A Kamala Harris impersonator is ready for her moment
The comedian will be watching the vice-president’s next moves closely, for personal and professional reasons, she says
MOMENTS after US President Joe Biden announced last Sunday (Jul 21) that he was withdrawing from the 2024 presidential race, Allison Reese’s phone began flickering with text messages.
“Excited for you!” one read.
“I hope this is going to be good for the country, but also for you,” went another.
A third: “You’re about to be so famous.”
Reese, 32, who lives in Los Angeles, is not a presidential hopeful or a political operative. She is a comedian known for her impression, since the 2019 Democratic presidential primary, of US Vice-President Kamala Harris.
With Biden’s endorsement on Sunday, Harris became the leading contender for the Democratic party’s nomination.
Reese puts on pearls and distinct vocal inflections for the satirical sketches she posts on TikTok, where she has more than 200,000 followers, as @alienreese. Her account gained another 10,000 of them on Sunday after she began riffing on the news.
“It’s been a weirdly crazy day,” said Reese on Sunday, who is also a television writer and host of the podcast The N’Kay Hour.
“I can’t imagine what Kamala’s actual day was like,” she added.
At American comedy institutions like Saturday Night Live (SNL), an impressionist’s career can soar or sputter alongside a candidate’s political prospects.
For instance, Tina Fey won an Emmy for her parody of vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin in 2009. Biden has been portrayed by a rotating cast of actors including Jason Sudeikis, Jim Carrey and Mikey Day.
Reese first stepped into the role of Harris during an SNL showcase – which is essentially an audition for the show’s creator, Lorne Michaels – in the summer of 2019. It was the year Harris first sought the Democratic nomination for president.
“I was like, wow, as a half-Black woman, when am I ever going to get the chance to use this skill?” Reese said. “I can do a lot of different vocal impressions, but it was never applicable to me.”
The voice took a couple of tries to get right. Harris’ delivery is musical with a touch of vocal fry, Reese noted. She lifts the pitch of a phrase when she feels it is important, and splits long words into equally enunciated syllables.
And then there is her laugh: a cascading peal that arrives unpredictably, sometimes mid-sentence. “It’s like, you’re surprised to have laughed, and then you’re really settling in to enjoying that you’re laughing,” Reese said.
The impression did not ultimately land Reese a spot on SNL, which recruited former cast member Maya Rudolph to play Harris during the primary.
But Reese kept developing the character in comedy showcases, and in 2021 began posting videos as the vice-president on social media.
Reese has played Harris reacting to the Republican primary debates and former president Donald Trump’s indictment. She has done multiple takes on Harris’ now-famous rhetorical question: “You think you just fell out of a coconut tree?”
“You’re better at Kamala than Kamala is,” a commenter wrote.
The impression earned Reese the attention of comedian Billy Eichner, who cast her in his 2022 movie, Bros.
She appeared as the vice-president on a 2022 episode of Lovett or Leave It, the comedy spinoff of Pod Save America.
As her profile has grown, Reese has taken heat from both sides of the political spectrum. “A popular comment is: ‘I can’t stand her. You nailed it,’” Reese added.
Fans of the vice-president sometimes comment that the exaggerated, jokey impression diminishes Harris’ intelligence.
“It is a very difficult time to do these impressions,” the television writer noted. “You can’t just be like, ‘I’m being a silly goose!’ You have to be intentional and thoughtful, because some people take it very seriously.”
She added that it was never her goal to make the vice-president appear unintelligent.
Reese hopes Harris does secure the nomination, for reasons both personal and professional. “I think she’s got a good head on her shoulders,” she said. “I don’t agree with everything, but who would?”
Like any good politician, the podcast host has her own circle of trusted advisers. She reached out to a friend who does an impression of Biden about filming a video in which he passes the baton.
And she will be watching closely for Harris’ next moves. “A thing will happen, and I’m like, all right, get the wig,” she said. NYTIMES
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