When Keegan-Michael Key appeared on Stephen Colbert’s The Late Show (12July21), I realized that he didn’t really know anything. He sorta just babbles, and then flails around a bit. This is not to say that he’s not entertaining. He simply doesn’t come off as someone who knows a lot of things. During his time in the spotlight, he harkened back to an era, a mere hundreds of years ago, when the idea of “the variety show” birthed what we essentially understand today as late-night comedy.
I beg to differ.
According to E. O. Wilson in his The Origins of Creativity, Wilson argues that the domestication of fire is what essentially created humanity’s first leisure time, which then birthed the notion of campfire entertainment as the day wound down toward sleep. Members of the community would share stories, perhaps even sing songs, and perhaps even do a bit of reenacting, one imagines. This, then, would be the birth of the idea of humans entertaining other humans for the pure pleasure of it, late at night.
As much as I’d love to go along with this notion that some modern (unmentioned but assumed) white man, who’s now perceived as a genius for coming up with this idea of entertaining people at nighttime, I simply cannot, in good faith, give this idea any further traction than simply stating that this idea of nighttime entertainment is ANCIENT. It’s an intrinsic aspect of what makes us human because this idea of nighttime entertainment is prehistoric. It’s so obvious the cavemen thought of it. So, not only does this idea not require genius, but also, it’s not really an idea so much as a human essence.
So sure, I will support an idea that revolves around how nice it is to have people who still crave to entertain us through whichever medium is “hot” for the times, but I will not support an idea that revolves around a modern (white) man being the “creator” of something that’s so intrinsically human. Obviously, there are better and worse entertainers, and as entertainers go, Key is not someone I find entertaining, and as of late, actually, I’m finding Colbert to be less and less entertaining, but that seems like a whole post unto itself.
For now, that’s all I’ve got, so there’s that.
Until next time.
Lady Polarity 