Fans of Saturday Night Live should check out comedy genius Chevy Chase's review of this week's SNL season premiere on Huffington Post (Sept 15), as he makes some very interesting and pointed comments about both Tina Fey and Amy Poehler's performance, as well as the candidates who were portrayed.
Here's my favorite Chase quote from the article: "The more that the nation understands that McCain has lost his mind, the better it is really."
Okay. Before the campaign gets really serious again, here is your chance to vote for Sarah Palin -- that is for the best impersonation.
And there are two really great impersonators too. You may already have seen Saturday Night Live's "A Nonpartisan Message from Sarah Palin & Hillary Clinton". In case you missed it, click on the pic for Tina Fey and Amy Poehler in their SNL opening skit:
But Tina's got competition! Here name is Lisa Vega (aka Lisa Donovan), who was once featured on MADtv, and she has done three Palin sketches already. The first had her corner Obama on a stairwell as he comes home, and she browbeats him till he turns into the "angry black man"; this may explain why the clip is no longer available. But her parental guidance skit called "Is McCain Palin's Bitch?" is already a YouTube classic, and showcases the other side of Sarah:
You can click on the photo. That's Dan Oster as John MCcain.
So here's your guilt-free chance to vote for Sarah Palin (impersonator, that is). Please cast your vote below on the comment section.
Sarah Palin missed her calling . . . she's a good actor.
By Michael Shelby
September 4, 2008
Watching Republican Veep nominee Sarah Palin's acceptance speech I was continually plagued by an unsettling feeling of where have I seen this personality before? Yes, she's a dead ringer for Tina Fey and Amy Poehler could play her in a SNL sketch but they don't capture her essence naturally. Then, about halfway thorough the well executed attack speech teeming with irony, hypocrisy, misinformation, outright lies, and devoid of substance, it came to me . . . this performance really is a movie sequel and Sarah Palin is Tracy Flick all grown up!
Tracy Flick, played by Academy Award Winner® Reese Witherspoon in the 1999 movie Election (also starring Sarah Jessica Parker's hubbie Matthew Broderick as Tracy's advisor and former lover), runs a ruthlessly ambitious, win at all costs, vote manipulating campaign for her high school class presidency. Tracy's narcissism perfectly transforms into the cult of personality that the Republican party is running it's campaign on today. John McCain's campaign manager, Rick Davis, confirmed that "This election is not about issues," said Davis. "This election is about a composite view of what people take away from these candidates." Translation: the Republican's are running on the cult of personality and away from the issues. This fits perfectly into a sequel for Tracy Flick that I am calling, for now, Election 2 – Tracy's Back and Badder Than Before!
That Tracy has private scandals that are kept relatively secret, questionable decision-making rules, and a moral code that could at best be described as being governed by situational ethics seem to embody the history of Republican Veep candidate Sarah Palin as well. Tracy loses to the popular good guy jock whose innocence, sincerity, and honesty earns him a squeaker win much to the surprise of Ms. Flick. Flick has gone through numerous underhanded manipulations of the election to win including looking into the vote counting room to get advance information that she has won (however, it is her advisor who actually steals the election away from Tracy in a futile act of redemption for his earlier indiscretions and to blunt the evil ambitions of his once promising student). After recovering from the shock of a loss she had not expected, the end of the movie leaves open what lies ahead for Tracy. Clearly she has gained no insights or epiphanies and is instead driven even more so to “succeed.” My grown up Tracy will take into her future the unbridled ambition, narcissism, authoritarian archetype, selfishness, and self-centered attributes that are quintessentially Tracy (and Republican), apply them as needed during her stages of development toward adulthood, only to emerge as Sarah Palin in the flesh.
Tracy's base pandering to Jesus, that will later be exploited by John McCain and personified in the religiosity of Governor Palin who believes the Iraq war (causing the deaths of thousands of our soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines and over a million innocent Iraqi children, women, and men) is ordained by God and didn't object to or leave the pew, thereby tacitly approving her pastor's spewed hate speech, that said acts of terrorism on Israel were God's punishment for not believing in Christ, who denies the science of evolution and stem cell research in favor of the fantasy of creationism and prayer, and who thinks abstinence only sex education is effective (DUOH!); is predicted by Tracy's prayer for deliverance into victory I have paraphrased from the movie: Dear Lord Jesus, I do not often speak with you and ask for things, but now, I really must insist that you help me win the election tomorrow because I deserve it and [Barack Obama] doesn't, as you well know. I realize that it was your divine hand that [rescued me from obscurity] and now I'm asking that you go that one last mile and make sure to put me in office where I belong so that I may carry out your will on earth as it is in heaven. Amen.
The possible plot lines to Election 2 are thick with possibilities, twists, turns, back stabbings, dirty dealings, and plain old wicked good story telling. SPOILER ALERT! My version of the sequel ends once again in defeat for Sarah, er, Tracy in ignominious defeat as another presidential candidate from Arizona is historically defeated in disaster once again. Unlike Senator Goldwater who was true to himself and authentic to the end of his admirable life, Senator McCain has screwed the pooch vis-a‘-vis integrity and so-called “straight talk” and will, if he's lucky, just fade into obscurity. But Sarah, dammit I mean Tracy, will go on like the plucky oblivious to the real world girl she is as she quotes her mother from the original movie, “It's like my mom says, The weak are always trying to sabotage the strong.”
Sarah, oh there I go again, Tracy we couldn't have post-rationalized it better ourselves.
Of course it would come to this. The news media entertain while comedy shows deliver political spin.
Having apparently boosted Hillary Clinton's campaign by playing the media-is-too-easy-on-Obama skit immediately before her wins in Texas and Ohio, and the Hillary-at-3AM ad last week, Lorne Michaels, the executive producer of Saturday Night Live has gone out of his way with the NY Times and LA Times to dispel the impression his program in any way backs the former First Lady for the Democratic nomination. He was reacting to the two skits and the bitches-get-stuff-done endorsement from former SNL cast member and 30 Rock diva Tina Fey that have raised suspicion of political agenda at work.
If you follow the money, however, are there more clues to some intentional or subliminal motives? Lorne Michaels has been an active political donor over the years. The largest and most consistent beneficiary of his largesse since 2000 has been Chris Dodd and the Chris PAC. Dodd withdrew from the current race in January and has since endorsed Obama. But Michaels has also regularly given to John McCain since 2000, including donations in March and May of last year totaling $2300, the maximum allowed for the primaries. Is Michaels on some level helping McCain, who he vows will not receive additional donations now that he has captured the GOP nomination, by trying to ensure that Clinton becomes his opponent? Just asking.
Mr. Micheals' remonstrations might be more convincing if he had not selected comic-musician Fred Armisen to impersonate Barack Obama. The otherwise-talented Armisen has failed to capture any of the charisma and inspiration that make the candidate so appealing. Instead, his is a dour and dumb Barack Obama Who Never Smiles, guaranteed not to garner any sympathy when viewed alongside the simpatico Hillary Clinton of Amy Poehler.
At the start of this season, Michaels streamlined the SNL staff in what was viewed as a cost-cutting measure. It was also reported earlier this year that the chubby Kenan Thompson was on a diet so he could play Obama. When the writers' strike came to an end, tryouts for the part at SNL were widely reported. Does Michaels' decision not to sign a new impersonator indicate he does not expect Obama will be in the running much longer, so he is saving money with someone already on staff?
Art imitates art. Meanwhile, as I reported previously, it is now confirmed that Seth Myers will play Eliot Spitzer on SNL this Saturday. Not clear yet who will play Kristen or if they will in fact call the segment "Superdelegates Gone Wild".
