And her name is Janeane Garofalo.
Hear me out here. Kaufman’s genius, or his insanity, was to blur the line between performance and reality to the point where the audience’s reaction (is this really happening? Is this guy serious?) becomes part of the act. Unlike some latter-day acts (can you say, Borat?) he managed to find the line of plausibility and straddle it uncomfortably close, so close that many of his “acts” are still believed by many to have been real events. (The fictional Tony Clifton, his “feud” with wrestler Jerry “The King” Lawler.)
It has dawned on me that Janeane Garofalo is conducting an elaborate performance piece of satirical brilliance that would make the late Mr. Kaufman proud. This woman sat on a soundstage at MSNBC and explained to Keith Olbermann how tax protesters are actually racists. How can you not watch that and not see the genius of Kaufman’s Inter-Gender Wrestling champ and how it infuriated the SNL audience? Now, she has managed to say something so absurd that even those that sympathize with her carefully selected views can only stare gaping as she offers the following devastating quote:
GAROFALO: The, mostly the media in the States is much more to the right. I mean there is almost no liberal outlet for news commentary or editorializing.
One has to stand in awe at the woman’s commitment to her art.