If "The Daily Show" is keeping you up too late at night and caffeine just isn't giving you enough of a jolt in the morning, you may want to tune in to "Morning Sedition" on Air America Radio.
Airing every weekday morning, the program occupies the primetime slot on the new liberal talk radio station. Hosted by career comedian Marc Maron and New York radio personality Mark Riley, the show has seen a procession of high-profile guests, from Will Ferrell to Bill Clinton, since its debut on April 2nd of last year.
Maron was kind enough to take time out of his busy schedule for a phone interview with the Daily. However, while holding his cell in one hand, he was apparently pushing a shopping cart with the other, so his comments about the show were periodically interrupted by exclamations like, "Hey dude, what's that cheese I like? Allz-ass? Alsace-Muenster, that's it!" The Daily excuses Maron, considering he had been up since 2:30 that morning.
Citing influences such as Richard Pryor, Woody Allen, the dearly departed Hunter S. Thompson and even "MAD Magazine," Maron boasts that he has always been "the smart-ass, the class clown, a disturber of the peace." He became a stand-up comic soon after graduating from Boston University in 1987 and has made his living in show business ever since, touring the late-night circuit with the likes of Conan and Letterman, yukking it up on his own HBO and Comedy Central specials, and turning his one-man, off-Broadway show, "Jerusalem Syndrome," into a book.
"Morning Sedition" is Maron's first foray into radio, but with the help of co-host Riley, a radio veteran, he quickly became acclimated to the show's eclectic mix of hard news and humor. What sets "Morning Sedition" apart from most talk radio shows, Maron says, is "the way we move back and forth fairly seamlessly between news and guest spots, and humor and improvisation."
Indeed, the show combines scripted comedic scenes with improvised conversations about the news of the day with live calls from listeners. Maron, always the provocateur, revels in the spontaneity of the interactions: "I like to get a reaction; I love making control freaks unravel."
To the show's credit, its writing crew includes "The Daily Show" veterans and, interestingly enough, several Tufts alums. Producer Jonathan Larsen is both, having served as senior political producer for Jon Stewart's "fake news" show during the 2000 election debacle and, perhaps even more impressively, as editor-in-chief of The Tufts Daily during his time at Tufts.
Of the "The Daily Show," Larsen said that the writers would take whatever was the funniest thing on the news that day or whatever made the best sound bite, be it Bush butchering his native language in a press conference or footage of a fistfight on the floor of the Taiwanese legislature.
"The primary goal there was to be funny. The primary goal here [on 'Morning Sedition'] is to be smart and funny, to get at what's really important in the news today, at what concerned citizens should know about. There are plenty of shows on in the morning if you just want to laugh, but listening to us should be like hanging out with your interesting, informed, hysterical friend."
Whether or not this goal has been accomplished still seems up in the air. As with most morning radio fare, the show's humor is, at times, frankly sophomoric and uninspired.
Take, for instance, the movie trailer clip they created, complete with screaming and skin-slapping sound effects, in response to chairman of the Abu-Ghraib investigation panel James Schlesinger's comment that likened the conditions at the prison to those of college satire film "Animal House"; this kind of obvious gag that makes light of human suffering is simply unfunny.
Yet there are also smart, subversive moments, like the "Planet Bush" segment where a correspondent reports on what conditions are like in the Commander-in-Chief's warped reality. Then there's "Rapture Watch" where a mock religious figure details what signs of the coming apocalypse have occurred in the past week.
And, like "The Daily Show," the "Morning Sedition" crew has a talent for selecting and showcasing revealing sound bites that are so ludicrous in and of themselves that no snappy commentary is needed.
And though promos quip that "Morning Sedition" is the show to turn to when "you want your news skewed so far to the left it's wearing a dress," Marc and Mark strive to be equal opportunity offenders, as indicated by recurring bits like the straight-from-the-Streisand-compound "Liberal Agenda" which pokes fun at self-satisfied liberal elites.
Maron said, "Liberals are only slightly less annoying than conservatives - for different reasons, of course."
With conservatives dominating the talk-radio airwaves, one hopes that this promising program will be able to excise its own annoying aspects and provide an articulate, entertaining, alternative view - of which open-minded listeners will be happy to say, "My, but that dress looks lovely on you!"
