Recently I happened upon an episode of The Dana Carvey Show on Hulu. That’s right, the series that was cancelled after just six episodes. As I got into the episode Carvey did a sketch where he was Ted Koppel covering the 1996 Presidential campaign and, I’ve gotta tell you, it bored me to tears.
I don’t think it was due to Carvey’s talent (nor the talent of his staff which included Steve Carell and Stephen Colbert). No, I think it was simply that political comedy just doesn’t age well. It tends to be really entertaining for a really short amount of time and then… without the context, it’s just a bit of a miss.
This particular sketch included a rip on Steve Forbes and, really, is anyone curious about what would have happened if Forbes somehow won in 1996? Not really. The show’s political skits then serve as curiosities. They only show that we were kinda interested in this stuff for a week or two. Instead of timeless, it’s dated.
Then again I imagine there’ll always be a Bill Clinton cigar joke floating about, and a George W. Bush dumb joke. Maybe someone can make a musical comedy piece out of those.
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