In Meggie Foster’s TikTok videos, the actress takes the exact words of today’s politicians and lipsyncs to them in innovative contexts – all filmed, in lockdown, in her own rather nice-looking suburban home. Thus we get Priti Patel’s belligerent statements delivered direct from the drinks cabinet, hair askew and mouth curled up; Boris Johnson giving us lockdown instructions in the bedroom, as though telling us a particularly nightmarish story; and Piers Morgan and Rudy Giuliani having an almighty ding-dong, but reimagined as one of those incoherent barneys you have in the kitchen after a long, heavy night out. If the contexts are often surprising and outlandish, it goes without saying that, sadly, the words were already surprising and outlandish enough in the first place.
In this weird year, Foster isn’t the only female comedian who’s using the video-vignette sensation that is TikTok to comment on the ongoing political circus either. Her most obvious counterpart is the US’s Sarah Cooper, who has managed the miraculous and found a new way for us to laugh at Donald Trump. In her hit video ‘How To Medical’, the comedian takes the words of the President verbatim as he notoriously wonders aloud if injecting yourself with disinfectant mightn’t be a good idea. Again, filmed in isolation at home, the eyes particularly mad as she plays both clueless president and helpless advisers, it highlights a fresh vein of madness in The Donald. It’s a trick repeated by her fellow Americans Kylie Scott, who has had horrible fun rephrasing Trump’s statements as though they’re the ramblings of a drunk guy in a club, and Maria DeCotis, who has used the utterances of New York Governor Andrew Cuomo to say something more filled with existential dread. The long and the short of it – and the major achievement – is that each has found a fresh and funny way to face the madness that is 2020.
Instagram content
This content can also be viewed on the site it originates from.
There are a couple of ways in which they prove themselves the appropriate comedic salve for now. Firstly, the medium. TikTok has been the go-to social media app during the pandemic, and if it has mostly distinguished itself by cute dance routines – Drake’s Toosie Slide leading the way – it was inevitable it would end up weighing in, somehow, on the political context too. The videos still have the playfulness of most TikTok output – Foster, for instance, basically repackages Patel as a sneery ladette – but they pack a heavier punch.
Next, the use of lipsync is truly uncanny. Not only is it a fine art in itself (see RuPaul’s Drag Race for details), it also means that you are not trying to outdo the madness of today’s politicians, which would seem impossible – you’re just highlighting it in a new way. “Taking away Trump, the image of him, and having the words come of out of my mouth, makes it even more clear how ridiculous it sounds,” says Cooper. It’s a rare victory for contemporary comedy, which has spent the last few years panicking that it’s impossible to do decent satire these days – the truth was already weird enough. But by isolating specific instances of crackpot chatter, it makes us see it clearly again. After all, another defining characteristic of this era is the avalanche of contrasting and absurd information – Trump often seems to prevail by sheer confusion. These videos make us stop, pause and see the daftness anew.
Instagram content
This content can also be viewed on the site it originates from.
Finally, we can’t avoid the fact that these lipsyncers are women. It certainly marks a change in the world of comedy, which for so long has been male-dominated – especially the world of political satire, which Britons have long equated with the style of Bremner, Bird and Fortune. Yes, there have always been female satirists, but rarely have they so obviously taken centre stage.
What’s more, they are doing it on their own terms, rather than trying to fit into traditional tropes. Some of the best Foster videos see her re-staging political discussions as chummy gals’ chats over glasses of rosé on the patio: one, which zips through various points of the Women for a People’s Vote argument, has great fun rephrasing it as passive-aggressive chatter between two ladies-who-lunch and a snubbed waitress. It’s naughty, silly, but somehow cuts right to the bone. Oh, and if there’s also the added satisfaction that it’s great to see clever, outspoken young women outwit these politicians, the women themselves are too classy to say it. But you just know that Trump, for starters, would be so, so chuffed.
More from British Vogue:
