America: All Better! Second City
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The show begins with a giddy Lauren Ash singing the praises of Obama as America’s savior, even as a castmate interrupts to remind her that she’s lost her home, the market’s dropped 1,000 points, and the governor just got arrested on corruption charges. By evening’s end, though, cynical pessimism has given way to an embrace of Obama’s “yes we can” rhetoric: a horror film parody finds a group of grade-schoolers reciting the PE’s victory speech as a way to stave off being eaten by a monster.
But for all the Obama allusions, political satire doesn’t figure all that heavily here. There’s a brief nod to Rod and Patti Blagojevich, Illinois’ foul-mouthed first family, as well as a running gag about Rahm Emanuel (“the Hebrew hit man”). And—in one of the evening’s few clunkers—there’s a grossly unfair lampoon of Mayor Daley pitching Chicago to the Olympics site selection committee, in which Daley is portrayed by Michael Patrick O’Brien as a vulgar moron who doesn’t know the el trains run to Evanston. Oddly, O’Brien doesn’t attempt to mimic Daley’s speaking style, which makes the bit even less effective.
Second City’s trademark blend of spontaneity and slickness is on full display in America: All Better! That bodes well for the troupe’s 50th anniversary next year. Hope they don’t fuck it up.v
