I think Jamie’s going to be chiming in later today with an attack on the article about Playboy that I found so invigorating, but in the meantime I thought I’d direct your attention to this Youtube clip of a recent monologue by Late Late Show host Craig Ferguson.
It’s basically an AA testimonial, in which Ferguson talks about his own struggles with alcoholism and about why he’s going to try, from now on, to no longer participate in the cultural mockery of vulnerable, probably substance-abusing people like Anna Nicole Smith and Britney Spears.
It’s a pretty simple speech, but it’s also pretty amazing, maybe as much for its artistic bravery as for its honesty and self-exposure. Ferguson’s clearly taken control of his show in a way that makes, say, Conan O’Brien look pretty safe by comparison.
So, kudos to Ferguson, and welcome to the Mantheon.
MANTHEON UPDATE: This is somewhat tangential, but I just noticed that Jamie has recently (and quite without consultation, I must note) added David Sedaris, NPR talkster extraordinaire, to the Mantheon. And let me just say: No, I do not like it, Not one little bit!
Sedaris has got a lot of the qualities I admire in men — humility, humor, wisdom, self-deprecation — but at the end of the day he’s just too much of a pleaser. He’s never really going to stand up to power or to complacency. To compare him, for instance, to the great Stephen Colbert, can you ever imagine Sedaris doing what Colbert did to Bush at the White House Correspondents’ dinner? Sedaris would have found some way to use his own gayness to take a gentle potshot at Bush’s anti-gay politics but he would have done it in such a way that Bush was basically let off the hook. That’s the Sedaris way, and while maybe there’s something mildly subversive in it — look, gay men are just like you! they chuckle at New Yorker cartoons too! they are New Yorker cartoons! — it’s too mild for admission to the Mantheon.
Where does it end? Augusten Burroughs?
