Only a fuzzy line divides comedy and politics
Comedian Volodymyr Zelenskyy after winning the second round of presidential elections in Kiev, Ukraine, in April 2019. Credit: Getty Images/NurPhoto
The border between comedy and political commentary is forever hazy. Back in the 13th century, the Italian poet Dante Alighieri famously skewered his powerful contemporaries in verse.
But today’s methods of communication reveal just how often that thin line separating entertainment and serious message gets drawn and crossed.
The Long Island election of fabulist Rep. George Santos prompted a robust digital windfall of comic material.
Here was Santos’ likeness virtually superimposed as Jesus in a counterfeit of DaVinci’s “The Last Supper.” Then came the comparisons to the old George Costanza character on “Seinfeld” and an old photo of a cross-dressing Santos with the drag name “Liza Lott” added. One Santos character on television claimed to have walked on the moon; another said he invented gravity.
These days the shtick germinates in real time — and interactively. The famous “Liar” player from long ago, comedian Jon Lovitz (“Yeah! That’s the ticket!”), promptly revived his act, playing Santos on the Jimmy Fallon show.
The severely truth-challenged Santos responded sourly on Twitter that Lovitz and other comics needed to “step their game up.” Lovitz tweeted back that he agreed: “My pathological liar character can’t hold a candle to you!”
Other ad hominem personal jokes born out of politics might boomerang if they’re too loaded or weaponized. In campaigns, as in comedy, results depend on timing, material, and audience.
Sometimes, the circumstances don’t qualify as funny.
Massapequa-raised Alec Baldwin fatally shot cinematographer Halyna Hutchins in 2021 with a prop gun on the set of the movie “Rust.” Now the actor is charged with involuntary manslaughter, but three days after the shooting, Donald Trump Jr., son of the ex-president Baldwin loved to mimic, hawked a T-shirt online that said: “Guns don’t kill people, Alec Baldwin kills people.”
Matters of taste aside, the flow of jokes, bits, lampoons, and memes may not change votes in a particular election. But as the success of comic late-night “news” formats proved over many years, they can serve as points of reference for how we think of politics.
How often do half-century-old Monty Python skits make their way into conversations, such as the “Silly Party” versus the “Serious Party”? Or, from the last decade, the nonstop White House blundering in the “Veep” series?
But beyond all that, something far more significant than satirical messaging occurs when an established comic figure crosses that blurred border into public governance. America’s most famous example: Al Franken of Minnesota (who quit the Senate in 2017 after admitting sexual harassment). In Guatemala, another TV comic, Jimmy Morales, was president until 2020.
Before becoming Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy played a high school teacher whose videotaped rant on rampant state corruption goes viral, accidentally catapulting him into the presidency.
Nowadays, in real life, Zelenskyy seeks to emulate Charles de Gaulle rather than Charlie Chaplin as his nation confronts horrid death and destruction from an unprovoked military siege by neighboring Russia.
Karl Marx may have had it backward when he said history repeats itself first as tragedy and later as farce, since Zelenskyy’s personal history went from creating farce to confronting tragedy.
Surely, we have had clowns in leadership positions. At least Zelenskyy, as a TV pro, created his persona with a sharp idea of what he was up to. His political importance comes as performances drive perceptions — whether in Kyiv or Washington or New York.
n COLUMNIST DAN JANISON’S opinions are his own.
Dan Janison is a member of the Newsday editorial board.
