Toddlers & Tiaras' Makenzie: Funny or Die looks into the future with Ashley Tisdale and Leah Remini. [VIDEO]

Toddlers & Tiaras' Makenzie: Funny or Die Looks Into the Future With Ashley Tisdale and Leah Remini. [VIDEO]

Toddlers & Tiaras' Makenzie: Funny or Die Looks Into the Future With Ashley Tisdale and Leah Remini. [VIDEO]

The XX Factor
What Women Really Think
Sept. 28 2011 11:31 AM

A Peek Into the Future for Toddlers & Tiaras Star Makenzie [VIDEO]

Funny or Die, the comedy video site from Will Ferrell and co., is on a roll this month. Two weeks ago, the site skewered Michele Bachmann’s stance on HPV vaccination. Today, we’re treated to an eerily believable parody of Toddlers & Tiaras, the terrifying kiddie pageant reality show on TLC. High School Musical alumna Ashley Tisdale plays a grown-up version of Makenzie, the bratty but somehow charismatic little girl who has become one of the show’s … stars, for lack of a better word. In the Funny or Die video, Makenzie, now “25 and three-quarters," still competes in the 5-to-7 age group. Leah Remini plays Makenzie’s indulgent, beaten-down mother, who has overinvested financially and emotionally in the high-but-low stakes of children’s pageants. In the sketch's best scene, Remini deadpans, "“When Makenzie was 8, we had to pull her out of homeschool so we could focus on pageants." Another competitor's sour-faced performance to the wildly inappropriate Police song "Roxanne" seem nearly plausible when you remember that a recent episode featured a 3-year-old named Paisley costumed in the famous hooker gear from Pretty Woman.

If, like me, you've ever jaw-dropped your way through a Toddlers & Tiaras marathon, the video, below, is well worth the four-minute time investment.

Torie Bosch is the editor of Future Tense, a project of Slate, New America, and Arizona State that looks at the implications of new technologies.