Since I’ve never attended the Al Smith generosity dinner before, I felt compelled to watch it on Thursday night after learning Kamala Harris was too scared to go and would instead become speaking via prerecorded video.  ,
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But if you were expecting Kamala to be on camera making a few gags, that’s not what happened. The videos began with a more severe introduction.
The Al Smith supper, which features artist Molly Shannon playing her old Saturday Night Live figure, the socially awkward Catholic girl Mary Katherine Gallagher, said,” Your holiness and distinguished friends, the Al Smith breakfast provides a unique opportunity to set aside partisanship.”  ,
The Mary Katherine Gallagher figure was running around in the qualifications before “distracting” Kamala.
” Hey, what’s going on? Who was that”? Kamala asked, her acting abilities a painful zero.
” Oh, sad. Mary Katherine Gallagher”, Shannon said anxiously and eagerly. ” Mary Katherine Elliott. It’s nice to meet you” . ,
Kamala, however deadpanning, replied. ” Really nice to meet you, Mary Katherine. Right now, I’m trying to record my conversation for tonight’s meal”.
” I just want say that I’m a Catholic, and now is one of the biggest dinners next to the Next Lunch”.
Things merely grew more unpleasant when Shannon’s figure blurted out her brand saying,” Sometimes when I get frightened, I stick my hands under my hands, and I smell them like that”.
If that column was amusing in the 1990s, it’s not funny again because people who are old enough to remember the monologue have heard it countless times before.  ,
” But tell me everything. I’m giving a speech”, Kamala continued, suddenly, without any speaking skills. Do you have any ideas for what I may say now?
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The Mary Katherine character responded with a ridiculous talk about how necessary a lady should represent the nation, only to discover that Kamala and most likely the visitors were perplexed by the lines that were taken from the television series” House of Dragons.”
Harris tried to make a joke out of the fact that she had been trying to relate election fraud to the Ten Commandments after Mary Katherine said,” Thou shall not bear false witness to thy cousin,” as the conversation dragged on.
Kamala replied,” Indeed, especially thy neighbor’s election results” . ,
I suppose that was meant to be humorous?
It did n’t get any better, but the whole skit was only a few minutes. However, as you can tell from the film, the audience was undoubtedly unawed by it.
NEW: Kamala Harris releases her pre-recorded videos from the Al Smith supper in New York that she missed.
After the dreadful clapping, comedian Jim Gaffigan made fun of the Vice President.
Cringe. photograph. twitter.com/9dvsYQub9h
— Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg ) October 18, 2024
According to Wikipedia, Shannon portrayed the figure on SNL from 1995 to 2001. It was n’t particularly funny back then, and it’s baffling that Kamala’s campaign thought it would be funny now, 23 years after the character’s heyday.  ,
The official reason for Kamala Harris’s absence from the event was chalked up to a scheduling conflict, but after watching the footage, the real reason seems clear: Kamala Harris simply ca n’t pull off humor. Certain, she can learn from a script, but delivering a prank that truly land is a complete different skill set.
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That’s not always a blow against her—comedy is all about schedule and distribution. Even Jim Gaffigan, a skilled artist, struggled to make some jokes hit during the dinner, maybe because the jokes were poor but also because some were badly delivered. Although some praised his performance as the emcee, it was far from his best. Gaffigan enjoys reading his own jokes, and it felt like he had just read them off the teleprompter.
I suspect Kamala’s handlers tried a speech that incorporated humor, but it did n’t work, so she delivered a short and boilerplate speech, leaving the comedy part to Molly Shannon, which did n’t work either.  ,
After the video was over, Gaffigan made a joke to the audience,” I do n’t even know what that noise is.” ” As I watched that, I could n’t help but think,’ Now I know how my kids felt when I FaceTime’d into a piano recital they were at. ‘”  ,
Trump, on the other hand, absolutely crushed it last night.