He did that because he remembers some of the times Roseanne showed some sensitivity and/or humor. She sometimes stood up for fellow comedians who had been excoriated for telling a "bad joke." She could be helpful to fellow co-stars, including John Goodman who had a drinking problem. Sometimes she used her mental illness issues to create outrageous entertainment, which is how many sensitive artists deal with their problems.
Unfortunately, as she demonstrated by singing a deliberately haywire version of the "Star Spangled Banner" and then making things worse by "parodying" how players spit and grab crotch, she is the Queen of Bad Taste.
Unlike others who dabble in bad taste, such as Lisa Lampenelli or Kathy Griffin, she generally doesn't even think what she's said IS in bad taste. Like, like, err, uh, it was just, err, uh, FUNNY, ya know?
Like calling an obscure ex-Obama aide a cross between a Muslim and something from "Planet of the Apes." Gosh. Most everyone has an inner voice that says "Don't SAY that." She's like Porky Pig in the old Warner Bros. cartoons, where there's an image of a Red Devil Porky saying "GO AHEAD" and an Angelic Porky saying "DON'T." Only without the angelic Porky.
PS, anyone still can't get the image out of their minds, of when Roseanne and her then-husband Tom Arnold deliberately did hideous things like pig out by romping in mud for a photo shoot?
It's "hacky" to tell bad jokes, or to shout insults that aren't even jokes at all. It's "hackier" to turn around and offer an apology, as if you didn't mean it. No, you meant it. That's why you said it. You didn't listen to your inner discipline because of your ego or your rage. And now those words will stay out there, remembered as hurtful, while you think you've gotten a clean slate just by saying "I'm sorry." No. If you're sorry because you have no self control, announce you'll be working on that with a therapist. Otherwise, it's shallow. The celebrities (and non-celebs, come to think of it) who insult, curse, or leer and make a grab...know what they're doing and should know better.
Now she's apologized (sigh) and she's vowed to stay off Twitter.
The crack about the Obama aide got most of the attention, but the New York Post headlined that Roseanne's Twitter-storm was both racist and anti-Semitic. For some reason, she claimed Chelsea Clinton was married to an anti-Semite named Soros, who isn't married to Chelsea and may not even be an anti-Semite, and then raged (a joke?) about Hillary Clinton and colostomy bags and shit. Er, "shite" as she suddenly became British for a moment.
Roseanne rages about Hillary Clinton, who isn't going to be running for President again, and snickers that under her winter coat she has a "colostomy jug." Well, it's quite possible that more people who have a colostomy bag were upset about that one than Clinton fans. While comedians tend to shrug off the "politically correct" whining of fat people, old people, etc., they generally have some kind of awareness for the "physically challenged" and know that referencing wheelchairs, blindness, iron lungs or colostomy bags will be cringeworthy.
No, I have no idea what most of her rages were about, except that it proves that you can have all the plastic surgery in the world, and no longer look like a boxy, sour lunatic, but still be one. But most who were around when she first started were not impressed iwth her crappy "superior housewife" sneer-jokes, which were just a cop of Jean Carroll and Phyllis Diller's old husband jokes mated to Judy Tenuta's satiric "goddess" persona.
In a very surprising move, very much in keeping with the new "ME TOO" and "PC attitudes of the day, Roseanne (aka Roseanne Barr, aka Roseanne Arnold) got shown the door by ABC. ABC had a #1 show, and even with a dysfunctional cast, and a few people expressing discomfort or quitting the staff, they could've had another year or two of strong ratings but...why take the chance on more disaster? Wanda Sykes (everyone's favorite black lesbian) announced her departure from some kind of name-only post as a producer. And then, with more and more Tweets from celebrities expressing their anger, and the media showing disgust as well, that was it. It didn't take more than a few hours, all told, for the news to hit, her account to be deleted with an apology...and her show canceled.
"Planet of the Apes" jokes on a black woman? NO. And no apology accepted. ABC probably would've shrugged over the anti-Semitic stuff and the Hillary Clinton gags.
ABC knows the difference between aberrant and abhorrant:
No comments:
Post a Comment