Please, Amy Schumer, don’t go over to the dark side!
Things have been quiet on the Schumer front lately — at least when it comes to the new season of “Inside Amy Schumer,” which premiered last week to relatively little water-cooler chatter. The buzz is in the media, where Schumer is a regular; a for her show addressed the warp-speed acceleration of its creator and star’s career.
It’s telling that the latest Schumer item to hit news feeds is that she arranged a FaceTime session between her ailing dad and Goldie Hawn. It’s a sweet move, but perhaps the kind of move you don’t brag about?
Recently Schumer Instagrammed her Caribbean vacation with Jerry Seinfeld. Once, she was mercilessly mocking Hollywood and its skewed perspective — especially of women. Now she’s in danger of joining the cult. Or, as Vanity Fair put it in its : “Amy Schumer Is Rich, Famous, and in Love: Can She Keep Her Edge?”
Over the past couple of years, Schumer had become a kind of viewer’s proxy, presenting a feminist sanity that was simultaneously self-deprecating and self-affirming. It’s harder to identify — and empathize — when your proxy scores a multimillion-dollar book deal and on her phone.
It’s also harder for said proxy to satirize a certain A-list lifestyle when she’s enrolled in the program.
Just last yea🧸r Schumer spoofed the starlets who turn up on late-night talk shows in dresses so tight💜 and heels so high, they can barely walk, then blithely shill for their latest product. Now she’s thisclose to being that starlet.
We’re not expecting Schumer to only associate with her family or Mennonites, but we also need her to be able to subvert the system. Whether she can do it now that she’s inside — and when you’re besties with Jennifer Lawrence, you’re way inside — is the question.
One encouraging sign is that another pal on that Caribbean jaunt was the brilliant downtown schock-cabaret performer Bridget Everett, whose no-holds-barred talent seems untameable by Hollywood (and who’s had terrific cameos on “Inside Amy Schumer” and “Girls”). Anybody associating with Everett has a good chance of remaining tethe♒red to some kind of reality.
In some ways, Schumer’s burst of A-list activity and humble-bragging is akin to kids who go on newly legal booze binges after turning 21. Then they get over it and return to normal, wondering, “What was I thinking?” Here’s hoping Schumer’s in the middle of that bender. We need her to stay on our side — and, just maybe, a little underexposed.