Abstract
This chapter suggests that President Donald Trump exhibits a “carnivalesque” comic persona and behavior which have instigated a war with America’s comedians on television. This study examines Trump’s use of comedy as a means of attack, his reactions to comic attacks, and the wide range of satire undermining him. This includes examining the belittling and “camping” satires of Trump on the “popular” network shows Saturday Night Live (NBC) and The Late Show with Stephen Colbert (CBS), as well as the more cerebral satires by HBO’s comedians Bill Maher and John Oliver. This study also examines Comedy Central’s “grotesque” parody by Anthony Atamanuik, and the distribution of satire on YouTube, including the “Sassy Trump” series by Peter Serafinowicz.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Baker, Peter, Michael S. Schmit and Maggie Haberman. “Citing Recusal, Trump Says He Wouldn’t Have Hired Sessions.” New York Times. 19th July 2017. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/19/us/politics/trump-interview-sessions-russia.html?mcubz=2 (Accessed 12th October 2017).
Bakhtin, Mikhail. Rabelais and His World, trans by Helene Iswolsky. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1984.
Balluck, Kyle. “Trump slams ‘Saturday Night Live’ as ‘unwatchable.’” The Hill. 4th December 2016. http://thehill.com/blogs/in-the-know/in-the-know/308658-trump-slams-saturday-night-live-as-unwatchable (Accessed 10th October 2017).
Bender, Michael and Carol Lee. “RNC Chair Reince Priebus Is Named Donald Trump’s Chief of Staff.” Wall Street Journal. 13th November 2016. https://www.wsj.com/articles/leading-contender-for-donald-trump-s-chief-of-staff-is-rnc-chairman-reince-priebus-1479069597 (Accessed 1st October 2017).
Benen, Steve. “Trump applied for a difficult job he knew very little about.” MSNBC. 14th November 2016. http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/trump-applied-difficult-job-he-knew-very-little-about (Accessed 1st November 2017).
Berenson, Tessa. “Watch Donald Trump Mock Marco Rubio by Spilling Water on Stage.” Time. 26th February 2016. http://time.com/4239357/donald-trump-marco-rubio-water-bottle-texas/ (Accessed 12th October 2017).
Borchers, Callum. “Meryl Streep was right. Donald Trump did mock a disabled reporter.” Washington Post. 9th January 2017. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2017/01/09/meryl-streep-was-right-donald-trump-did-mock-a-disabled-reporter/?utm_term=.eb3e54f15b4a (Accessed 12th October 2017).
Bourdieu, Pierre. Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1984.
Bruner, Raisa. “Read Jimmy Kimmel’s Moving Healthcare Monologue That Everyone’s Talking About.” Time. 20th September 2017. http://time.com/4949522/jimmy-kimmel-healthcare-transcript/ (Accessed 1st January 2017).
Cramer Brownell, Kathryn. “The Saturday Night Live Episode That Changed American Politics.” Time. 15th April 2016. http://time.com/4292027/gerald-ford-saturday-night-live/ (Accessed 10th October 2017).
Day, Amber. Satire and Dissent: Interventions in Contemporary Political Debate. Indiana: Indiana University Press, 2011.
Fastenberg, Dan. “Bush the Elder Invites Dana Carvey to the White House.” Time. 29th July 2010. http://content.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,2007228_2007230_2007252,00.html (Accessed 10th October 2017).
Fowler, James H. “The Colbert Bump in Campaign Donations: More Truthful than Truthy.” Political Science and Politics, Vol. 41, No. 3 (Jul., 2008), pp. 533–539.
Gass, Nick. “Trump: We have to take out ISIL members’ families.” Politico. 2nd December 2015. http://www.politico.com/story/2015/12/trump-kill-isil-families-216343 (Accessed 15th October 2017).
Gopnik, Adam. “Trump and Obama: A Night to Remember.” New Yorker. 12th September 2015. https://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/trump-and-obama-a-night-to-remember (Accessed 1st October 2017).
Heil, Emily. “Is Obama’s 2011 White House correspondents’ dinner burn to blame for Trump’s campaign?” Washington Post. 10th February 2016. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/reliable-source/wp/2016/02/10/is-obamas-2011-white-house-correspondents-dinner-burn-to-blame-for-trumps-campaign/?utm_term=.efbc50170660 (Accessed 10th October 2017).
Herring, Richard. “Peter Serafinowicz – Richard Herring’s Leicester Square Theatre Podcast #134.” YouTube. 15th February 2017. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=616Cm1lTaZA (Accessed 10th October 2017).
Kahn, Carrie. “Bill Maher’s Obama SuperPAC Donation Causing Stir.” NPR. 28th March 2012. http://www.npr.org/2012/03/28/149512215/bill-mahers-obama-superpac-donation-causes-stir (Accessed 1st October 2017).
Karni, Annie. “White House rattled by McCarthy’s spoof of Spicer.” Politico. 6th February 2017. http://www.politico.com/story/2017/02/melissa-mccarthy-sean-spicer-234715 (Accessed 10th October 2017).
Levine, Elana and Michael Z. Newman. Legitimating Television: Media Convergence and Cultural Status. New York: Routledge, 2011.
Marks, Olivia. “Is There Still A Place For Satire In The Age Of Trump?” Vogue. 1st August 2017. http://www.vogue.co.uk/article/current-affairs-satire (Accessed 9th October 2017).
Matviko, John. “Television Satire and the Presidency: The Case of Saturday Night Live.” Eds, Peter C. Rollins, John E. O’Connor. Hollywood’s White House: The American Presidency in Film and History. University Press of Kentucky, 2003.
McGee, Ryan. “20 Most Savage ‘SNL’ Political Impersonations.” Rolling Stone. 8th February 2017. http://www.rollingstone.com/tv/lists/20-most-savage-snl-political-impersonations-w465555/sarah-palin-tina-fey-w465684 (Accessed 9th October 2017).
Neidig, Harper. “Scarborough: Trump asked adviser why US can’t use nuclear weapons.” The Hill. 3rd August 2016. http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/presidential-races/290217-scarborough-trump-asked-about-adviser-about-using-nuclear (Accessed 10th October 2017)
Russonello, Giovanni. “Jimmy Kimmel Doubles Down on Criticism of Health Care Bill.” New York Times. 21st September 2017. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/21/arts/television/kimmel-cassidy-health-care.html (Accessed 1st January 2017).
Soffen, Kim. “Yes, Donald Trump’s hands are actually pretty small.” Washington Post. 3rd August 2016. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2016/08/05/yes-donald-trumps-hands-are-actually-pretty-small/?utm_term=.58f3a3bda7c0 (Accessed 1st October 2017).
Sontag, Susan. “Notes on Camp.” Ernest Mathijs and Xavier Mendik, eds. The Cult Film Reader. Maidenhead: Open University Press, 2008, pp. 41–52.
Symons, Alex. Mel Brooks in the Cultural Industries: Survival and Prolonged Adaptation. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2012.
Symons, Alex. “Podcast Comedy and ‘Authentic Outsiders’: How New Media is Challenging the Owners of Industry,” Celebrity Studies (Volume 8, Issue 1, 2017).
Thrush, Glenn and Maggie Haberman. “Melissa McCarthy Plays an Angst-Ridden Sean Spicer on ‘Saturday Night Live.’” New York Times. 14th May 2017. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/14/arts/television/snl-melissa-mccarthy-sean-spicer.html (Accessed 10th October 2017).
Tulloch, John. “Classic Theatre” As Media Against Trump: Imagining Chekhov, in Happer, Catherine, Andrew Hoskins and William Merrin (Eds.) (2019) Trump’s War on the Media. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, pp.159–180.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2019 The Author(s)
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Symons, A. (2019). Trump and Satire: America’s Carnivalesque President and His War on Television Comedians. In: Happer, C., Hoskins, A., Merrin, W. (eds) Trump’s Media War. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-94069-4_12
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-94069-4_12
Published:
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-94068-7
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-94069-4
eBook Packages: Literature, Cultural and Media StudiesLiterature, Cultural and Media Studies (R0)