Saturday, Aug 30, 2008
In a crowded field of candid cameras -- from Moore to Kutcher, "Jackass" to "Joe Schmo" -- Sacha Baron Cohen (aka Ali G) works it like no one else.
Jul 16, 2004 | James Broadwater is flustered. A Mississippi Republican running for Congress, he's canvassing with a man he thinks is a television reporter from Kazakhstan named Borat. As the two go door to door, shaking hands with constituents, they stop to introduce themselves to a woman walking by.
Broadwater: I'm running for United States Congress in District 2.
Borat: He is a strong man. He will crush his opponents and he will be powerful like Stalin and not tolerate people who are bad.
Broadwater: Well, actually, I wouldn't compare myself to Stalin ...
Borat: Will you vote for my friend?
Woman: Well, I probably will, but I don't ever tell people who I vote for before I vote.
Borat: If you do not vote for him, he will take power!
Woman: Well, it depends on whether he gets enough votes or not.
Borat: I will not leave until you swear on the eyes of your child that you will vote for him.
If you're not already familiar with British comedian Sacha Baron Cohen, a prankster and provocateur whose startlingly real alter egos and shrewd tactics make Michael Moore look like a slow-moving animal, his HBO show, "Da Ali G Show," returns Sunday for its second season. It again stars Cohen in his three guises: the aggressively misguided Borat, Austrian fashion journalist Bruno and hip-hop dim bulb Ali G. They are men who speak broken English and are largely unfamiliar with American culture, and yet they seem to be able to bring out the best -- and worst -- in everyone they encounter.
Their interview subjects have ranged from Newt Gingrich to Boutros Boutros-Ghali, but you would think that this time around, Cohen would have a lot more trouble luring in public figures. Not so. The first two episodes alone feature such big names as ABC's Sam Donaldson, former presidential candidate Pat Buchanan and former Los Angeles police chief Darryl Gates, and upcoming episodes feature Noam Chomsky and EPA administrator Christine Todd Whitman. And nobody appears to have been in on the joke.
How Cohen attracts high-profile guests to his show -- and how it's possible that these individuals and their publicists aren't familiar with his routine -- is anybody's guess. But interviews with prominent people are far from the main draw of "Da Ali G Show." Cohen's unbelievable skills at improv and physical comedy call to mind Peter Sellers and Charlie Chaplin. When he shows up as Borat to taste wine with some older gentlemen, he embodies this stiff, formal man who's prone to passionate outbursts. He tosses back several glasses of wine until he's very drunk, but never breaks character. "You look like Premier Brezhnev, but more good," he gushes drunkenly to the men as he's leaving. "Very good man! Not just in head. Head, nothing! Heart everything." Later, as Bruno interviewing a pastor who "converts" homosexuals, Cohen folds his legs under him and holds himself with a loose, bored air that's utterly different from Borat's forced, aggressive gestures. The two characters look so completely different despite minimal costume adjustments that it would be easy to believe that Borat and Bruno are played by different actors.
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