December 13, 2005, 8:21 a.m.
America as Comedy
Daisy’s dull.

By Louis Wittig

The last time I saw David Arquette, star of Scream 3 and husband of Courteney Cox, on a late-night talk show something was off about the way he laughed. The host had thrown him a softball question about his next movie. David couldn't muster a cogent response, so he nodded, mumbled something, and let out a weaselly chuckle. To be polite, the host laughed along, though there was nothing actually being laughed at. I thought little of it then. Now I think it may have been a symptom of a much more serious problem. It's possible David Arquette suffers from a rare neurochemical imbalance that prevents his brain from distinguishing between things that are funny and things that aren't. I say this because I recently saw the first episode of a show he and Cox produced, Daisy Does America.

The pseudo-reality, porn-homage titled show runs on TBS and stars British actress-comedian Daisy Donovan. The theme is America. Daisy introduces herself over the opening montage. "Hi, I'm Daisy, and I'm an America-holic." And already the show's poorly thought out high concept has put you in a vaguely awkward position. An America-holic? Should I be flattered or...? Makes you wonder how Jack Daniels feels.

For however long Daisy does better than the Sex and the City reruns before it, Donovan will be criss-crossing the continent with a camera crew, each week trying out a typically American profession like poker pro, country singer, and rap mogul. Hijinx to ensue. None of this actually requires that the show push the America button as much as it does. It could be called Daisy Finds a Job. But its slightly bizarre America spin brings us to another dent in its producers' perception. Apparently Arquette thinks Americans will respond to a comedy about their American-ness with the same dull fascination parakeets feel when they see themselves in a mirror.

Novel as this thought is, Daisy isn't that unique. The Daily Show has been working with the same basic formula for years, minus the America stuff. Step one: Find someone who's just invented a machine that allows him or her to understand raccoon-speak. Two: Follow said person around with a camera, take them as seriously as they take themselves, watch the absurdity bloom. Three: Laugh.

Daisy begins the process by attending bounty-hunter school, which to non-Americans, viewers have to presume, seems as bumpkin-fabulous material as a raccoon translator. While the instructor cuffs a student, Daisy asks, "Can I handcuff him to the fence and leave him there?"

"No," the instructor replies, "that would be cruel and unusual punishment." She insists on asking a few more times. He says no some more. It's an odd scene, but it doesn't quite get to absurd.

The almost-funny nature of Daisy isn't solely the comedienne's fault. For these types of mini-mockumentaries to work, the rubes have to be either completely in the dark or else fully aware of the joke and eager to play along. Out of school, Daisy interviews in the bounty-hunting industry. She tells one potential employer that she would subdue a suspect with a glockenspiel. He looks impatient. When she lands a gig she peppers her co-hunter, a raspy blonde bail bondswoman, with droll questions. The woman looks out the window and answers, "yeah, I guess."

Daisy tries for some fish-out-of-water laughs, bugging her eyes out in comic incomprehension as another bounty hunter speaks in a thick southern accent (but not so thick it would baffle the average American viewer.) The overall effect is something like a goldfish intentionally vaulting out of its bowl and flopping around on the ground histrionically.

That Donovan fails at fitting in with the Americans she pokes fun at is the whole point of the series. But the failures themselves are predictable and spiritless. There's no way to suspend disbelief and pretend Daisy doesn't understand her material. Anyone who comes to America in order to have a star of Friends produce their reality-TV show already has a good grasp on what the country is about.

It's said that good shows need time to find their audiences. Daisy Does America needs a passport. If recent global opinion polls are any indicator, 20-odd prime-time minutes of unscripted comedy that prod at Americans' accents could do big numbers for the BBC or whatever channel it is that Canadians watch.

Not here though. Hopefully, when he's getting the medical attention he needs, David Arquette will be able to rehabilitate his sense of humor, and with therapy, come to realize that Americans don't warm to television just because it features the word "America" repeated over and over and over. Even insubstantial shows have to have some substance.

— Louis Wittig is a writer living in New York City.

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