JUST IN TIME to celebrate this magical season of warmth and togetherness, a new Christmas special arrives to remind us of the most important truths about this wonderful time of year. In his new Showtime hour, Have You Heard of Christmas?, comedian Matt Rogers, dressed in a metallic tuxedo, stands onstage at Joe's Pub to deliver his own interpretation of the holiday's central message. "Every year, Santa knows just what to say/When all of the elves claim the bag's way too tight/And maybe we shouldn't do this tonight," he sings, his lips curling with naughty pleasure. "Nobody asks why Santa has so much lube," he continues, nearly bent in half, eyes closed. It's among the first of Rogers's original songs in the special, and like most of his numbers, it's sung with the intense sincerity of a starlet who knows her entire cultural worth is tied up in her sex appeal. In the opening number, a more upbeat banger, each verse is an ever-more-explicit description of hooking up with someone: "Intoxicate/Alleviate/I want to feel you from inside." And then comes the chorus, delivered with an arm flourish and a twirl: "Also it's Christmas! Did I mention that it's Christmas in this club?"
Christmas and comedy are fond bedfellows-much like many of the people Rogers sings about here-but the most familiar versions of Christmas comedy treat the holiday as a situation. There's the National Lampoon version, in which Christmas becomes the backdrop for family shenanigans and frantic last-minute shopping, travel, romance, secrets, and elaborate showcases that need to be pulled off or else everything is ruined. There's also Awkward Comedy Christmas (gifting cringe), Capitalism Commentary Christmas (shopping, but make it satire), Sketch-Comedy Christmas (if Netflix doesn't make an I Think You Should Leave holiday special, the executives are bigger idiots than I thought), and of course Christmas Myths Are Real (Santa exists, and that is funny).
Esta historia es de la edición December 05-18, 2022 de New York magazine.
Comience su prueba gratuita de Magzter GOLD de 7 días para acceder a miles de historias premium seleccionadas y a más de 9,000 revistas y periódicos.
Ya eres suscriptor ? Conectar
Esta historia es de la edición December 05-18, 2022 de New York magazine.
Comience su prueba gratuita de Magzter GOLD de 7 días para acceder a miles de historias premium seleccionadas y a más de 9,000 revistas y periódicos.
Ya eres suscriptor? Conectar
Early and Often: David Freedlander - Momentum vs. Machine The Trump and Harris campaigns battle it out for every last vote.
WIth two weeks left to go, the contours of the 2024 presidential election are clear: Both campaigns need voters who usually don’t vote, and Kamala Harris needs to bring the Democratic coalition, including its Trump-curious members, back home.While the Republican side plans to spend the remaining days of the contest trying to lure low-propensity voters to the polls, the Harris team will attempt to persuade voters of color to return to its side and will try to increase numbers among white voters in previously red suburbs.
Drowning in Slop - A thriving underground economy is clogging the internet with AI garbage-and it's only going to get worse.
SLOP started seeping into Neil Clarke's life in late 2022. Something strange was happening at Clarkesworld, the magazine. Clarke had founded in 2006 and built into a pillar of the world of speculative fiction. Submissions were increasing rapidly, but “there was something off about them,” he told me recently. He summarized a typical example: “Usually, it begins with the phrase ‘In the year 2250-something’ and then it goes on to say the Earth’s environment is in collapse and there are only three scientists who can save us. Then it describes them in great detail, each one with its own paragraph. And then—they’ve solved it! You know, it skips a major plot element, and the final scene is a celebration out of the ending of Star Wars.” Clarke said he had received “dozens of this story in various incarnations.”
The City Politic- The Other Eric Adams Scandal The NYPD shot a fare evader, a cop, and two bystanders. He defends it.
On Sunday, September 15, Derell Mickles hopped a turnstile, got asked to leave by cops, then entered the subway again ten minutes later through an emergency exit. This was at the Sutter Avenue L station, out by his mother's house, five stops from the end of the line. Police said they noticed he was holding a folded knife. They followed him up the stairs to the elevated train, asking him 38 times to drop the weapon.
Can the Media Survive?
BIG TECH, Feckless Owners, CORD-CUTTERS, RESTIVE STAFF, Smaller Audiences ... and the Return of PRINT?
Status Update
Hannah Gadsby's fascinatingly untidy tour through life after fame and death.
A Matter of Perspective
A Matter of Perspective Steve McQueen's worst film is still a solid WWII drama.
Creator, Destroyer
A retrospective reveals an architect's vision, optimism, and supreme arrogance.
In Praise of Bad Readers
In a time of war, there is a danger in surveying the world as if it were a novel.
Trust the Kieran Culkin Process
First, he nearly dropped out of Oscar hopeful A Real Pain. Then he convinced Jesse Eisenberg to change the way he directs.
The Funniest Vampires on TV
What We Do in the Shadows is coming to an end. Its idiosyncratic brand of comedy may be too.
