Word: stand-up
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Political satire, of course, has had its ups and downs in American comedy. The Eisenhower 1950s proved a fruitful time for outsider satirists like Mort Sahl and Lenny Bruce, and the counterculture years of the late '60s and '70s gave rise to stand-up social commentators like George Carlin, Richard Pryor and Robert Klein. By the '80s, however, stand-up had mostly retreated to the home front (Roseanne Barr), the trivia of everyday life (Jerry Seinfeld) and the carefully nonpartisan "topical" jokes of Johnny Carson. In the George W. Bush years, political comedy came back in style, not just...
With Bush's departure from the scene, much of the political urgency has drifted away from stand-up comedy. Pay a visit to a typical comedy club these days and you're more apt to get pummeled with details of the comedian's dating life than with his views on Obama's stimulus plan. "I'm not hearing a ton of political stuff," says Kevin Flynn, a New York-based stand-up who has a couple of Obama jokes in his repertoire but, like a lot of his colleagues, is still feeling his way along with the change in Administrations...
Ripped from the HeadlinesStill, the Bush years got stand-up comics reading the headlines again, and they haven't stopped. The economic crisis has been a hot topic for months, health care is coming on strong, and favorite targets like Sarah Palin and Clinton have helped out by refusing to leave the stage. But when it comes to Obama, the comics are still groping. Greg Geraldo, a club stalwart whose material was filled with anti-Bush gibes a few years ago, has moved on to Obama, but mostly to execute a deft pivot - like a bit on John McCain...
...racial angle has also provided good fodder for African-American comics like Kyle Grooms (who does one of the better Obama impressions) and Larry Wilmore, the Daily Show's "senior black correspondent," who also talks about Obama in his stand-up act. Yet Wilmore's jabs are directed, as usual, mostly at the country's reaction to Obama ("that is a very comfortable level of black") rather than the President himself; the worst he can do is lampoon Obama's habit of giving long-winded answers to even simple questions...
...Bush presidency, it turns out, may have had a more lasting impact than comedians appreciate. As it opened up a bitter divide in the country, it forced stand-up comedians to take notice - and take sides. Even with a President who's no longer a ready-made joke, for comedians, there's no going back. As for Obama, he'll need to watch his step. Those White House rugs can be dangerous...