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Tuesday, 28 September 2010

Ali G

Ali G (born Alistair Leslie Graham) is a satirical fictional character invented and performed by British comedian Sacha Baron Cohen. Originally appearing on Channel 4's Eleven O'Clock show, Ali G is the title character of Channel 4's Da Ali G Show, original episodes of which aired on HBO in 2003–2004, and is the title character of the film Ali G Indahouse.
Sacha Baron Cohen's character Ali G, alongside his Borat and Brüno characters, has been retired.[1]

[edit] Development of the character

The character of Ali G plays on the stereotype of a non-black suburban male who revels in a mixture of American Gangsta Rap and Jamaican Black culture, particularly through hip hop, reggae, and jungle music; though the actual ethnicity of Ali G's character caused confusion, with some believing him to be a Middle Eastern.[2] Baron Cohen stated that BBC Radio 1 DJ Tim Westwood was an influence on the development of the Ali G character – Westwood hosts Radio 1's Rap Show and speaks in a faux American Hip-Hop dialect. Ali G's middle class credentials mirror Westwood's: the latter was brought up in Lowestoft, Suffolk as a bishop's son.[3]
Prior to Ali G's appearance on The Eleven O'Clock Show, Baron Cohen had portrayed a similar character named MC Jocelyn Cheadle-Hume on a satellite channel called Talk TV (owned by Granada Television). While chatting to a group of skateboarders, in character, Baron Cohen realised that people could actually be led to believe the character was real, and filmed a number of segments which were ordered off air by London Weekend Television.[3]

[edit] History

Ali G first came to prominence on Channel 4's The Eleven O'Clock Show as the "voice of da yoof" in 1998.[4] He interviewed various public figures in the United Kingdom. Ali G is a boorish, uneducated, faux-streetwise poseur with a deeply stereotypical view of the world, who either embarrasses his interviewee by displaying a mixture of uninformed political incorrectness, or gets the interview 'victim' to agree to some breathtaking inaccuracy or insult.
Other examples of his bold interviewing style include getting Lindsay Urwin, the Bishop of Horsham, to admit that God created the Universe, and then asked him, "And since then, He's [God's] just chilled?" Ali G asked the Bishop about God's appearance, to which the Bishop replied, "Well, he's sort of Jesus-shaped." During an interview with James Ferman (former director of the British Board of Film Classification), Ali G asks whether his made-up vulgarities would restrict a film to an over-18 audience, and suggests that film censorship be performed by younger persons who understand contemporary slang. Ali G begins an interview with the Chairman of the Arts Council of England Gerry Robinson with the question, "Why is it that everything you fund is so crap?"
Ali G was in a series of ads for the 2005–06 NBA season, in which he used his brand of off-kilter journalism to interview various NBA stars. The spots were directed by Spike Lee.

[edit] Background

Ali G is a fictional gang member of the "West Staines Massiv", who lives with his grandmother in a semi-detached house at 36 Cherry Blossom Close, in the heart of the "Staines Ghetto". He was educated at what he calls "da Matthew Arnold Skool"; the Matthew Arnold School is a real secondary school.
Staines is a middle-class commuter town to the west of London is far different from the inner city ghetto that Ali G claims. In the same comic vein, he also makes reference to other similar middle-class towns in the area, such as Egham, Langley, Berkshire and Englefield Green. Despite the incongruous nature of his home town, he purports to exemplify Inner City culture. Ali's "real" name is later revealed to be Alistair Leslie Graham (revealed in the eponymous film).
Ali G non-standard grammar has been the point of ridicule by at least one interviewee. Claiming to be black and of Jamaican ancestry, some of his catchphrases include "Aight" (alright), "Booyakasha", "Big up Yaself", "Wagwaan", "West Side", "Respek" (respect), "For Real", "Punanee", "Check It" and "Keep It Real". His trademark hand gesture is the dip snap. He once defined the meaning of "Boyakasha" as "Hear me now, bo, selecta, swallow back, holler, big up ya self, everything that I in, coming at ya like Cleopatra, come in a couple of bars, recognize, represent, keep it real, you gotta check ya self before ya wreck ya self, swallow back ... oh yeah, and hello".[5]

[edit] Criticisms of the character

Although Baron Cohen has repeatedly stated that the Ali G character is a parody of suburban, privileged youth 'acting black', numerous commentators have opined that the force of the humour is derived from stereotypes of blacks, not poser whites. According to this view of the character, the suburban background written into Ali G's character serves as an alibi.[6][7][8]
Ali G also seems to revel in dumbing down; although he has had a middle-class upbringing and his parents are presumably hard working, he is anti school. His life appears only to revolve around acquiring material wealth, taking drugs, gaining respect on the streets through violence and sleeping with lots of attractive women. Many Black and White commentators feel that what Ali G reflects is where Black British – and to some extent American youth – has gone wrong and that there is something[clarification needed] wrong with a Cambridge graduate making fun of the whole issue.[9]
Felix Dexter, of The Real McCoy comedy series, said in The Guardian that he appreciated the humour of an innocent confronting an expert with neither understanding the other. But, he added: 'I feel that a lot of the humour is laughing at black street culture and it is being celebrated because it allows the liberal middle classes to laugh at that culture in a safe context where they can retain their sense of political correctness.[10]

[edit] Notable people interviewed by Ali G

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