Staff Blog
Chocolate News
posted by Molly Eichel
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| David Alan Grier on Chocolate News |
| nydailynews.com |
David Alan Grier is one of those guys who should have a better career — he should be at the forefront of television comedy, not wasting away playing bit parts in mediocre movies (David: An American Carol? Really?). Grier’s work during In Living Color alone is reason to tune into Chocolate News. But it’s not exactly a reason to stay.
Initially sold as a the black counterpart to The Daily Show (covering “anything chocolate”), it’s more of a hybrid of The Colbert Report and Chapelle Show — because it’s sketch comedy as much as the two comedians shared race and skewering of racial taboos. As host, Grier takes on a character (referred to as Dag), much like Stephen Colbert transforms into his version of the conservative pundit. He opens the first episode with a rant about the state of hip-hop and while there are some funny lines it’s understated and feels off, too serious and indignant, never reaching either the Colbert/Chapellian levels of satire. Is this Grier talking, or is it Dag?
Grier is really a character actor and the sketches carry the show. His Maya Angelou is spot-on — with the pitch-perfect vocal cadences and facial gestures. But it’s old news if you caught Grier hosting SNL in the mid-’90s, where he had Angelou shill products like Fruit Loops (”We gave you, Toucan Sam, life. You, Toucan Sam, give us loops of fruit”) and Butterfingers. But that too never reaches the level of hilarity that it could. Next, Grier becomes Phat Man — a Lil Jon booty rapper — who is hired, and subsequently fired from, writing PSAs for No Child Left Behind. This sketch is what Chocolate News needs to be. It’s just ridiculous enough, with back up dancers in tiny school girl outfits gyrating in front of elementary school kids, half of whom are wide-eyed and horrified, the other half titillated and bouncing along. It’s here that Grier reaches In Living Color heights.
But with Grier, Comedy Central adds an important weapon to their arsenal, especially if Barack Obama takes the White House in November. In a July piece in the New York Times about how late night comedians, most of whom are white, were having problems dealing with Obama because he is black. In the article, Grier says, “Those guys really can’t go there. It’s just like the gay comic can do gay material. It comes with the territory.” They’ve got the territory covered. Chocolate News just has to keep up.
Chocolate News premieres tonight at 10:30 p.m. on Comedy Central.
