One of the true pleasures of Full Frontal with Samantha Bee is waiting for Bee’s next description of Donald Trump. One episode he’s a “two-bit used hate salesmen”; the next, a “crotch-fondling slab of rancid meatloaf.” His whole campaign is one never-ending joke that was never funny in the first place, and it’s hard for writers to come up with material that isn’t clever name-calling. Even Veep, the cruelest and funniest political comedy on TV, is having trouble. “The show’s becoming less of a satire,” star Tony Hale said. “There’s a lot of stuff on the surface in this campaign that’s given Veep a run for its money.”
The Los Angeles Times spoke to the showrunners of three political-themed series — Madam Secretary‘s Barbara Hall, Designated Survivor‘s Jon Harmon Feldman, and Veep‘s David Mandel — about the Trump-related headaches they’ve faced this election cycle, including having to cut jokes. “I’ve never said this before,” Mandel revealed,” but “we had a scene where a minor character gets picked up on a DUI and he’s being a little mouthy to a female police officer and we sort of had a run using [the word ‘p*ssy’]. It was pretty funny and they basically threw it in the garbage. [Trump] is ruining comedy.”
Let’s test this “theory.”
Still hilarious. Trump hasn’t ruined comedy… yet. Later in the interview, when asked if he could have scripted this election, Mandel responded, “Most likely we’d all be fired if we wrote a 10th of what has happened thus far. In some ways, this year’s election has become some sort of insane single-camera comedy. It comes complete with guest roles, like Ken Bone. We could call the comedy Misery.” Ben Carson can play the wacky neighbor.
(Via the Los Angeles Times)
