Wednesdays on Grantland we always run a "Youtube Hall of Fame" feature (last week was a good one, "worst music videos of all time"). This week it's a special Eddie Murphy package, I believe tied to the good reviews he's been getting for Tower Heist.
I submitted the "Kill the White People" sketch, and the crossing-the-freeway scene from the movie Bowfinger. You can read what I wrote when it goes up later, but basically I said they're awesome...
and Bowfinger almost makes one want to go on a what's-up-with-Heather Graham goose-chase, but no, stay focused, and I think this was the last time Eddie made me snot myself in the theater.
ah, the memories.
ReplyDeletemy older brother and i used to LOVE the kill the white people sketch, which is perhaps most interesting on the level of us actually being white. (well, you know, except for the "30-second" cherokee.) we would perform it at family functions. i can't watch it here in the office (most definitely NSFW), but i seem to recall the onscreen audience boycotting the performance and vacating the room. the real-life audience gets to watch these fussy white people onscreen get all offended, and feel superior, as "down" white people. but maybe that's the real joke. and also what makes shit like 'stuff white people like' work?
Here's link on G-land for Eddie's Greatest Hits
ReplyDeletejoanna,
ReplyDeleteyeah. that's prob right. although a chart might be good, cause now i'm thinking it wouldn't work with crowd of fussy black people. but with variables of eddie/performers. the crowd in the sketch. and the real crowd. i think the joke works with black performer, not white (always). then if the crowd is black, i almost think the funny would be them participating (like the guy at the end).
but I guess its also same premise as louis ck "being white" bit. there's some truth in the tweaking white privilege. any other demographic is not the same.
i'm not sure i agree it's the same as the louis ck premise... although the difference may have more to do with timing than anything else. i mean, the KTWP sketch is a racism/bigotry mockery, whereas louis ck is confronting white privilege... ck's audience kind of has to be more than down--maybe a new level of down? like, actually thinking about that shit? and, willing to expose it, play with it, take risks with it, etc. i've thought before that he must be universally funny, for a smart, progressive crowd--beyond a specific demographic. do you think that's true?
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