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Strange Bedfellows
Price: $24.95
Subtitle:
How Late-Night Comedy
Turns Democracy into a Joke
Author: Russell L. Peterson
Subject:
Film and Media,
Politics, Current Events
Cloth ISBN 978-0-8135-4284-3
Pages:
272 pages, 15
illustrations
Publication Date: March 2008
Reviews
for Strange Bedfellows
"This book takes an insightful look at the increasingly complex media landscape, where "legitimate" cable and network journalists, cable-news pundits, and TV comedians all fall under the same category of "infotainment" and political leaders and celebrities alike are both ridiculed and revered. He also raises the question whether late-night comedians have a moral role to play as individuals who reach a mass audience with their jibes. Especially timely now that the election season is underway." —Library Journal
"A cultural analysis so smart, supple, and frisky that it instantly stands as required reading for every aspiring critic in the country." —Troy Patterson, Slate
"Jay Leno may be annoying, but is he a threat to American democracy? That is the eyebrow-raising charge that Russell L. Peterson levels at the host of The Tonight Show and his mainstream comedy peers in Strange Bedfellows."—The Chronicle Review
Washington Post online interview with Troy Patterson
Featured in the Chicago Tribune
"Zesty and contentious and sophisticated...part of the fun of Strange Bedfellows is matching up your own likes and dislikes with the author's."—Louis Bayard, Salon
Praise
for Strange Bedfellows
“Ever since cable TV exposed American journalism as a niche
entertainment genre, comedians have rushed in to grab responsibility
for safeguarding American democracy. With Letterman, Leno, Stewart,
Colbert, Maher, Kimmel and the other witty white boys of the night
delivering the news, it was just a matter of time before comedy
reviewers caught on and accepted their new role as postmodern
metajournalists. But don’t take my word for it; read Russell Peterson’s
Strange Bedfellows.”
—David Marc, author of Television in the Antenna Age
Description:
It is no coincidence that
presidential candidates have been
making it a point to add the late-night comedy circuit to the campaign
trail in recent years. In 2004, when John Kerry decided it was time to
do his first national television interview, he did not choose CBS's 60
Minutes, ABC's Nightline, or NBC Nightly News.
Kerry picked Comedy Central's The Daily Show. When George W.
Bush was lagging in the polls, his appearance on the David Letterman
Show gave him a measurable boost. Candidates for the 2008 presidential
election began their late-night bookings almost as soon as they
launched their campaigns.
How can this be? The reason is that polls have been consistently
finding that a significant number of Americans-and an even larger
proportion of those under the age of thirty-get at least some of their
"news" about politics and national affairs from comedy shows. While
this trend toward what some have called "infotainment" seems to herald
the descent of our national discourse-the triumph of entertainment over
substance-the reality, according to Russell L. Peterson, is more
complex. He explains that this programming is more than a mere
replacement for traditional news outlets; it plays its own role in
shaping public perception of government and the political process.
From Johnny Carson to Jon Stewart, from Chevy Chase's
spoofing of
President Ford on Saturday Night Live to Stephen Colbert's roasting of
President Bush at the White House Correspondents Dinner, Strange
Bedfellows explores what Americans have found so funny about our
political institutions and the people who inhabit them, and asks what
this says about the health of our democracy. Comparing the mainstream
network hosts-Jay, Dave, Conan, and Johnny before them-who have always
strived to be "equal opportunity offenders" to the newer, edgier crop
of comedians on cable networks, Peterson shows how each brand of satire
plays off a different level of Americans' frustrations with politics.
About the Author:
Russell L. Peterson teaches American studies at the
University of Iowa
External Links:
Russell L. Peterson's blog
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Price: $24.95
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