Cool down, friends. Classes are done for the day, and I will now list my problems with the good Mr. Zehme's article.
1) Zehme quotes Rock's stand-up routines. Normally, when writing a profile of a comedian, it is appropriate, even expected, that the author should quote the comedian's material; Mr. Zehme quotes Mr. Rock's routines frequently and at length. It may not sound bad, but it reads as the laziest article ever written. Zehme even takes it upon himself to quote Rock's commentary track from the
Head of State DVD.
2) Mr. Zehme is the kind of author who has to establish superiority over his subject. In this particular article, that entails numerous asides in which Zehme "wittingly" comments on his own article, thereby proving to himself and his readers that he can hang with this Chris Rock fellow. What's worse is that he takes the easy way out, putting all of his jokes in parentheses instead of making an attempt to weave them into the article. If they were funny, it wouldn't really matter, but they're unfunny, and they stick out. There's a lot of 'em, too - between Zehme's jokes in parentheses and the quotes of Rock's material, you have about 70% of the article.
3) Mr. Zehme's Vocabulary. This is more of a pet peeve of mine; I hate it when there's a conscious effort on the author's part to "dress up" their writing. Mr. Zehme is guilty of this in spades. When the phrases "an occluded maw" and "warmly monochromatic" somehow eke their way into a profile of a comedian, the author is showing off, plain and simple. I like directness. Just gimme the facts, Zehme!
4) Zehme tries to link Obama's success with Rock's movie
Head of State. I don't get it, and neither does Zehme, but he takes sheer coincidence and runs with it like a motherfucker.
Here's a sample paragraph:
There had been a mix-up with the cranberry juice Rock ordered at brunch that afternoon, and you may take from this what you wish: The waiter placed a glass of straw-yellow liquid in front of him, and Rock stared at it and was having none of it. "Um, this is cranberry juice?" he asked, whereupon, the waiter scooped it away and returned with a glass of appropriately red liquid, reporting, "That was white cranberry; this is regular." Said Rock, "Oh, it was white cran! I never even heard of that." (Who has?) Nevertheless, the whiteness had discomfited him and he rejected it reflexively. Ancient profundity may lurk in subtext here. But probably not. Anyway, he then asked the waiter (who was whiter than the white cran, which, after all, was yellow) for a separate glass of ice and added with overwhelming beneficence, "Pretty please? Sugar on top?"
So, Rock rejected the white cran because of some subliminal resistance against whites? Really? I think maybe it's just because WHITE CRAN ISN'T WHAT HE FUCKING ORDERED. Those jokes were good, though, right? The waiter was "whiter than the white cran"! Ha! Oh, wait, the white cran was yellow? Okay. I guess it isn't funny after all. The man sabotaged his own joke. Good for him?
Here's an indirect example of Zehme's Obama-
Head of State connection, complete with wildly misplaced quote:
As blow the winds of whim and fate and inevitability, one resonant Head of State footnote did emerge. And it would feel not unlike a nomination for the highest office in the land of the business of dreams (controlled by white men). Chris Rock was elected in 2005 to host the Oscars. And despite quaking Old Guard trepidation (how many "motherfuckers" might he hurl up into the satellite beams?), he strode onto the stage welcomed merely by a standing ovation (unheard of for a host!). "Sit yo' asses down!" he began, exuberance personified. (Avers friend Bill Stephney, "He is very much stand-up's Obama.")
Another pet peeve of mine is when someone says something like "a little band called the Beatles," or "a little place called Los Angeles." You know, that ironic undercutting of a massive subject? I hate it so much. "He strode onto the stage welcomed merely by a standing ovation"? Gross. And then the exclamation point? Oh, Zehme, you did it again! Hey, I did it too!
If nothing else, this article gives me hope. If this clown can make a living writing dreck like this, then there's hope for me yet.
EDIT: Thanks for providing the link, ericluxury!
