Suck It, Jesus, Kathy's Never Been Mellow

S04E03

Kathy E-mail Watch: Nothing this week, but with The View in Vegas, I'm sure she's been super-busy writing new material, so I'm not surprised.

Hee, okay, the poster advertising Kathy's latest stand-up show has her sandwiched between appearances by Joe Cocker and Toto. That's brilliant. A bewigged Kathy (seriously, I'm pretty sure I saw that thing atop a B-52 at some point) jokes about offending Portia de Rossi in Australia while Lance Bass laughs in the audience. That wasn't a punchline, that's just what happened. Leave Lance alone, you guys, he's had it hard enough, never getting to go to space and all.

So coincidentally enough, Kathy's planning a tour through Australia, and she clutches her Emmy as she gives the details to Team Griffin. It's a quintessential Kathy gig: she's hitting up Gay Mardi Gras (as opposed to...?) in Australia, and her flight down is some Gay Comedy Flight that, sorry Kathy, sounds hellish. I already feel like there's no escape when I'm on an airplane -- I do not need the desperation of gay cabaret to make me feel even more anxious. Jessica expresses her fear of drag queens ("They're big and tall and clown-like") and generally dreads the trip. Kathy wonders if Jessica was ever (fabulously) molested by drag queens as a child. Lady, get in line behind the rest of us who've been molested by drag queens as adults. Tom wishes he'd get molested by drag queens, but Kathy says he's not hot enough.

Kathy (still in L.A.) tapes an interview with an Australian radio show and goofs with the one about her skinned knee. Kathy interviews that the Australian press are "unshockable," which of course puts them right up there with the gays in Kathy's Big Book of Unshockable Subcultures. They talk about Jesus Sucking It, and honestly? I'm kind of over Jesus Sucking It. I still like it for the recap titles and all, but as far as episode fodder? Even Jesus is like, "Yes, I sucked it, can we move on?"

Kathy does another interview, this time over the phone, with a different Australian radio show. She tells them that she has planned an "audience" with Olivia Newton-John while she's down under, since she's like the "Australian pope." The radio hosts give Kathy the 411 on some Aussie curse words, like "dickbag" and "cunt features." Lord knows I hate to pay extra for cunt features -- I usually just take what comes standard.

Kathy pays her mom a visit before she flees the country, and she attempts to scandalize ol' Maggie with a jar of Kathy-brand condoms. So Kathy tosses some condoms around, and Maggie sips her wine and is a good sport as always. As Kathy leaves, she asks her mom to give her a "Bye, girl!" in her best drag queen voice. Maggie: "Bye, gal!" Aw! Maggie prefers drag queens with some old-timey moxie! I like that.

So, to explain all you need to know about this "Pink Flight" to Sydney: the actual airplane is wearing a pink feather boa. ...Yeah. Team Griffin arrives with pink boas of their own for the pre-flight party at the gate. Kathy greets the crowd, then greets the passengers as they board the plane. This is the most pink feathers I've seen since I accidentally walked in on that flamingo orgy.

Kathy boards the plane as she interviews about the barely-organized chaos that is this Pink Flight. Kathy does her "stand-up" via the PA phone at the front of the coach section, it looks like, and Kathy interviews that that's not exactly a setup that's very conducive to hilarity. "I've been funnier on the phone with my friends," she says, and it does kinda look like she's bombing. Or at the very least, she's not playing to the most receptive of audiences. Kathy's Plan B works out better: she works the crowd. Taking photos, sitting on laps, that sort of thing. She interviews that it's actual similar to her gigs with the troops in Iraq.

Considering this is a fourteen-hour flight, Kathy gets six hours to nap, and when Tom wakes her up so she can oversee the breakfast service, she really looks like she'd rather be anywhere else. Ahh, the fourteen-hour flight: the great equalizer. So Cranky Kathy hands out some breakfasts, then searches the plane for Jessica and Tiffany, who have apparently been lying low somewhere. She also helps Jess confront her fear of drag queens by having a couple of them scream in her face. It's the only way, really.

So with one hour to go until Sydney, there are finally some shirtless dudes prancing around the airplane. If it took them this long to get their shirts off, I don't know what kind of self-respecting gay flight this is, but whatever. Not to be outdone, Kathy runs through the cabin with her shirt off, though she acknowledges she's fighting an uphill battle with this crowd. She then interviews that she is beat to hell, but once the plane lands, she pretty much has to hit the ground running. I'm exhausted just looking at her.

Team Griffin exits the Sydney airport in the pouring rain (Kathy thinks this is maybe the Australian climate's revenge for all those Nicole Kidman jokes), and they head on off to do a morning show. Kathy interviews that her plan is to announce to the world that she's going to rehab for a mental illness. Team Griffin brainstorms possible mental illnesses in the limo and settles on Tall Poppy Syndrome, which is characterizes by a "tendency to criticize successful people." Wait...so being a hater makes you mentally ill now? I thought that was just coincidental!

So Kathy, in a much better wig than earlier, chats with Kerri-Anne on the air, then drops that she's going to rehab. Kerri-Anne brings up the subject of Kathy's celebrity dates, including Nick Carter from back in Season...Two? One? Whatever, back a couple years ago. Anyway, Nick (and the fu-manchu-looking one) recorded a video for Kathy saying that he had a girlfriend at the time, but he'd like to make out with Kathy now. And A.J. would like to grab her ass. Kathy is touched. It's nice and all, but I'm not sure how cool it is to be double-timing these boy bands like this. Lance can't be pleased when he sees this on TV.

Kathy prepares to film some promos, and the script appears to call for some play-acting from Kathy and her assistants. Tom appears to take to scripted dialogue about as naturally as he takes to his regular spontaneous dialogue: awkwardly and kind of retarded. It also appears that this Aussie network "Arena" is just totally co-opting Bravo's "Watch What Happens" tagline. Can they do that? Is Arena just some mirror-universe of Bravo? Do they also show Gangs of New York at 8 AM and have their own Aussie version of Andy Cohen stinking up their reunion shows? I'm curious now!

So Team Griffin films their promo, which involves lewd and suggestive acts with a didgeridoo. It also involves Kathy reading some lame copy and Jessica and Tiffany giggling like crazy. It's all deeply stupid, but that's the point. Cut! Print!

After the promos, Kathy meets up with Lance Bass, who either flew down to Australia for Gay Mardi Gras or to be on Kathy's show. Either one seems plausible. I have to say -- gaywad alert! -- I kind of love how Kathy and Lance have been real, actual friends for a long time, and how she never outed him in her act, and how they seem to really enjoy each other's company outside of the whole fame cyclone in which they live. Anyway, Lance preps Kathy on Olivia Newton-John (he says she's lovely), and they take a water taxi to the Sydney Zoo. Kathy interviews that she doesn't normally hang out on show days, but she's making an exception for Lance because he calms her nerves. "He's like gay valium." You guys, I think I like Lance Bass now. I'm sorry.

At the zoo, Team Griffin and Lance get to see a koala up close, then...okay, how to describe this. Lance lays down on the ground with a kangaroo and...well, he spoons him. Spoons the kangaroo. "Okay, now take your shirt off," Kathy jokes, and it's funny, but I'm not sure how off the mark it is. It looks like Lance and the kangaroo are posing for a swimsuit calendar. Or the cover of a romance novel. Then comes the snake wrangler, and once again, Australian wildlife really seems to have a thing for Lance Bass, because the snake goes right for his crotch. Overall, Team Griffin enjoys a wonderful day at the zoo, but Kathy's got a show to do!

At the venue, Kathy, as usual, gets hives around the straight dudes and immediately demands to speak to some gays. She needs to get down with the lingo and references of the Aussie gay population. She grabs a couple of totally cute guys, but the fact that they've yet to see Paula Abdul's music video makes them "bad gays," as they both admit. Kathy figures she'll just have to wing it.

So after the break, Kathy performs her act, complete with up-to-the-minute accounts of the Pink Flight and the zoo, before she barrels right into her Nicole Kidman material. And while, on the one hand, it's kind of rich to see Kathy Griffin of all people making fun of someone for plastic surgery, it is no less true that Nicole Kidman has frozen her face into a waxy mask of terror.

The day, Kathy meets up with Carson Kressley, and they both head off to meet the wonderful Olivia Newton-John. Think The Wizard of Oz couldn't get gayer? Think again. Hey, so remember how I kind of fell for Lance Bass a few paragraphs northward? That will not be happening with Carson Kressley. Kathy and Carson meet with Olivia for "high tea," while Kathy interviews as to the best time to bust out with "cunt features." So Kathy and Carson go at Olivia like a pair of hyperactive howler monkeys (and I mean that in the best way...for Kathy), telling her how fabulous she looks and mis-quoting lines from "Physical." Kathy finally tells the story of "cunt features," and Olivia, slightly horrified, says she has no knowledge of that being accepted slang. Olivia is halfway between being repulsed by Kathy and fascinated by her, but she does end up "translating" for Kathy, so that when Kathy says, "G'day, cunt features!" Olivia translates, "Hello, pretty face!" Oh, that's perfect. So if you ever meet Olivia Newton-John and she calls you "pretty face," you'll know what she's really saying.

Later Kathy meets up with her pal Margaret Cho, who is captioned as "Not So D-List," which is funny, because Kathy has certainly eclipsed Margaret Cho on the fame list, right? Though, maybe not in Australia, because when Kathy says she'll be riding on the back of the PFLAG float (or, rather, truck), Margaret reveals that she's "Chief of Parade." Which is Aussie for "Grand Marshall," it sounds like. So then Kathy and Margaret meet Cyndi Lauper (and Cyndi's fabulous extensions) at some drag costume shop, and every gay dude in America and Australia just spontaneously combusted right then. I am now typing this recap from a dustbin because I am a pile of ashes. When Margaret tells Cyndi that she's the "Chief of Parade," Cyndi screeches that she's "gotta have a crown!" It's great to see how much Kathy genuinely respects and enjoys these women, and the three of them have a blast trying on different headpieces and such. Then they step outside for the not-at-all-staged-by-Kathy photo op.

At the Mardi Gras parade, Team Griffin arrives but can't find Margaret's Grand Marshall float, so instead they just flit around and "bum-rush" other floats. Some unpleasant-looking dykey broad tries to throw Kathy out of the parade, and scores of Australians have zero idea who Kathy is, and eventually Team Griffin is reduced to walking the parade. That's pretty pitiful, I'll give them that. Kathy eventually gets some press to notice her, though the guy who called her "Kathy Grissom" probably didn't recognize her so well.

Eventually, Kathy meets with some fans who love her and scream for her, and she interviews that, with one out of a hundred Australians recognizing her, that's a pretty big success.

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Joe R has no problem being greeted as "cunt features," though you'll get farther with him if you lead with "pretty face" instead. Kathy, or anyone else, can reach him via email.