Jim Carrey is a black swan on ‘Saturday Night Live’
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‘Black Swan’ is an over-the-top movie; Jim Carrey is an over-the-top comedian. Clearly, the two are a match made in spoof heaven. Carrey’s sendup of ‘Black Swan’ this weekend on NBC’s ‘Saturday Night Live’ featured the actor wearing a tutu and showing off his ballet chops in the service of lampooning the awards-magnet prestige picture starring Natalie Portman.
Carrey played the darker, malevolent protagonist in the Tchaikovsky ballet, known as Odile, as interpreted in the movie by Mila Kunis. In ‘Black Swan,’ Kunis’ ballet dancer is a sneering bad girl with considerable sexual prowess who tempts Portman’s frigid princess out of her ice shell. Carrey communicated his character’s sexual skills by placing his fist in his mouth, flipping his legs over his head and gyrating his hips.
It should be noted that Carrey -- who has been compared throughout his career to Jerry Lewis -- is above all a physical comedian who brings a dancer’s alacrity to the art of mimicry. The ‘SNL’ skit doesn’t really take advantage of that -- it feels too short and underimagined -- but Carrey’s imitation of a hissing swan is brilliant. As Matthew Bourne has shown, male dancers make more zoologically convincing stage swans than their female counterparts.
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-- David Ng
