Lite Pop: Squeeze That Lemon!

I don't know about everybody else, but as much as I look

forward to Tina Fey's Sarah Palin impressions on SNL, what I've really been waiting for finally came Thursday night -- the third Season Premiere of "30 Rock." From episode one this show has been a tantalizing mix of character comedy, industry parody and social commentary and episode 37 is no exception. 

http://www.nbc.com/30_Rock/video/episodes/?vid=800161

Tina Fey's intrepid alter ego Liz Lemon ranks in the top five, maybe even three female television characters of all time.  Not only is she funny and smart and persevering even when mightily challenged by the powers-that-be (in the forms of Alec Baldwin as her corporate boss and Tracy Morgan as her unpredictable, uncontrollable star), she is also selfish, self-destructive, corruptible and mean-spirited.  In other words, she's an actual human being.  And her love interest isn't ever really in the form of a guy -- it's in the form of her job, her friendships and her lame attempts to overcome (sometimes) her baser nature.

No need for me to gush when you can check it out for yourself (if you are new to this show, treat yourself and watch all of the episodes on NBC.com), but how many shows have lines as loony as "She was wearing Dora the Explorer panties that were meant for an obese child" and as highbrow as "We're not the best people, but we're not the worst people. The worst people are graduate students" in the same episode?  Par for the course on "30 Rock," as are sight gags, cutaways, wordplay, political jabs and celebrity jokes.  It's a veritable comedy grab bag almost every episode and totally gets away with it.

Why?  Because Tina Fey, her writers, actors and directors are, I think, out for more than ratings or Emmys or even a good belly laugh (even though they've consistently gotten two of the three).  I think they are out to tell the truth of the people and the place they are presenting, no matter how wacky, ugly, venal or petty they get.  As Liz Lemon says (after tons of shenanigans and half-truths) to the woman who is evaluating her to become an adoptive mother: "Yes, this place is not ideal but these weirdos are family to me and so if this job is a deal breaker, you tear up my application and I will start someplace else."  Moments like these, and the undercutting ones that follow are why this show has heart as well as humor and why I think we all should squeeze that Lemon and keep her around for as many seasons as she'll give us.

LLH out.

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A Sacred Institution Between Two Unwilling Teenagers

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Y'all know what I'm referring to, right? The third in the most-awesome series of SNL political spoofs ever? You know -- the Joe Biden/Sarah Palin debate parody from Saturday night.  Tina Fey and gang were on fire and never did they shine more brightly than with the single line above.  If you want to catch the full context, watch the video above.  It will show you the whole segment but if you just want to hear the line (the whole sentence is actually "I believe marriage is meant to be a sacred institution between two unwilling teenagers") scroll about six minutes in.

The reason the above joke/sentiment made me laugh out loud and almost damn-near cheer my TV (it got the most live-audience applause, too) is because I can't stand that neither the republicans NOR DEMOCRATS will support gay marriage.  I'm not so sure about Palin or McCain, but I know Obama and Biden know better -- two men so knowledgeable about history and civil rights have to know how unfair it is to deny ANY citizen ANY right.  But they choose to pander because they feel they can't risk the political backlash in so close a race. Though I rarely start a sentence with the following because I feel it is reductive, I can't help it in this case. As a black person (that's the sentence starter right there), it is unconscionable to me to ever deny any law-abiding citizen the right to participate in any government-sanctioned activity.  I think about voting rights, property rights, housing rights, hell, even marriage rights (first for blacks -- the broom jump developed because it wasn't legal for slaves to marry -- and interracial marriages were illegal until 1967) and in every case, the people who wanted them were denied such rights because the majority perceived them as "less than."

So they can say all they want about tolerance and "a civil union is just the same" -- but it's not.  It is NOT the same.  Does 1896's Plessy vs. Ferguson "separate but equal" ring a bell for anyone?  Or that it had to be undone fifty-eight years later by Brown v. the Board of Ed? (I didn't even fact check the dates -- they have been seared in my brain since high school because they've always struck a deep chord with me.) Come on, people, let's spare ourselves the decades-long anguish over this and do the right thing now.  Does it make any sense to you that two "oops, we got pregnant" teenagers who don't even want it can get all the rights and legal protections of marriage?  That prisoners like Erik Menendez who murdered his parents can get married?  But good, loving people like my friends Ray Lancon and Sara Washington (I've been feeling your recent pain over this one, girl) can't? If that's not calling somebody "less than," I don't know what is.

California Voters -- No on Prop. 8. Voting any other way says you are against liberty and justice for all. This is not my opinion, this is fact. And it is also a fact that those against gay marriage will be proven wrong and one day gay marriage will be as commonplace as seeing a woman vote (an abomination in 1919) or a black person in a public swimming pool (cause for a lynching before the 60s). 

Okay, so... this is a screed as well as Deep Pop.  But we still love it.

April 7, 2009 UPDATE:  As everyone knows, Obama/Biden captured the White House on November 4, 2008, shattering a ceiling most felt would take several more generations to break through.  But even with that huge leap forward, California took a huge step back by passing Proposition 8.  The matter is still in the state Court of Appeals, and hopefully justice will prevail.  In happier news, Vermont and Iowa approved gay marriage this week, bringing the total of states that sanction same-sex matrimony to four (the other two are Connecticut and Massachusetts).  Four down, forty-six to go!