Chast & Nancy

Emily Gordon: I’d been thinking, during the Ricky Gervais talk the previous night, that there’s something Chast-y about the fabulous Franklin—albeit, on the stylish end of Chast dames—and clearly others have had the same thought, because, well, look! My sense was that the audience didn’t know what they were in for when Franklin started reading her hilarious Talk about a pseudoscientific, English-major-marred study of post-post-adolescent Beatles reactions, but they sure figured it out. Anthony Lane’s Sith schtick got the biggest laughs of the night; British people doing American accents always brings down the house. Noah Baumbach was a huge hit as well, and how could he not be, adding an actual, spooky Tom Cruise invocation (that kind of impersonation that transcends mere imitation and gets at something more brilliantly central—my friend Casey is the best I know at this) to his howlingly good Tom Cruise as dog monologue?

Other standouts: my longtime inspiration and undervalued New Yorker standby David Owen; Paul Rudnick, of course; Frank Gannon’s “Aristotle on Relationships”; Patricia Marx’s fantastic “Audio Tour,” which should become something longer (I did some sleuthing at the time about what happens if you call “Todd Niesle’s” phone number); the satisfyingly odd Paul Simms creating an excellent vision of an irritated chimp; and Andy Borowitz, who has great timing. And, as I said, Remnick, who was probably relishing his chance to relax after all the Updike gentility and Katrina outrage; he gave the Woody Allen bit his all, said Let there be lightness! and it was good.

26 September 2005 | uncategorized |

Briefly Noted (by the vacationing editor)

“People think these poor people are just lazy and dumb, but I see these people working harder than I’ve ever worked in my life. I can guarantee you that if being lazy and dumb was criteria for who’s poor and who’s rich, things would be very different in this country.”

—John Scalzi, as quoted in the AP story about his essay “Being Poor.”

25 September 2005 | uncategorized |