printI’m in Seth MacFarlane’s corner, despite his smarminess. The master of ceremonies at the 85th Academy Awards managed to annoy the right people.
In “Oscars’ Hostile, Ugly, Sexist Night,” Amy Davidson, an affirmative fem at the New Yorker, kvetched over the “hostility shown to women in the workplace.” The meandering Davidson was moaning about MacFarlane’s “We Saw Your Boobs” routine (I didn’t see it), and its implication:
We saw your boobs, but that’s not even what we find attractive, so you exerted no power in doing so—all you did was humiliate yourself?
Behold the sacred boob! So now if a woman strips and a man laughs he risks accusation of impropriety. Besides, women rule the work place, toots. I know men who don’t dare greet a female for fear of an harassment suit.
Another anemic New Yorker writer whined that MacFarlane insulted those Who’re Always Ready to Receive Offense.
Snivels She Who Took Offense:
MacFarlane came off as kind of a pig, as he made fun of women for being too thin, too old, too naked. How sophisticated is it to call the pretty, popular girls sluts? I had to stand up and move away when he turned his sights on the lovely black nine-year-old Quvenzhané Wallis, nominated for Best Actress. I felt sick imagining where MacFarlane might go. So when he simply made a joke about George Clooney sleeping with her down the road, I felt my body relax.
I’ve now watched “We Saw Your Boobs.” If this is indeed MacFarlane singing, he has a better voice and is more musical than all the other warblers who “sang” last night, except for Dame Shirley Bassey, of course, who can do no wrong.
Here’s her stunning, sexy, original performance of Gold Finger
As I predicted in Annual Oscar Offal, Adel did deliver a monotone. She has no range. Barbra Streisand was appalling. And I owe you an apology. I promised no Jennifer Hudson. But someone did go primal on stage. I suspect it was Hudson.
Finally, the reason I’m on MacFarlane’s side is because he has set off that ersatz defender of Jewish interests, Abraham Foxman of the Anti-Defamation League. The ADL, “on Monday blasted an Oscars sketch in which potty-mouthed film star bear Ted joked about Jews in Hollywood.”
I recall that Foxman had more to say about Mel Gibson than he had about a Seattle based Jihadist, Naveed Afzal Haq. Haq murdered a Jewish woman and critically injured five other women at the downtown Jewish Federation building in 2006.
The ADL’s website issued only the tersest of statements. It made no mention of the dead, the injured, and the Muslim. A glance at the League’s site and a visitor from Deep Space might get the impression Seth MacFarlane and other marauding Christian Cossacks like him posed the greatest danger to Jewish continuity.
As I said, I caught but a glimpse of Seth MacFarlane presenting the Oscars. He was not terribly funny, but then they never are. Don’t tell me you found any of the multiple appearances of Billy Crystal and Whoopi Goldberg the least bit amusing.
“Family Guy” is quite cute, but this MacFarlane creation has nothing on Mike Judge’s stuff. “Idiocracy” and Beavis & Butthead are sublimely smart.
MacFarlane is certainly not in Joan Rivers’ league when it comes to impropriety. If only she were unleashed on the Oscar crowd. Now that she’s old, she gets away with speaking her nimble mind.
I laughed so loud and hard at a comment she made on her reality show with Mellisa, the insipid but loving daughter, that I missed at least two more jokes. (I would not recommend watching “Joan Knows Best?”. Like all reality voyeurism, it’s junk—and a schlep, as Rivers would say.)
Ms. Rivers walked in on a football party Mellisa was throwing for her young son and his rowdy small friends. Looking on with disdain at the grubby little boys, Rivers blurted out:
“I don’t know how Jerry Sandusky managed to do it.”