Smoke came out of my ears when I saw Betty White recite yet another deflated joke about her libido at last night's Emmy Awards. I know, she was referring to Jon Hamm, but still: Why has this incredible woman -- six time Emmy-award winner and pioneer for women in the media -- been reduced to the role of potty-mouthed, simpleton granny?
The scope of White's career has made her renaissance exciting on so many levels. Here is a woman who has worked in radio and television for over six decades. White co-produced Life with Elizabeth and The Betty White Show when very few women worked behind the camera. It's easy to forget how progressive The Golden Girls was for its time, showcasing real female friendships, (Samantha Jones and Blanche Devereaux would no doubt be fast friends if they met in real life) and tackling risky social issues like AIDS and gay marriage. And let's not forget The Mary Tyler Moore Show.
It's no wonder millions of Americans rooted for White to host SNL. I was among them. (And good god, that New York Magazine cover with Tracy Morgan has got be the magazine's best since the the Spitzer "brain" masterpiece). But sadly, the SNL episode turned out to be one cursing-granny joke after the next. I mean, is it really that funny to see an old lady express sexual desire and say '"fuck" on prime time television?
The answer, of course, is no.
In Christopher Hitchens awesomely infuriating piece "Why Women Aren't Funny" Hitchens writes "women get funnier as they get older." If this is true, as I suspect it may be, one can only hope that our beloved Betty is just warming up.
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Betty White is enjoying herself immensely.. and I imagine some of her jokes that make you feel uncomfortable are made expressly for THAT purpose. There is nothing much funnier than a youngster with a pinched expression, who is prudishly shocked when you dont do what is expected. I hope she ignores you and goes right on doing whatever it is she feels like doing without worrying about whether she is pleasing or displeasing anyone else.
Except there was Betty White.........and her performance...(somewhat "potty mouthed") made the whole two hours and ten bucks completely worth it...........I've got a role for her in my screenplay. (I know.........I'm a little delusional........)
The easy solution for mediocre writers confronted with small children or octogenarians is to have them say things that you'd normally hear coming from a 25- or 30-year-old, getting a cheap laugh on the premise "Isn't it funny that she/he is still/already talking about sex and using naughty words."
It's tough to write truthfully for someone so much older than you that you can't really imagine what it's like to be that age, or so young that they have little life experience and a relatively tiny vocabulary from which to draw comedy. Thus, we have the old standby stock characters of the precocious wisecracking kid and the sex-obsessed, dirty-mouthed old lady.
A good gauge of a TV show's quality is, Do the kids talk like actual kids, and do the old folks talk like actual old folks, or do they sound like a frustrated thirty-something hack writer who's been kicking around LA for 10 years with just some crummy sitcom scripts to show for it.
Betty White isn't stupid and she's not going to do things that she doesn't want to do. If she didn't want to make sex jokes, then she wouldn't. She seems to be enjoying her life and the work she's doing. I watched her on, I believe Jimmy Fallon, right before she was on SNL and she mentioned she put her foot down about making jokes about drug, because she didn't feel that it was something to joke around about. Just let Betty White have fun and enjoy the newest success of her long and amazing career. And here's hoping that I have as much sass as her when I'm her age.
who writes these jokes ? 25 year olds? something is wrong with our societys treatment of elderly people . why should this woman make a mockery of herself? we need to honor her not treat her as an object of curiousity . i get that its nice to have humour about ages (both young and old) but this is really tiresome and stupid. poor betty (as she laughs all the way to the bank)
Maybe if they didn't have to churn out skits in a week, they would get more original.
What if Don Rickles was zinging her with some of his jokes - that guy is hilarious. Betty White was never quite such a subversive type of comedienne as Don Rickles so he could still probably get her flustered.