It’s very sad to me that many of my formerly favorite comedians have turned out to be hateful. I used to enjoy Franken’s hilarious Stuart Smalley skits (“Because I’m good enough, and I’m smart enough—and doggone it, people like me!”) Well, I don’t like him much these days after the political things he’s said on the air and in print.
Recently Chevy Chase enjoined Tina Fey to “eviscerate that woman” in her future Sarah Palin impressions. That, to me, was a shock. I lost all respect for Chase then. (He was never a favorite in recent years anyway.)
I forgave Fey, though, because there wasn’t any certain clue that she’d followed Chase’s suggestion—she simply did a dead-on impression as usual, and comedians know that they are only presenting a “heightened reality,” as Lorne Michaels said to Palin in one scene of her appearance on SNL.
Also, according to one of the Palin interviews I recently posted here, off-camera Tina and Sarah got on like a house on fire. So I have completely forgiven Tina.
(By the way, when in an earlier post about the first Fey skit I expressed dread at the prospect of having to choose between two of my favorite women, someone suggested I send flowers to both. I did. Sarah’s bouquet was promptly returned to me, delivered on the back of a moose. Tina’s also came back, also on a moose. I guess she was still in character.)
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