Jackie Mason: Politically Incorrect
at Link’s Hall, December 1, 2, 8, and 9
Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites »
When Mason asked someone in the front row “Are you a homosexual person?” the audience roared. He looked out at us innocently–or at least as innocently as a wrinkled, baggy-eyed gnome with dyed red brown hair can look. He explained to us that “there are a lot of homosexuals–crowds.” Again the audience roared. Then he launched into a speech about how the only group you can make fun of are white Protestant American gentiles: “They’re the only ones without an organization.” For a moment it looked as if Mason were arguing for fairness and brotherhood. But then he was back on homosexuals. Ten minutes later he capped his shtick with, “What is the worst thing a faygeleh can do to you?” He used the Yiddish word but pronounced it FAG-ala so even us goys would get it. “Make love to you? Tell me it isn’t.” At this point my wife sighed. “I’m leaving at the intermission,” she said. “Give me a call at the office when he’s finished.”
Mason’s act is a narcotic. He flatters complacency and praises denial. He reveals the hate in his audience’s souls and then, like Rush Limbaugh, revels in the hate. Though Mason calls his show Politically Incorrect, hinting that he’s an ideological free spirit, in fact he toes the Republican party line. It’s OK to hate gays, because they make us feel uncomfortable. It’s OK to hate blacks, because they’ve gotten too loud, they get special treatment, and we really don’t have a racial problem in this country anyway (at least not in any all-white suburban enclaves).
The premise of the play is that Sop and Heave–played with grace and sublime understatement by Magnus and Beau O’Reilly–have a long trip ahead of them, and so to pass the time they chatter mindlessly about this and that like some modern American version of Didi and Gogo. The thing is that the longer they talk, the clearer it becomes that something is bothering Sop, but she doesn’t quite know what it is. And her attempts to discuss this unknown something with Heave only lead them into greater and greater confusion. Meanwhile the car trip is also going awry, as Sop drives deeper into foreign territory.
