al Qaeda holding a convention at a hall in the Jupiter room, and then the Zimmerman bar mitzvah booking the Jupiter for 10:30 that had me going. You seemed to ad-lib at the end of that one; you're so quick that another time you made me laugh simply by explaining that the theme music at one point was so lengthy because you had to walk two feet to a different spot in the studio.
You're shrewd, too. You remind me of Jerry Lewis in that way. The practical, hard-headed funny guy. You did some time in the dreadful Aristocrats, and you refused to get pulled in to telling that awful joke. You dropped a brief token obscenity. But you stayed aloof, like Robin Williams, a comic genius who provided almost the movie's only funny moments.
And you had them filming you while you were in a star situation, in your dressing room being groomed for, one assumed, your show. The impression you produced was that this movie, The Aristocrats, was small-time, about as important as the pomade you put on your hair before the big-time event that is "The Daily Show." I admired your manipulativeness. It was as if you sensed that something was off about that third-rate comic, Penn Jillette, who ended up creating a movie that made other comics look unfunny, mad to please the camera, as helpless to resist invitations to tell the joke as the critics were to resist the pressure to look hip and sexy and praise the film. It was really a movie about how easy it is to kill off implicitness in comedy. Eagerness to please the camera, implicitness--that brings me back to the young thing.
I see, Jon, that you're still doing the easy bits at the beginning, showing Bush or Rumsfeld uttering some absurdity, or what seems to be a lie, and then adding a kicker, or simply making a funny face. The kicker always makes explicit the comical juxtaposition. Nothing is left to ironic chance. One segment that tried to satirize Anderson Cooper and the new crop of anchorperson-emoters started off beautifully. I thought real comedy was on its way. We saw the guy playing "The Daily Show" correspondent resolve to out-feel Cooper and the other actors. He gravely and emotionally tells an astonished reporter: "I refuse to interview a woman who is menstruating." It's very funny. And then he ruins the whole conceit by declaring, explicitly, that he is going to out-emote the competition, concluding like this: "I've shot enough footage to sell to the networks. Suck it, Anderson Cooper." Why the cue cards for the audience? You think they're dumb or something?
You're shrewd, too. You remind me of Jerry Lewis in that way. The practical, hard-headed funny guy. You did some time in the dreadful Aristocrats, and you refused to get pulled in to telling that awful joke. You dropped a brief token obscenity. But you stayed aloof, like Robin Williams, a comic genius who provided almost the movie's only funny moments.
And you had them filming you while you were in a star situation, in your dressing room being groomed for, one assumed, your show. The impression you produced was that this movie, The Aristocrats, was small-time, about as important as the pomade you put on your hair before the big-time event that is "The Daily Show." I admired your manipulativeness. It was as if you sensed that something was off about that third-rate comic, Penn Jillette, who ended up creating a movie that made other comics look unfunny, mad to please the camera, as helpless to resist invitations to tell the joke as the critics were to resist the pressure to look hip and sexy and praise the film. It was really a movie about how easy it is to kill off implicitness in comedy. Eagerness to please the camera, implicitness--that brings me back to the young thing.
I see, Jon, that you're still doing the easy bits at the beginning, showing Bush or Rumsfeld uttering some absurdity, or what seems to be a lie, and then adding a kicker, or simply making a funny face. The kicker always makes explicit the comical juxtaposition. Nothing is left to ironic chance. One segment that tried to satirize Anderson Cooper and the new crop of anchorperson-emoters started off beautifully. I thought real comedy was on its way. We saw the guy playing "The Daily Show" correspondent resolve to out-feel Cooper and the other actors. He gravely and emotionally tells an astonished reporter: "I refuse to interview a woman who is menstruating." It's very funny. And then he ruins the whole conceit by declaring, explicitly, that he is going to out-emote the competition, concluding like this: "I've shot enough footage to sell to the networks. Suck it, Anderson Cooper." Why the cue cards for the audience? You think they're dumb or something?
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