It's Time to Admit It: Anderson Cooper and Kathy Griffin are a Classic Comedy Duo

The medium of television and the sensibilities of comedy are vastly different today than they were during the runs of such gold-standard bearers as Mike Nichols and Elaine May, George Burns and Gracie Allen or Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz. So just to preface this for comedy purists; we would never suggest that a 21st century couple, atop today's fractured media landscape, could ever lay claim to that kind of titanic yucks aura. However... As a sign of just how much we have come to love the NYE shenanigans of one Kathy Griffin and Anderson Cooper, FishbowlNY has no trouble admitting that we DVR-ed the entire thing December 31 and watched the entire thing January 1. And enjoyed every minute of it. This year's seventh go-round (by Cooper's count) or eighth (by Griffin's) ranks as the best so far. Largely because, after a couple of borderline years, Griffin seems to have finally read the contractual fine print and figured out more nimbly than ever how to straddle the Times Square barrier. One of the highlights of Cooper-Griffin 2013 was when she launched into the first of several recurring bits mocking her co-host's banal tweets and starved-for-attention Twitter M.O. Cooper was literally doubled over with laughter as Griffin put on her therapist party hat: "Why do you read every single [reply] tweet?" "I know the hurt little boy who lives inside the model body. He's five-years-old. Mommy's missing, she's at Studio 54. His soup is cold... And all he wants is love. So he's reading every, single tweet..." "There's one tear, like Demi Moore in Ghost. He's doing some pottery. He's the little boy who never grew up. He's got short pants, he's got suspenders. Somebody, love him... He's an underwear model who became a newsman by mistake." Cementing the age-old straight man to her jokester rhythms is the Cooper giggle. Not a small detail; part of any great comedy team is the reaction sounds or look, and Cooper's laugh is a delight to tee-hee-hold. So... consider these annual getogethers as a sort of compressed, new-century equivalent to an old 22-episode sitcom block. How long can this duo go? Probably as long as Cooper is at CNN. P.S. The above, quoted segment was triggered by a Twitter exchange Cooper had with @TheTylerHardin, who claimed at one point last year that stranger Cooper had started texting him. Our thanks to Hardin, a student reporter in North Carolina, for the great set-up.

Fishbowl

It's Time to Admit It: Anderson Cooper and Kathy Griffin are a Classic Comedy Duo

Richard Horgan

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Richard Horgan