From our "opposite sides of the same coin"
department comes an accounting of the city's best and worst comedy exports.
Like any decade, the ’00s saw a lot of comics make, or attempt, the jump to the
big time in the US,
but few stand in such good/evil, yin/yang, Jedi/Sith contrast as former Atomic
Fireball Samantha Bee and alleged stand-up Carla Collins.
There is little about the magnificence of The Daily Show
that hasn't already been said. But if Bee's career has a shortcoming it's that,
after that talent search came ’round in ’03, she set the bar uncomfortably high
for any of her fellow icebacks by arriving and soon excelling on the Comedy
Central series just as it hit its most praise-worthy anti-Bush stride.
True, not every Bee bit has been comedy gold, and her
appearances have lately been rare because of those back-to-back pregnancies (courtesy
of husband and fellow correspondent Jason Jones). But from her "Kill
Drill" and NILF segments to her accidental role in the Fox-fabricated
"War on Christmas," Bee has been one of the brightest lights in the
Jon Stewart boys club — a deliciously deadpan, whip-smart piss-taker and a
singer in the most important comedy chorus since the early glories of SNL.
In contrast to this dissenting and motherly
Torontonian-turned-New Yorker is Collins, that skin 'n' bones starfucker,
lately of Los Angeles. The former
Weather Network hostess and CTV entertainment reporter relocated to LA
in the mid ’00s, where she and hubby Tyrone Power Jr. (yes, really) have since
pursued fame and new levels of unfunniness via a reality show and her stage
act.
Carlawood (a hurtin' imitation of Kathy Griffin's My Life on
the D-List) apparently doesn't air in the US,
so the Yanks have been spared the obvious and sorry-ass gags of this
Barbie-blonde green-eyed monster. But pity any poor sap who wandered unaware
into that Malibu theatre during her
Third Eye Blonde — and shudder at the thought that Collins might one day get
homesick, and bring her act back north.
Los
Angeles? We're sorry about Collins, but you can keep her. New York? We'd like Bee back, please.
Sean Davidson's Comedy column appears every Wednesday.