Tina Fey is the entertainer of the year? You betcha.
The 38-year-old comedian, whose dead-on impersonation of Gov. Sarah Palin ruled the election cycle, was voted The Associated Press' Entertainer of the Year for 2008.
Fey's wink-filled cameos on "Saturday Night Live," where she was a head writer until 2006, became a huge hit and drove the show to record ratings.
"She simultaneously entertained us with her wit and put a mirror up to the nation during the election and made us think about what was going on," said Scott Shive, assistant features editor at the Lexington Herald-Leader.
Fey also made her leading role debut on the big screen this year, starring in "Baby Mama," and won three Emmy awards for her critically acclaimed NBC sitcom "30 Rock."
But she made the biggest splash playing her look-alike Alaska Governor after Palin was tapped as the Republican vice presidential nominee.
Fey's five appearances on the late night comedy were watched by millions on TV and on the Web.
"The "SNL" stuff has certainly changed things for me," Fey said in October. "A lot more people seem to know who I am
We've loved Tina Fey ever since she rocked that short haircut and crazy hot-for-teacher glasses on "Weekend Update."
And when, standing on the balcony of my awful hotel in Denver the morning Sarah Palin became John McCain's VP candidate, it took all of four seconds for me to realize that Fey would be back on "Saturday Night Live" real soon.
Of course, I won't claim to be smart enough to have predicted her meteoric rise in pop culture thanks to her genius Palin impersonation. No one could have, not even Lorne Michaels. And at least more people in America have woken up to the brilliance of Fey and "30 Rock."
But when Annie Leibovitz takes your photo, you know you've made something of yourself in this world.
There she was, hot Tina Fey, looking mad good on the January 2009 issue of Vanity Fair. Then, whammo! Along comes Jennifer Aniston and that GQ cover of hers. Totally blew Fey out of the conversation. So unfair.
But to read Maureen Dowd's excellent story on Fey, that's pretty much how she prefers it.
Tina Fey Talks About That Scar
After years in the spotlight Tina Fey has finally chosen to reveal the story behind the scar on her left cheek. "It's impossible to talk about it without somehow seemingly exploiting it and glorifying it," she tells Vanity Fair in the January issue.
Her and husband Jeffrey Richmond tell the mag that she was playing in her front yard in Upper Darby, Penn. at just 5-years-old when a stranger approached her, violently cutting her cheek.
"She just thought somebody marked her with a pen," Richmond says.
The 30 Rock star claims the scarring didn't affect her as a child saying, "I proceeded unaware of it. I was a very confident little kid. It's really almost like [I was] able to forget about it, until I was on camera."
Instead Fey is more concerned about being an over protective parent to her daughter Alice, 3.
"Supposedly, I will go crazy," she says. "My therapist says, 'When Alice is the age that you were, you may go crazy.'"
Elizabeth Stamatina Fey started as a writer and performer with a bad short haircut in Chicago improv. Then she retreated backstage at S.N.L., wore a ski hat, and gained weight writing sharp, funny jokes and eating junk food. Then she lost 30 pounds, fixed her hair, put on a pair of hot-teacher glasses, and made her name throwing lightning-bolt zingers on “Weekend Update.” Speeding through the comedy galaxy, she wrote the hit Mean Girls and created her own show based on an S.N.L.-type show: 30 Rock. The comedy struggled in the ratings for two years but was a critical success, winning seven Emmys last fall and catapulting Fey into red-hot territory. Before she even had a chance to take a breath, a freakish twist of fate turned her from red- to white-hot, and enabled her, at long last, to boost the ratings of 30 Rock: Fey was a ringer for another hot-teacher-in-glasses, Sarah Palin, the comely but woefully unprepared Alaska governor, who bounded out of the woods with her own special language to become not only the first Republican woman to run on a national ticket but also God’s gift to comedy and journalism. So where does Fey go from white-hot?
30 Rock star Tina Fey and her baby...
No More Sarah Palin for Tina Fey
Wednesday, November 05, 2008
Tina Fey says she is through playing Sarah Palin now that the election is over.
Fey’s Palin character helped Saturday Night Live’s ratings skyrocket this season with viewership up a whopping 70%. Ratings for Fey’s show, 30 Rock, also rose 20%.
She names her television show as the main reason she will not continue with the Palin impersonation. “I have to retire just because I have to do my day job.”
Her spot-on impression of Palin was so good that we can’t imagine anyone else even attempting it. But when asked who she would likely pass the torch to, she replied,
“I think [Kristen] Wiig would do a really good job. Maybe we could get a real torch. Or I could give Wiig the Palin wig
Say the name
Tina Fey and most people will immediately think of her hilarious, spot-on impersonations of
Sarah Palin. But there's much more to the "30 Rock" star.
Tina tells Vanity Fair in her January cover story interview that she loves playing strippers, that she's never gone for bad boys and that she loves cupcakes. Like, adores them.
And don't forget: She is not a mean girl, but she did write "Mean Girls."
It's a really great interview, full of the spontaneous humor and smartness that have made Elizabeth Stamatina Fey (yes, that's her real name) America's new sweetheart.
Tina Fey Breaks Campaign Promise, Forced to Play Sarah Palin Once More
By Kyle Buchanan, 10:15 AM on Mon Dec 15 2008, 7,696 views
Remember this lady, Sarah Palin? She was famous for appearing every Saturday night on the tee-vee, saying cute things about Russia, gays, and Katie Couric. Or maybe that was her portrayer, Tina Fey?
Though Fey fired herself as Sarah Palin after the Republican ticket lost the election, the will of the people (and the network's biggest female star) is no match for the whims of NBC boy-king Jeff Zucker! According to New York, Fey was forced to reheat the impression for the state's Assembly Speaker and his Democratic caucus:
NBC boss Jeff Zucker asked her to do it, according to Fey’s manager, David Miner. “He doesn’t ask every day for something,” Miner says. The lawmakers voted for legislation this year expanding tax credits for New York film and television productions, like 30 Rock. Miner says Fey was happy to be there, but one lawmaker in attendance isn’t convinced. “She seemed incredibly uncomfortable,” he said. “It was like she didn’t know what she was doing there. Someone said, ‘Do a Sarah Palin!’ and she did a Sarah Palin.” Fey posed for pictures before racing out to finish a script for a 30 Rock episode shooting the next day.
Will NBC ever stop forcing an uncomfortable Fey (they said it, not us!) to sing for her supper when the woman runs a sitcom that demands her attendance? Or will Zucker continue to issue loaded threats to Fey, musing, "You don't have to do Palin for my godson's bar mitzvah, but what do you think about Kevin Eubanks getting a 9:30 Leno pre-show, hmm?"
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