/ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT/TELEVISION-ARGENTINA: Gov’t Takes Humour Seriously

By Marcela Valente Reprint | | Print |

Marcela Valente

BUENOS AIRES, Jul 3 2001 (IPS) - A television parody in which the star is President Fernando de la Rúa, played by a comedian, last week broke records for total viewing audience – and now the government has made it into a state matter.

‘El Show de Videomatch’ was already the most-watched programme on Argentine television when its producers decided to parody the show that was broadcast immediately following, the local version of ‘Big Brother’, the “reality TV” programme that uses dozens of cameras to show the minute-by-minute cohabitation of a group of people isolated in a house.

The idea spawned ‘Big Brother-in-Law’, in which 12 actors portray Argentine government leaders and politicians shut inside a house. In addition to De la Rúa, the characters in the house include former president Carlos Menem (1989-1999, currently under house arrest on arms trafficking charges) and his wife Cecilia Bolocco (Chile’s former Miss Universe), former vice-president Carlos Alvarez and economy minister Domingo Cavallo.

Awkward and disoriented, like an old man who has lost a bit of his sanity with the passing of the years, the version of the president in ‘Big Brother-in-Law’ was already a staple on ‘Videomatch’ from the previous season.

But this year, his inclusion, alongside other politicians, in the production-lot house nearly doubled the viewing audience for this prime-time show, which last week jumped from 20 to nearly 40 points (the equivalent of 3.5 million viewers in a country of 36.6 million).

The Buenos Aires daily ‘Página 12’ reported that 60 percent of all television viewers had their eyes on ‘Big Brother-in-Law’ during that time slot.

Communication experts in the government oscillate between invocations of freedom of expression and veiled threats of lawsuits for what they consider a bad joke against the president. Nearly all agree that the TV parody is devastating.

The satire is not unfounded – it is based on fact, say humorists and political analysts alike. Of the population surveyed, 44.4 percent holds a negative opinion of De la Rúa, 65, who took office in December 1999, according to a June poll by the Equis consulting firm.

“Political humour does not generate political phenomena, but rather is a consequence of those phenomena. Humour accentuates or exaggerates social perceptions, but it doesn’t create them. In other words, if humour underscores a certain weakness in the leadership it would be because the idea already exists among the audience,” explained analyst and pollster Rosendo Fraga.

For his part, humorist Santiago Varela said that “caricature is always based on elements that are found in the popular imagination because, if they weren’t, they wouldn’t be recognisable.”

“One cannot do a parody of political humour about something that is not based on reality,” he added.

But Varela stressed that a caricature cannot be held responsible for the fall in popularity of the person being parodied, and cited the examples of the scandals of the presidency of Bill Clinton in the United States (1993-2001). The jokes and satires multiplied and spread, but Clinton maintained his popularity.

Some Argentine officials pointed to the case of the short-lived Arturo Illia government (1963-1966). Illia was nicknamed “tortoise” by the opposition and was a frequent target of comedians and humorists for his supposed slowness in taking decisions.

But he was not overthrown by jokes, said Varela, but rather a military coup.

“It doesn’t matter what we do, the disoriented De la Rúa of ‘Videomatch’ is destruction by degrees,” commented a government minister interviewed by the local weekly ‘Noticias’ who preferred to remain anonymous.

The magazine dedicated its cover last week to the phenomenon it dubbed the “Tinelli effect,” named for the host of “Videomatch”, Marcelo Tinelli.

‘Noticias’ stated that the popularity of the parody, which shows a half-witted president incapable of one clear thought, is at least as difficult for the government to counteract as the Argentina’s “country risk”, an index that measures the confidence of foreign investors – an obsession of the presidency.

The De la Rúa of ‘Big Brother-in-Law’, and the 10 other politicians and one union leader, face being expelled from the house by audience call-in vote, just like on the original ‘Big Brother’, a programme/contest that originated in the Netherlands in 1999.

The public has already voted for the removal of the character representing María Julia Alsogaray, a former official of the Menem government who currently faces trial for illicit enrichment.

In ‘Big Brother’, which ended here over the weekend, surviving in the house until the end meant prize-money totalling 200,000 dollars, while in ‘Big Brother-in-Law’, the one who makes it to the last day will only have the honour of causing more laughter.

And, so far, Argentina’s TV viewers seem inclined to keep De la Rúa among the cast, if only to prolong the mockery.

Legislative deputy Elisa Carrió, who in real life abandoned the governing coalition bloc in Congress, is portrayed in the satire by a male actor. Carrió said she hopes her character is voted off the show soon so she will no longer be “surrounded by those people.”

Carrió, famous for her denunciations of corruption, is also known for being overweight. Her impersonator on ‘Big Brother-in-Law’ portrays her as controlling her anxiety with food and cigarettes.

Another victim of the televised gag is Alvarez, who resigned from the vice-presidency claiming lack of support from De la Rúa for his anti-corruption campaign.

The actor playing Alvarez is always shown clutching his suitcase and continually looking for an open window through which he might escape.

Hugo Moser, a television scriptwriter and Economy minister Cavallo’s communications and image adviser, commented that for the politicians it is harder to be the subject of a joke on Tinelli’s programme than to come under fire in a newspaper headline.

Reports that nearly four million TV viewers saw ‘El Show de Videomatch’ last week, when the bogus De la Rúa tried to get the cow kept in the house’s yard to give milk by talking to it, convinced the officials in charge of government communications to try to subtly discredit the programme.

Among other comments, they suggested that “Big Brother-in-Law” is a political manoeuvre to benefit the opposition, because some of its leaders caricatured on the show could be shown in a positive light.

But the programme’s producers have said that the show will – in the long run – “dignify the political class” and that “the ones who will benefit most will be the new generations of leaders.”

“Through this programme, the people undergo catharsis,” said one of the ‘Videomatch’ producers.

They creators do, however, understand that for many, the show has turned into the best form of “revenge of the middle class,” which is deeply disappointed in the De la Rúa presidency because it has failed to reduce unemployment or reactivate the economy, now in its third year of recession.