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NEW YORK CITY: She was plucked from obscurity to become the most
watched woman in America, but now vice presidential pick Sarah
Palin’s very image is at risk of being hijacked by a hugely
successful impersonator.
In recent weeks, millions of television viewers
in the United States and Internet users around the globe have been
treated to hilarious, spot-on portrayals of the Republican
politician by comedienne Tina Fey on Saturday Night Live (SNL), a
weekly comedy stalwart for NBC for more than 30 years.
“Can I call you Joe? ‘Cause I practiced a
couple of zingers where I call you Joe!” Fey’s grinning
“Palin” character asked “Joseph Biden,” her Democratic
rival, a week ago on the show’s parody of the vice presidential
debate.
Fey was only slightly expanding comments
overheard at the start of the October 2 showdown.
Fey’s caricature catches the
ultra-conservative politician – unknown to the vast majority of
Americans just six weeks ago – in full and unvarnished blush.
The folksy Midwestern accent, Palin’s winks to
the camera during the debate, the swept-up hairstyle, those rimless
glasses, and the blunders on foreign affairs topics are not Fey
inventions, but generally accurate plays on Palin’s public
persona.
And their looks are so similar it is striking.
Palin as Fey
Palin seems to have been well aware of their
uncanny resemblance long before Fey and the rest of Saturday Night
Live’s cast even knew who she was. Last month Palin conceded to
Fox News that she had once dressed up as Fey for Halloween.
Style columnist Tom Shales of The Washington
Post wrote that Fey’s challenge “will be to out-Palin Palin, to
make the parody more outrageous than the original.”
“I think that Sarah Palin’s own identity has
not been established, and that allowed the Tina Fey identity to be
the gold standard, to Sarah Palin’s detriment,” Alan Schroeder,
associate professor of journalism at Northeastern University said in
amNewYork weekly.
“It’s a tremendous help for the
Democrats,” said John Leo, a senior fellow at the Manhattan
Institute and a pop-culture expert.
CNN reported that a skit lampooning Palin’s
stumbling interview last month with CBS News anchor Katie Couric was
actually viewed by more people than the real interview.
‘Barracuda’ bounces
Faced with the remarkable success of the
caricature, the real candidate has been forced to respond.
“I love her. She’s a hoot and she’s so
talented and it would be fun to either imitate her or keep on giving
her more material and keep her in business,” Fox News quoted Palin
as saying recently.
In what would clearly be an episode of must-see
TV, Palin is committed to appear on SNL later this month, according
to the New York Post.
NBC has not confirmed the rumors though, and
after a probe found late Friday that Palin had abused her power as
Alaska governor it would seem unlikely that the struggling campaign
of Republican John McCain would open itself up to any further
ridicule.
Stateside satire
Fey, 38, was the first female chief writer for
SNL. She is now writer, producer and star of the show 30 Rock, for
which she has received a Golden Globe award.
Political satire is a staple of US television
culture. Some experts believe that parodies of President Gerald Ford
during the 1976 campaign – particularly by SNL’s Chevy Chase,
who portrayed Ford as a bumbler – cost him the White House.
In addition to SNL, Palin’s ascendancy has
provided fodder for countless cartoonists, including in The New
Yorker.
In its latest issue, the respected magazine has
a cartoon depicting two women walking down a path in a park.
“I’m voting Republican,” one woman says to the other, “just
so Tina Fey will keep impersonating Sarah Palin.”
-- AFP
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