Lizzy Caplan says it best

Sh*t Liz Lemon Says

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You might have noticed that lately, magazines and TV are being applauded for finally displaying “average” looking women. From America Ferrara starring on Ugly Betty, to Tina Fey on 30 Rock, to Glamour giving Crystal Renn her own spread, it seems like the media industry was actually making some headway in this department!

But here’s the thing- Crystal Renn is actually smaller than the average lady (and I’m willing to bet she’s not overweight by medical standards), America Ferrara is stunning, and as for Liz Lemon? She’s hot! I mean, you can’t slap glasses and a sense of humor on a gal and turn her ugly!

A recent post by Feministing examines my point in more detail. Author Chloe poses the question, “if Tina Fey, Lea Michele and America Ferrera are ugly, what hope is there for the rest of us?” Amen, sister Chloe! I’ve always been frustrated with the jokes about Michele being ugly (would anyone else give their right arm to look like her!?), and the Liz Lemon-bashing has never resonated with me either. Yeah, these characters might have some unfortunate wardrobe choices, but let’s face it – they’re (WAY) better lookin’ then the average chick.

Even the Washington Post agrees. Ezra Klein writes, 30 Rock “didn’t have the nerve to cast an actually frumpy actress in Liz Lemon’s role. About half the jokes focus on Lemon’s looks, and they’re all undercut when the camera focuses on the slim, beautiful Tina Fey.” In other words, not only does it not make sense to poke fun at these women for the way they look, but if these actresses are cast as the unattractive characters, what does that mean about the rest of us? Much like those super skinny models walking down the runways at Fashion Week, calling Liz Lemon ugly is setting the standard of beauty higher and higher, where perfection by modern standards is basically unattainable.

This article really makes me think. Is this movement towards average-looking characters actually a step backwards? I mean, what kind of message is the media sending us when Ugly Betty isn’t even ugly!?

What do you guys think?

I know it’s early, stop judging.

This week, in light of the ever-riveting Emmys, I’ve decided to countdown the ten primetime ladies that I wish I could be in real life. Most of them are from currently aired shows, but of course I had to let some of my canceled favorites slip by.

10. Cuddy – House
Who wouldn’t love to work with the ever lovable Dr. House? Cuddy is a complete non-pushover HBIC (look it up) who always looks fierce. And her hair is never out of place! Unlike that awful Cameron. Barf.

9. Lucille Bluth – Arrested Development
Why did this show get canceled? Why? I hope one day to be Lucille when I’m a “Gangy,” dirty martini in hand and Chanel skirt suits never out of place. Hopefully I’ll be slightly less mentally damaging to my family, though. Slightly.

8. Heidi Klum – Project Runway
The only non-fictional character on the list. This one’s a no brainer. Except I’m not sure how I’d go home to Seal every night.

7. Pam – The Office
I’m not a huge Pam fan. In fact, I was totally Team Karen while she was on the show. But, she has Jim Halpert (John Krasinski) and that’s all I need.

6. Buffy – Buffy the Vampire Slayer
I don’t watch True Blood, I don’t care for that Twilight nonsense and I will never, ever believe that there are vampires comparable to Spike or Angel out there. Here’s to the original ass-kicking, vampire slaying valley girl that everyone knows and loves. Without her, this vampire craze probably wouldn’t exist.

5. Blair Waldorf – Gossip Girl
If I can’t be Blair, just let me have her wardrobe. Or her love life.

4. Liz Lemon – 30 Rock
While I adore Toni Collette in the new series, “U.S. of Tara,” Tina Fey was robbed last night. Robbed! I heart Liz Lemon and it would be such a treat to try and wrangle Tracy, Jack and Kenneth on a weekly basis in 30 Rockerfeller Center, no matter how pathetic Liz’s personal life is.

3. Nancy Botwin – Weeds
Who doesn’t love stoned suburbia? Best show ever.

2. Sookie – True Blood
Like I said, don’t watch the show. However, that hottie Bill that I see hanging around the cast pictures? Yeah, okay, maybe I’ll Netflix it.

1. Joan Holloway – Mad Men
I mean, have you seen her?

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Dear Mr. Bianco:

What is wrong with you?

1) Demographics:

You are terribly presumptuous in thinking that the show only appeals to a younger audience (20s and 30s age range). The demographic is wider than you would think — haven’t you noticed the subtle ways they’ve advertised baby diapers, baby toys, etc.? Obviously appealing to the baby demographic, which you failed to consider when writing your critique.

My ol’ granny lives in a nasty retirement home. It smells like urine, but that’s not the point. My ol’ granny watches 30 Rock all the time. Perhaps that’s anecdotal, but I’ve been over there many times, and enjoyed an episode out in the main area with a bunch of other old peeps. They all laughed, just like my infant cousins laugh at the show. We all know (that means you), that when my granny and my infant cousins laugh at something, it’s universally funny.

2) Tina/Liz and Reality/Fiction critique:

OK, I won’t even go into that fact that this whole dichotomy is tiresome, and that you, Mr. Bianco, could learn a few things if you read literary theory and thought about the problematic divide between “reality” and “fiction.” I won’t go into that here, but I will raise a point about your comments about the show’s inability to hang onto reality.

At one point you write: “But as often happens lately, the jokes come at the expense of our attachment to the characters and to the show’s fraying links to reality.” Huh? What’s this mean? You devolve into a silly attack against Tina/Liz, and it makes me wonder if you harbor jealousy with the fact that (a) Tina Fey is probably WAY funnier than you could ever WISH to be and (b) you have some lame-o script for a sitcom wadded up in your tiny little office at USA TODAY.

3) Liz’s “sudden instability:”

When was Liz Lemon SANE? When? If memory serves me (and I have superb memory recall when it comes to 30 Rock), in one of the previous episodes Liz was drunk at a lunch meeting with super powerful big-wigs of the company. Have you seen her ex? Again, have you SEEN her ex? You suggest that Liz Lemon is more unstable in the last episode than in the other ones. That might suggest a bit of sexism, which Fey is poking fun at…if that’s the case, you’re a jerk, man. Besides, she wasn’t even pregnant, so there!

4) Decline in Ratings (according to Bianco) = Decline in Quality of Show

The decline in ratings might not be a result of the decline in the quality of content, but related to the fact that it’s intelligent humor. Ever considered that, Mr. Bianco? With that said, I’m aghast by the fact that you failed to acknowledge that much of this episode was a bitter and sarcastic critique of the Bush Administration. That strand of the story had nothing, absolutely nothing to do with pulling at our attachment(s) to the characters in “reality.” Of course, Fey is pushing viewers to think about the nonsense of a very real reality (the political spin that we’re currently drowning in, gasping for that last breath of air as I write this, before we’re all flushed down Bushy’s toilet of darkness), and that part was entirely detached from the real characters of TV Land. That was the only funny part? Come on! You sum it up in one tiny paragraph, and so flippantly.

Your overall assertion that Liz doesn’t give a damn about the show is punchy, based upon a few stringed together critiques. And how could you suggest that its tenure is similar to Studio 60? Are you serious? Are you really serious? Your comparing a drama to a sitcom! That’s why your conclusion is so utterly fallacious, and I can only determine that you take yourself too seriously and are projecting it onto a show.

Love,

C. Ryder

P.S. Studio 60 should have been given a chance – you’re just as wrong about that, too.

Tina Fey is far funnier than Sarah Silverman. While I applaud both women, Ms. Fey’s comedy is more polished, snarkier, and smarter. I like Sarah Silverman and was disappointed when Comedy Central stopped playing her show. I think if they’d given it some more time, I might think differently about Ms. Silverman’s abilities.

Don’t get me wrong, I think she’s funny. Trust me, I’m all about crude. If you’re a lover of Cervantes, Rabelais, Boccaccio, etc., you gotta be crude to appreciate those dudes. And that’s just a short, short list of the classics that abound with ribaldry – I’ll spare you the list of contemporaries (and for me, an index of “contemporaries” begin in the nineteenth century).

To be sure, I like that both these comediennes are crude. Again, I think it’s clear that I appreciate and relish vulgar forms of humor, but Ms. Silverman’s whole shtick is simply too unrefined, and that bothers me. Again, I’m not blaming her for being “less” funny than Ms. Fey, as I blame the fact that her show wasn’t allowed to blossom. I hope she’ll find another niche, say HBO, and she’ll have a similar show, and her weirdness and crudity will be put to the test, and for more than just a few seasons.

Unfortunately, television has a knack for cutting shows too soon. It’s similar to the music industry. It’s nothin’ but crappy, one hit songs, belted out by a thirteen year old girl/guy that matters these days, and that’s a shame, because the whole industry is run by a bunch of old men who don’t appeal to a wider range of Americans and are only lookin’ to make a buck, so that they can roll around in their RRs, smoke Cubans, and live in their over-sized Malibu manses.

But getting back to Ms. Fey. I’ll just say, I’m in awe. 30 Rock is absurdly funny, and we must thank Ms. Fey for that. I mean, Liz Lemon talks about poop and stuff, but the subtexts are far wittier than anything I saw on Ms. Silverman’s show. Ms. Silverman was too caught up in making fun of herself by obsessing about herself. As a viewer, it filled me with TV-viewing ennui, and I lost interest. It’s like, OK, OK, OK. I get it, Ms. Silverman, you’re self-obsessed, you’re narcissistic, you’re SO disgusting that you make fun of AIDS, blah-de-blah. And, like I said, I laughed at a lot of your stuff, but there’s a point, as my old friend use to say, when “you take it too far.”

That’s exactly what Ms. Fey’s character in 30 Rock and the stuff she wrote for Saturday Night Live doesn’t and didn’t do, i.e. flail about on the same old tired theme. See, witty, biting stuff has to show restraint. It’s not easy to rein in your humor, particularly when you’re talented humorists like Ms. Fey and Ms. Silverman. But it’s critical, absolutely critical, if you wanna captivate your audience for more than a few hours, or say two seasons.

Granted I chuckled at the “I’m F*king Matt Damon.” video. It was pretty good, but I guess I get sick of her lack of subtlety. Of course, humorists aren’t supposed to show restraint and subtlety. If they did t

hat all the time, they (obviously) wouldn’t be funny. Where would all those quirky, unrefined punch lines go if they were all about subtlety and restraint? But Ms. Silverman insists on pushing the envelope in everything she creates, and that gets old. If you do that, if you never show restraint, if you’re always, always over-the-top, then people will just yawn after all your acts. Why? Because they already expect you to push the skit, the idea, whatever to the limits. In a word, it’s called overkill.

And Ms. Fey’s style of humor is anything but.