"Is there any
price too high
for the promise
of eternal
youth?"
ALI BABBLE from page 47
Sat: Nov 13, 8:00 PM
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Tickets: (313) 237-SING
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But wild is what you get with
But ... anti-Semitic? Racist?
Cohen, whose bling is blinding when
"I would guess his parents are not
he flashes his outre outfits and bumps too happy with what he is doing; it's
fists — and heads — with celebrities,. not the kind of thing we would want
claiming "Respek."
a nice Jewish boy to do," explained
Respect is anything but what visi-
Rabbi Shaul Rosenblatt to The Age, a
tors get on the show. Indeed, not
newspaper out of Melbourne,
everyone is enamored of Cohen/Ali
Australia.
G's less than grandiloquent grand-
But in the familiar guise of Jewish
standing. Some get the Ali G rap;
wit — albeit en mufti as a
others want to rap his knuckles.
rapper/Kazakhstani cutup/fey stylist
But why are so many — guests
— isn't Cohen doing what the Jack
have included Gen. Brent Scowcraft,
Bennys, Milton Berles and Shelly
Newt Gingrich, James Lipton (Inside
Bermans have been babbling about
the Actors Studio), reporter Sam
for years? Playing a modern-day mis-
Donaldson and arch-conservative Pat
anthrope, Cohen plays the high and
Buchanan, among others — willing • mighty for fools.
to play stooge to his stupid ques-
tions?
`Distasteful, Even Dangerous'
As he told the New York Times in a
rare interview, "It's weird. For that
Certainly, when it comes to comedy,
time they're in the room with me,
he is a player, albeit one whose skill
sometimes they totally forget who
was honed not from a humble back-
they are. And they come out with a
ground like so many others but
totally different side of themselves.
through a higher economic calling.
"Some try to appear cool with Ali
Talk about being dressed for suc-
G and down with the kids. Some
cess: Cohen was raised in a family
want to be . liked by Ali G. [United
more suited for sartorial splendor
Nations Secretary General] Boutros
than sarcastic delight. His mother, an
Boutros-Ghali kept on telling me he
Israeli, and father, a Welshman, run a
series of suit outfits in Britain,
used to be a bit of a bully in school,
including the company Woodford
and he used to muck around. They
want Ali G's approval. They're in the
Ltd.
room with a total idiot, and yet
Yet there is no limit to Cohen's
sense of outrage. Irreverent yet reli-
they're seeking his approval. As if it
gious — Cohen is an observant Jew
somehow makes them cooler."
- — the observant comic hoists others
Cohen's line of questioning will
on their petards of prejudice.
never be confused with that of
And to think it all started sampling
Barbara Walters: If you could be a
tree, what kind of tree would you be?
Neil Simon. That's where Cohen got
More like: If you could be a tree,
his acting chops recognized, becom-
ing a member of the Habonim Jewish
would you spank people pissing on
Youth Group 15 years ago and
you?
appearing in their production of
(One who fell for the bait, Andy
Simon's Biloxi Blues.
Rooney, berated his host as a moron,
whereupon Ali G called him racist,
His next stop was far from
Mississippi; missing a sense of how
accusing Rooney of walking off the
his mother grew up, Cohen took off
show because Ali G is black. In real
for Israel. At 18, the up-and-coming
life, Cohen is white playing a black
kibitzer worked at the Rosh Hanikra
playing a white playing ... the black-
Kibbutz in Israel, trying to glean
est of black comedy.)
insight into his mother's and his own
In a world where fake news wins
Jewish heritage.
Emmys — hello, Jon Stewart —
It was the time spent there that
should it be so surprising that a Jew
helped,shape and format his life's
posing black should pose no ethical
problems for a viewing public punk'd
instincts to discover people's preju-
by poseurs? In a way, isn't a comedian dices against minorities, a topic he
wrote about quite daringly. and elo-
like Cohen just a modern-day Mort
quently when he returned to study at
Sahl-turned-salacious? (Although it
England's Cambridge University.
would be hard to picture Ali G with
It was also there, at Cambridge,
a newspaper — since one doesn't
know if he can even read.)
that he raised the roof as Tevye in the
university's production of Fiddler on
Comically brilliant, Cohen is not
the Roof:
everyone's cup of sarcasm, even if
On the one hand, he was a musical
there are those who may consider
star, on the other ... an iconoclastic
him the Jewish Will Rogers who
provoker who, with brother Erran,
never found a person he liked.