A Tale of Two ComicsMeet the anti-Seinfeld, Jerry's brilliant, twisted, evil twin.
Posted Friday, Nov. 2, 2007, at 2:55 PM ET
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StumbleUponSitting through the movie and watching Seinfeld as that witless Seinfeldian bee is almost too painful an experience to remember. It's going to take me years to get over the PTSD (post-traumatic Seinfeld disorder). But I would like to briefly review the promotional booklet.
Now, I've been a movie columnist in the past, and so I've seen all kinds of film promotional booklets. But this is pretty astonishing. Sixty-four slick pages devoted to the film and the filmmakers, roughly 40 devoted to kissing Jerry's ass from every angle possible. Making him out to be the great genius of all time. On just one page, co-workers ooh and ah: "… he's so adept …"; "he always knows …"; "… always pitch perfect"; "It was incredible …"; "I've never seen people so excited to get into a room [with him]." The word amazing appears on just about every page.
But there was one rather revealing passage in the promo booklet that brings us back to Sydney Carton and Charles Darnay.
It's when Seinfeld's Bee Movie crew gets really deep and talks about the "philosophy" of the film in a section called "Thinking Bee." The film celebrates not bees who think, but a bee who learns the danger of thinking for himself, abandons his individuality, and becomes part of the hive mind, a cog in the honey-making machine.
Seriously, that childishly totalitarian sentiment is the "redemptive message" of the movie. Not bee yourself, but bee like everyone else. Very Massapequa. But that's our Jerry.
(By the way, the booklet goes into rhapsodies about how carefully they calibrated the color of the honey. But I have a feeling that if Rick Shapiro ever saw the honey in this movie, I'm sure he'd say that you can't watch it without thinking they've made it the exact same color as urine. And once you get into that mode the whole movie become incredibly funny, if not on its own shallow terms.)
In any case, here's Jerry getting all deep and serious in his shallow way about "Thinking Bee":
One of the things that you have to know about in the movie is that we talk about the fact that all bees, once they sting, that's it for them. You sting, your life is over. So it's a big step. You really have to control your temper. You don't just sting somebody because you get upset. You have to control yourself. Makes you really think about anger management doesn't it?
Well, that's one thing it makes you think about. But notice that he's all about control, control, control.
That's the great thing about Rick Shapiro. He'll never be a billionaire, he'll always be Sydney Carton, whose fame is only posthumous. But he's not afraid to get out of control, to sting us, and himself, to death. He don't need no stinking anger management. Anger management needs him.
It's a far, far better thing he does, than Seinfeld's puny comic mind could ever imagine.
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Remarks from the Fray
What if I went down to Rosenbaum's office and criticized him? He'd throw me out! You know, people don't throw each other out as much as they used to, do they? The old-fashioned throw-out? You don't see much of that anymore. I mean, are guys grabbing other guys by the scruff of the neck and just tossing them out? Not so much, I think. By the way, do you really need "of the neck" after "scruff?" Does any other body part even have a scruff? What is a scruff? What genius came up with this concept?
--ClubhouseCancer
(To reply, click here)
Let's leave aside the Seinfeld and Shapiro comparison, since that is not really a fair match. Shapiro needs instead to be compared to in my opinion…the greatest comedian ever: Bill Hicks. And here is where Shapiro fails--he never takes the joke or the concept to that next level, to that next spot in the thought process that leaves just merely making fun of a group of people (trendy 20-somethings for example) into a higher level of social commentary. This is where Hicks beauty was. He realized that the greatest tragedy of them all was that all of our problems and faults are the result of our own failure to pay attention and think outside the box society has formed around us. ..
Shapiro on the other hand, by failing to take it to that level, comes across as someone who just is angry the beautiful girl at the bar denied his advances. And this is where Shapiro becomes disturbing, which, actually is in a way, beautiful and repulsive. It is beautiful to witness someone so willing, so open to communicating the demons in his head (which face it, are all in our head at some point to), and to openly discuss it with us. Perhaps it is therapy for him, which helps him deal with them. And hey, if you are going to have psychological issues, at least profit from them, no? But the other side of the coin is that you really feel that this man will never truly be happy. His loathing of others is nothing compared to the self-loathing that seethes within him. This is partly why most comics are usually deep down, depressed and self-conscious. It is the ability to see themselves for what they are, that also allowed them to see everyone else for who they are. It is also likely why Shapiro will never catch on. Most people have never been able to see themselves for who they are, and because of that, the sight of someone with such a crystal clear ability to cut through our own self-delusions usually upsets them. Seinfeld on the other hand, succeeded as Rosenbaum said, because it allowed all of us not to ever look inward, but always point the finger.
--VTbiker
(To reply click here)
What is funny to me is the vitriol that some people invest into a debate about an "Art form" that is slightly more interesting and relevant than mime, but finally, by definition, laughable. There is no good stand-up comedy about the holocaust, not because the holocaust is a sacred thing about which no humor can be found, but because stand up comedy is facile and populist: everyone has to get the joke in the exact moment its being told. If it takes almost a second to get it, that's a sleeper in stand-up terms. Not a lot of room for subtlety or insight.
So if you want someone with subtext who's funny, read George Saunders, if you want to have an easy laugh about crack whores or muffin tops, watch a stand-up comic. Liking an unfunny comic who used to live the life of a druggie doesn't make you authentic or Real, whether that comic is Tim Allen or Shapiro.
--Billdave
(To reply, click here)
(11/06)