BRILLIANT SATIRIST AMBUSHES CHOMSKY

First, a little bit on the comedian--you may have seen his show on HBO. From Wikipedia:

Ali G

Ali G is a satirical comic character invented and played by the British comedian Sacha Baron Cohen.

Ali G first appeared on Channel 4's Eleven O'Clock show as the "voice of da youth". He interviewed various public figures in the United Kingdom, who, too scared to appear "uncool", were completely fooled by his idiosyncratic interview technique, based mostly on the simple stratagem of pretending to be stupid.

One particularly memorable interview was with a fashion designer. Ali G suggested that the Wonderbra should be banned as it misleads men into thinking that a woman's breasts are larger than they are; he retold a story of having been disappointed when a girl he had "pulled" proved to have been wearing a Wonderbra. He also asked his interviewee if he was pleased Gianni Versace was killed, because it meant less competition, and he suggested that he'd heard a rumour that Calvin Klein did it. (This was a clear satire on the feuding which followed the deaths of the american rappers Tupac Shakur and The Notorious B.I.G., where it was thought to be the work of rival music producer Suge Knight).

And

Ali G can also be seen as a commentary on the adoption of American black street culture by both non-Americans and non-blacks. Because Baron Cohen is a middle-class, Cambridge University-educated Jewish actor portraying a suburban, presumably middle-class Briton of undetermined extraction who is, in turn, styling himself on American street life, the show maintains a certain Victor/Victoria quality. To many critics, Ali G is not satirising black urban culture, but those non-blacks and non-urbanites who appropriate it. Ali G's behaviour and clothing also parodies the UK junglist subculture of drum & bass listeners, and has many similarities to hip-hop culture. There are indications that his portrayal also typifies the UK chav subculture.

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I dare say that drum and bass listeners have had this coming for years. But I digress.

This guy's pretty damned funny in both a Spinaltap and Andy Kaufman kind of way. That is, like the film This Is Spinaltap, his humor is improvised, so there's a guerilla theater aspect to his work, and his character is over-the-top stupid, which is always good for a few laughs. On the other hand, like Kaufman, Cohen's material absolutely depends on his victims having no idea what's really going on--Kaufman generally preyed on his audiences; Cohen assaults his interview subjects. I suppose that Candid Camera was really the first to do this kind of thing, but the people Ali G interviews appear to be carefully chosen for their fame and public esteem, unlike the ordinary people taken for a ride by Allen Funt--this, I think, tends to give his comedy a sort of class consciousness.

At any rate, he makes me laugh, and the multiple levels of meaning he plays with engage me intellectually. Go check out, via Throw Away Your TV, his utterly retarded discussion of linguistics with Noam Chomsky here.



Yo, respect!

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