Billy Wayne Ruddick for the American people.
July 17, 2018 5:24 AM   Subscribe

Meet Billy Wayne Ruddick, Sacha Baron Cohen's latest creation. Dr. Ruddick (PhD) runs Truthbrary.org for the good of the American people.
posted by Foci for Analysis (27 comments total) 5 users marked this as a favorite
 
For anyone a bit confused, this article might help a bit.
“Who Is America?, which premiered July 15 on Showtime, is the comedian’s first TV series since Da Ali G Show went off the air in 2004, and it’s superficially similar. Though Cohen plays all-new characters, he’s pulling the same stunts, interviewing people (including politicians) under false pretenses and trying to goad them into saying something ridiculous (or at least nodding along in polite agreement as he does).”
[vi: The Atlantic]
posted by Fizz at 5:41 AM on July 17, 2018 [1 favorite]


I loved the first episode. His visit to the small town conservatives as their idea of a typical liberal was very funny too: "I’m a cisgender white heterosexual male, for which I apologise"!
posted by JonB at 5:59 AM on July 17, 2018 [2 favorites]


"A rudimentary knowledge of mortars"
posted by Pogo_Fuzzybutt at 6:09 AM on July 17, 2018 [1 favorite]




We signed up for SHO just for this. The first two acts were just okay. He mainly punched down and the other people acquitted themselves basically just fine. Mrs. Shell almost stopped watching at that point. However, we both agreed the payoff in the third act was well worth it.
posted by M-x shell at 6:34 AM on July 17, 2018




I think he should push the Ruddick character more. The shit artist and the liberal were sort of "meh" comedy, the part about compromising Republicans was the important value added.

I hope / assume he has a bunch of film in the can? Once this has aired it is kind of like the gig is up, right?
posted by Meatbomb at 6:35 AM on July 17, 2018 [1 favorite]


He mainly punched down and the other people acquitted themselves basically just fine.
Perhaps this is the point. In the first part of the show, SBC doesn't punch at all. Sanders and Gaetz don't fall in the trap. The Trump-loving couple is fine. The art gallery woman is fine. Up to this point, we see people react in the way one expects normal, decent people to react. And then all hell breaks loose.
posted by elgilito at 7:29 AM on July 17, 2018 [13 favorites]


No one does it better.

I have to say that the art-dealer bit in the middle of the first episode was weird and could have easily gone further off the rails, if the art dealer/rep hadnt been one weird-ass character herself.

I noticed in the main politics thread just this am that Rorbacher's behind in the polls, wonder if his appearance will have any measurable effect.

First peoples chants made me spit out some of my drink.
posted by Exceptional_Hubris at 7:41 AM on July 17, 2018 [1 favorite]


one weird-ass character herself.

I thought she was totally fantastic, the antithesis of what we normally expect from the prototypical art gallery owner on Laguna Beach snob. She was given a terrible picture by a supposed murderer, made of his own excrement and semen, and she didn't flinch. She picked out all of the good things, empathizing with and encouraging him. She came across as earnest and non-judgmental in a way that we need more of everywhere. Maybe it was an act, but it seemed really genuine.

Overall I thought this episode was excellent, and Cohen is just great. The gun segment was of course the most heavy hitting, but I also appreciated how he could poke fun at liberals - and, opposite of what we might expect going into a segment where a guy in an NPR shirt tells two wealthy Trump supporters that his wife has a dolphin paramour (among other relatively crazy things), the couple does a remarkable job listening to him without passing judgement and sort of trying to get where he's coming from. I think there's an interesting and powerful message there too about the divide in this country, and about how it plays out in real life vs. how we often think of it based on tv segments etc.
posted by Lutoslawski at 8:53 AM on July 17, 2018 [11 favorites]


Okay, I'm going to watch the rest of the show at some point, but nothing can beat "like owls, they can see in slow motion."
posted by sfenders at 8:56 AM on July 17, 2018 [3 favorites]


Yeah Lutoslawski, I concur about the art gallery part. I feel like it was set up to be the usual, lazy “art is stupid and pretentious!” shtick, but she was actually totally awesome and subverted it by being genuine.
posted by chococat at 9:08 AM on July 17, 2018 [3 favorites]


Conservative billboard artist owns the libs by erecting massive billboard advertising the show.

"conservative street artist" is a weird title.
posted by Dr. Twist at 9:55 AM on July 17, 2018 [3 favorites]


"Mock politicians and innocent public personalities all you want, if that lets you sleep at night, but HOW DARE YOU mock those who have fought and served our country.""

Innocent public personalities?! Give me a goddamn break, you were a marginal amount of votes from being vice president. You basically desecrated your party to lay the groundwork for Trump. On top of all the other awful things that all politicians get up to in the course of their careers, Sarah Palin cannot possibly be considered "innocent."
posted by GoblinHoney at 9:56 AM on July 17, 2018 [4 favorites]


I honestly got a different vibe from the art segment. I think she was somehow hip to the con, that if she didn't exactly know it was SBC, her spidey-senses were tingling.

But regardless, she was being a very open and empathetic person. Good for her. I thought when he walked away she would say something to the camera crew, but she stayed in character the whole time.
posted by Meatbomb at 10:10 AM on July 17, 2018 [2 favorites]


I liked it. Sanders' face at hearing the fantastic math behind those numbers was priceless, the conservative couple was pure cringe, the art gallery was almost that, but the owner probably heard worse before and rolled with it.
The guns segment is a brutal reminder on how some republicans are so afraid of the NRA they'd rather endorse arming fetuses with guns to stop abortions before saying "no, that's ridiculous" to anything that would sell guns.

I hope / assume he has a bunch of film in the can? Once this has aired it is kind of like the gig is up, right?
Yup, very likely the series are all filmed up by now, and like Ali G, Borat and Bruno, SBC will retire the characters because they got too famous to prank someone up. I think Eric Andre said the same about the difficulties of continuing the Eric Andre Show - he can't prank guests because most of them (and their managers) are in on the joke.
posted by lmfsilva at 10:23 AM on July 17, 2018 [1 favorite]


This is the sort of thing that I couldn't watch myself (too uncomfortable; I'm too empathic to watch people squirm, even if they deserve it), but I'm glad it's out there.
posted by LMGM at 10:32 AM on July 17, 2018 [1 favorite]


Conservative billboard artist owns the libs by erecting massive billboard advertising the show.

Nobody's really buying into Palin's "stolen valor" thing, right? I could at least see the logic (though I don't agree with it) in people being offended that he was somehow mocking veterans, but to label what he did as stolen valor is ridiculous—it's tantamount to accusing Tom Cruise of stealing valor for portraying an army vet in Born on the 4th of July.
posted by Atom Eyes at 11:13 AM on July 17, 2018


I don't know if it is my headcold/fever but everything is weirder and weirder to me this AM. I can't tell if the "conservative street artist" is just another fiction from SBC like Billy Wayne. I just read on another thread that NPR tweeted out the Declaration of Independence and I cannot tell if that is a hoax because, why would you ever do that?
posted by Pembquist at 11:30 AM on July 17, 2018


My favorite Sascha Baron Cohen character is Maria Butina. Notice how she appears everywhere, goading people to perform treasonous acts.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 11:32 AM on July 17, 2018 [2 favorites]




ugh why do horrible men ruin everything :(
posted by Exceptional_Hubris at 11:48 AM on July 17, 2018 [5 favorites]


Pembquist, NPR tweets the Declaration of Independence every year; I think I first noticed it (and the idiot responses) last year.
posted by lackutrol at 1:58 PM on July 17, 2018


Kurt Metzger was never fired from Inside Amy Schumer. They stopped making it around the time the controversy happened, so he was a writer until the end. He is seen as an extremely good writer and a very funny comedian by other comedians, even though he says and does things that are absolute anathema to, say, Me-fites.
posted by Barry David at 3:23 PM on July 17, 2018


Pembquist, NPR tweets the Declaration of Independence every year; I think I first noticed it (and the idiot responses) last year.

NPR reads the Declaration of Independence on July 4 every year, on ATC, but maybe they do it also on ME. They have done this, I believe, for as long as I've been listening to ATC which is something like 40 years at this point.
posted by hippybear at 6:36 PM on July 17, 2018


My favorite Sascha Baron Cohen character is Maria Butina.

Mine is Christopher Monckton, 3rd Viscount Monckton of Brenchley
posted by flabdablet at 11:44 PM on July 17, 2018 [2 favorites]


Also, having just watched the first ep of Who Is America: every single one of SBC's characters immediately screamed "person wearing a disguise". It's not immediately obvious that any of them are SBC, but I can't imagine any of that makeup being convincing at close range. Are all his "interview" subjects just completely blind?

And don't get me started on that allegedly Israeli accent.
posted by flabdablet at 12:11 AM on July 18, 2018


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