Sound of one voice yapping

You no longer have to stop the world for me to get off. I'm jumping.

What is making me leap is the sound of Ellen DeGeneres yapping about whether or not her TV persona on ABC's "Ellen" will declare herself to be a homosexual.

Among the unfunniest people on the face of the earth -- Yasir Arafat and Boris Yeltsen leap to mind, also -- is DeGeneres, whose approach to comedy is to keep speaking in a steady stream of tedious verbiage until she accidentally hits on something which might be considered mildly amusing among the very easily entertained. Or until the audience surrenders to the noisy torture and smiles wanly to get her to shut up.

Listening to her is like watching a blind dog search for a bone. Eventually, each will stumble across what they're looking for, but it will be only by happenstance.

Time wasted

I have watched "Ellen," the TV show, once in my life, and I am tempted to sue for the return of those 30 minutes, snatched from me like a handbag from a senior citizen. I was, in short, the innocent, unsuspecting victim of a media mugging.

Now Ellen the real-life person has made the rounds of talk shows, refusing to say if Ellen, her TV character, is going to announce that she is a lesbian. Asked about this rumor, Ellen the real-life person considers this response to be hilarious: "She will say she is Lebanese."

That was barely funny the first time I heard it -- in the schoolyard from a second-grade classmate. From a third-rate comedian, it's discouraging, to say the least.

Sin TV

As Ellen weighs this momentous announcement, some of her advertisers are growing nervous about having their products boycotted by those viewers who would rename her Ellen Degenerate for bringing sinful behavior onto TV.

But it wouldn't be the first time sin was practiced on prime-time television. Plenty of main characters on popular TV series have been serial fornicators; the cast of "ER" being but the latest example. George Clooney is admired for playing a doctor who can't keep his pants on. For years, Dean Martin stayed number-one in the ratings by portraying an alcoholic womanizer.

Archie Bunker and George Jefferson were adorable racists. On "Dallas," J.R. Ewing was a hit by being a grasping, greedy, conniving businessman who didn't care whom he hurt.

Many of this season's new shows are based on cohabiting couples, such as "Relativity" and "Spin City." On "Friends" and "Seinfeld," the characters routinely sleep with one another and with strangers. (Public health officials should look into why the chlamydia rate on television is zero. That sexually transmitted disease is now the highest-reported infectious disease in America.)

Asleep at the remote

This parade of sin, sexual and otherwise, barely stirs comment from most viewers, dulled and lulled by years of the same. What used to be shocking is now considered passe. Is it the fault of the producers and writers, or does the fault lie with us, the audience?

If Ellen the person decides that Ellen the character should be gay and actively so, offended viewers will have the right to make another kind of switch -- to another channel.

But I wonder: Will the same audience that has made "Seinfeld" the most popular TV series even notice another form of prime-time perversion?

(11-14-96)

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