The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
Arts
Wednesday, February 25, 2015 — 7A

ABC

“Please don’t P.M.D.”
‘Repeat After Me’ 
refreshes old idea

Celebrities parody 
themselves on Ellen-
produced ABC show

By SOPHIA KAUFMAN

Daily Arts Writer

ABC’s new half-hour comedy 

“Repeat After Me” premiered Feb-
ruary 17 and, despite its modest 
viewership, 
it 

proved to be a 
fresh take on a 
recycled 
idea. 

Ellen 
DeGe-

neres executive 
produces 
the 

show, and her 
mischievous 
mark is all over 
it. Like DeGe-
neres’s 
day-

time talk show 
“Ellen”’s hidden camera segment, 
“Repeat After Me” distinguishes 
itself as funny, not because we 
get to watch celebrities make fun 
of people or watch regular people 
make fun of other regular people, 
but because we get to watch celeb-
rities make fun of themselves.

Wendi McLendon-Covey (“The 

Goldbergs”) hosts “Repeat After 
Me,” dictating to celebrities via 
earpieces what to say to people 
who recognize them, but have no 
idea they are being filmed. In this 
episode, Scott Foley (“Scandal”) 
interviews a potential babysit-
ter for his kids. “My six-year-old 

smokes,” he says, impressing upon 
her how “terrible” his kids are. 
Sarah Hyland (“Modern Family”) 
meets a French tutor, and says part 
of the reason she wants to learn 
French is because she has a French 
lover, so she’s “got French kissing 
down.” Randy Jackson (“American 
Idol”) speaks to the people tinting 
the windows of his new truck, ask-
ing if they do houses too, because 
he has a “huge mansion with lots 
of windows” in which he likes to 
“walk around nakey.”

After each scene, the actors 

tell the people being pranked that 
they are on a hidden camera show 
and bring them out to see the live 
audience. At the end of the epi-
sode McLendon-Covey chooses 
her favorite moment of the night 
— which for this episode is Foley 
curled up in the fetal position and 
doing his best impression of a cry-
ing baby while the nonplussed 
nanny attempts to comfort him.

What gives “Repeat After Me” 

its energy isn’t so much the unpre-
dictable interactions themselves 
— though they are, for the most 
part, hilarious. It’s in watching 
talented actors make complete 
fools of themselves. They know 
how to maintain their momentum 
on camera, even in the moments 
when they are waiting for their 
next command, so the energy 
never lags. The actors of this 
episode complement each other 
particularly well; Foley says every-
thing he’s told to but can’t quite 
keep the mischief out his eyes, 

Hyland is completely straight-
faced throughout her whole ridic-
ulous scenario and Jackson can’t 
stop making the rookie mistake 
of laughing before delivering his 
lines.

Another aspect of the show 

reminiscent 
of 
DeGeneres’s 

own segment is that McLendon-
Covey’s jokes play on the fact 
that these are very recognizable 
celebrities interacting with regu-
lar people. Foley tells his poten-
tial babysitter that if she wants 
an autograph, they better get that 
out of the way first, and then he 
asks her if she ever worked with 
famous people before and if she 
has any good gossip. Hyland 
asks teasingly if her new teacher 
recognizes her from “Modern 
Family” and then brags with a 
cutesy laugh, “I’ve won a bunch 
of Emmys,” pointing proudly 
to the shelf behind her. Randy 
Jackson 
introduces 
himself 

quite simply as Randy Jackson 
“from television.” They all sub-
tly poke fun at the kind of things 
people expect celebrities would 
say, and it never comes across 
as mean-spirited or exploitative 
towards the people on the show. 
“Repeat After Me” may not be 
new, and it may be a while before 
McLendon-Covey reaches the 
skill level of DeGeneres when 
it comes to improvising, but at 
least it’s not plagued by petty 
problems that characterize the 
majority of reality programs on 
television now.

B

Repeat 
After Me

Series Pilot 
Tuesdays 
at 8:30

ABC

BIG MACHINE

The whitest Kardashian.
Haters gonna hate, 
but I still love Taylor

By CATHERINE BAKER

For The Daily

Let me be the first to tell you 

that I own every song Taylor 
Swift has ever released. There, 
I said it ... moving on now.

It’s 
December 
2007 
and 

much of my extended family 
has flown in from Minnesota 
to spend Christmas at my 
home in Michigan. I’m about 
to descend the stairs from my 
bedroom where I have carefully 
crafted my outfit — a jean skirt 
and pastel sweater — when my 
cousin Becca stops me. She 
informs me that I must listen 
to this new song her friend 
showed her.

I’m 11 years old and my life is 

about to be changed forever.

Ok, 
that 
may 
be 
a 
bit 

dramatic, but you get the point. 
As soon as I heard the opening 
violin on “Our Song,” I was sold. 
The combination of pop music 
with a slight country twang 
was right up my alley. Taylor 
has come a long way since that 
fateful day, and her songs have 
matured from what played after 

“Blue” by Crazy Frog at my 
junior high dances to anthems 
that have taken the entire world 
by storm.

For the past seven years, 

I’ve grown up alongside Taylor 
Swift, and despite all of the 
criticism 
she 
receives, 
she 

continues to remain a positive 
and growing force in the music 
industry. She’s evolved from 
a heartbroken girl singing in 
a prom dress on her bed to an 
empowered and shamelessly 
independent 
young 
woman. 

Yes, her dancing at awards 
shows is somewhat awkward 
and her cat pictures take up a 
large portion of her Instagram, 
but that’s what makes her 
human. 
Think 
about 
it 
— 

when is the last time you saw 
a celebrity baking cookies or 
sending Christmas gifts to her 
fans?

These pop idols and super-

stars are placed on such high 
pedestals that it’s hard to imag-
ine them walking their dogs 
or eating breakfast. (Seriously, 
does Beyoncé even have time to 
eat breakfast?) It’s refreshing to 
feel a connection to the elusive 
world that is populated by icons 
like Lady Gaga and Kanye West. 
Some of her new songs on 1989 
may be about Harry Styles, but 
no one was outraged when Sam 
Smith sang about his ex on “Stay 
With Me” or when Katy Perry 
wrote songs about her ex-hus-
band, Russell Brand. The double 
standard that surrounds Taylor 
is unfair and, frankly, overused. 
It’s not outrageous that she sings 

about actual experiences that 
happen to her in her actual life 
— it’s what everyone does. Even 
after embracing all the stereo-
types that surround her, she still 
receives disapproval.

My memories of Taylor Swift 

don’t include the times she 
receives mean tweets or when 
someone makes jokes about her 
abundance of ex-boyfriends. 
Her songs are reminders of the 
time I danced to “Our Song” 
at Christmas with my cousin, 
when I blasted “Long Live” 
while getting ready for my first 
homecoming dance or sang 
to “Shake It Off” in the car 
during my senior year of high 
school. While taking Buzzfeed 
quizzes, I still pick Taylor to 
be my celebrity best friend. My 
love for her has not diminished 
— 
it 
has 
simply 
matured, 

and I suspect that I’ll always 
squeal a little when I hear she 
is releasing a new album. An 
entire generation has grown 
up alongside Taylor Swift and 
I suspect she’s just getting 
started. So keep shaking it off, 
Taylor, and the haters are gonna 
hate, but I’m rooting for you.

By CATHERINE SULPIZIO

Senior Arts Editor

The vacation is written into 

our middle-class contract. We 
enter the workforce to earn 
money to squirrel away, but 
with the redemptive belief that 
there will be an opportunity 
for escape. Originally a luxury 
only for the elite, by the mid-
19th 
century 

the 
vacation 

was 
tugged 

down 
a 
few 

class notches. 
Amid a grow-
ing 
religious 

and 
medical 

suspicion that 
perhaps 
our 

Puritan indus-
triousness was 
turning against us, the vacation 
gained a prescriptive urgency. 
The beach wasn’t a luxury – it 
was a necessity.

Tatjana Soli’s latest book, 

“The 
Last 
Good 
Paradise,” 

unfurls against this psycho-
social landscape. With elegant 
prose that can swell into poetic 
intervals or sharp commen-
tary, Soli presents a book that 
courses with flawed, colorful 
characters, lavish food descrip-
tions (courtesy of a chef protag-
onist) and political intrigue. But 
beneath its lovely veneer is a 
book that confronts the Ameri-
can urge to escape on the balmy, 
outermost beaches of Polynesia.

The novel centers on Ann, 

an 
unhappy, 
yet 
successful 

attorney. In the first pages, 

she watches a fire consume a 
Los Angeles home; the proofed 
glass of her office blocks out 
the sirens and 90-degree heat, 
effectively enveloping her in a 
reclusive, airless bubble. Ann 
is suspended in a state of pro-
longed emergency — her job and 
her marriage festering instead 
of 
blooming, 
leaving 
Ann 

“marooned and stationary” in 
her stale life.

Ann’s chef husband Richard 

is on the brink of opening his 
first restaurant (financed by 
Ann) and fraying around the 
edges, especially as he’s saddled 
with managing his unreliable, 
charismatic business partner, 
Javi. And beyond their financial 
strain, Ann’s own body is muti-
nying against a fertility treat-

ment, which promises to deliver 
a baby she’s not sure she wants.

But before the siren call of 

motherhood sounds too shrill, 
the novel unleashes a set of 
legal circumstances that finally 
sends the couple on the luxury 
vacation they’ve put off for 
years (and funded by a trail of 
maxed out credit cards). There’s 

some delicious irony in the 
vacation finally taken to escape 
the law, but their flight mostly 
highlights the prolonged state 
of emergency that didn’t elicit 
escape — the paralyzed life, 
which contributes to its paraly-
sis by spinning its wheels.

As it is, travel isn’t the 

solution so much as the fleeting 
answer: 
“In 
the 
old 
days, 

when California was the end 
of the line, before the forces 
of 
globalization, 
one 
could 

just 
keep 
flinging 
oneself 

farther 
and 
farther 
west, 

hopefully landing somewhere 
that fulfilled one’s dreams of 
happiness before one ended up 
back in the place one started.”

Once on the balmy outreaches 

of Polynesia’s furthest tropics, 
Soli continues to sow the text 
with germane seeds of satire: 
free of WiFi and cell reception, 
the resort basks in its gadget-
free minimalism — which is 
slapped with a steep price tag, 
of course. Respite from society 
requires a chunk of change.

Beyond incisive commentary, 

the technology-free mandate 
severs Richard and Ann from 
all but memories of their old 
partners and bosses, which 
is 
crucial 
in 
transforming 

the island into a crammed 
stage full of combative egos. 
Once 
isolated, 
relationships 

unravel and reknit: somewhat 
implausibly, Ann’s rock star 
crush 
is 
vacationing 
there, 

along with his tan and supple-
limbed girlfriend Wende who 
catches the eye of Richard.

Daily Book Review: ‘Last Good Paradise’

The protagonists’ dissolution 

into 
the 
narration 
allows 

other residents to move into 
the foreground with varying 
results. 
While 
Loren, 
the 

resort’s mercurial owner with 
a mysterious past, plays an 
unlikely 
yet 
intriguing 
love 

interest for Ann, the rockstar and 
his girlfriend remain shallow 
even amid attempts to give them 
depth. Joli tries to repurpose 
the stock characters of Rockstar 
Sex God and Groupie, which 
feel flimsy against the originally 
hewed figure of Ann.

As Soli notes, lawyer-turned-

escapee Ann’s inner material 
is rich for excavation: “Wild 
could be in the heart of the most 
buttoned-down, 
burned-out 

lawyer … Wild was refuting the 

scratchy, dry surface of things 
and digging into the rich, loamy 
depths.”

What elevates this from a 

lovely character study is Soli’s 
heed to the invisible backbone of 
the resort — the native workers 
and their complex relationship 
with 
imperialism. 
The 
final 

third of the book unbinds the 
hidden hierarchy that organizes 
the island through a series of 
escalating political acts. Unlike 
Gaugan’s paintings that enamor 
Ann, this detour is surreal 
without 
artificiality; 
realistic 

and unromantic.

“The Last Good Paradise” 

binds 
all 
these 
components 

together 
as 
gracefully 
as 

possible — a loss of direction 
that stretches from the final 
third could have found its ways 
through 
a 
narrower 
scope, 

yet Soli’s detours are never 
tedious. Her quiet prose and 
lucid mediations ensure that 
regardless of its direction, “The 
Last Good Paradise” is always a 
pleasurable journey.

The Last 
Good 
Paradise

Tatjana Soli

St. Martin’s Press 

Feb. 10, 2015

As it is, travel 

isn’t the solution 
so much as the 
fleeting answer.

As Soli notes, 
Ann’s inner 

material is rich 
for excavation.

I’m 11 years 

old and my life 
is about to be 

changed forever.

Keep shaking it 
off Taylor, I’m 
still rooting for 

you

TV REVIEW
MUSIC NOTEBOOK

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AS WE DID?

THEN JOIN DAILY ARTS!

e-mail our managing arts editors chloe gilke or adam depollo 

at chloeliz@umich.edu and

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