Jon Stewart’s saving grace was always his humility. As the lionized host of the Daily Show, the comedian turned journalist turned media critic never pretended that his work compared with the real contributions of soldiers or civil servants or reporters or activists. When Stewart tried his hand at dramatic filmmaking with Rosewater (2014), he chose as his hero the real-life Canadian journalist Maziar Bahari, whose appearance in a Daily Show segment had come back to haunt him when he was imprisoned in Tehran during the 2009 election protests. Now Sara Taksler, a longtime producer for the Daily Show, has directed Tickling Giants, which tells the story of Egyptian comedian Bassem Youssef. A heart surgeon by training, Youssef became a national sensation after the 2011 revolution with a weekly TV show of political satire, but after the 2013 military coup he was driven off the air and out of the country. Like Rosewater, Tickling Giants acknowledges that political satire carries much higher stakes under a repressive regime.
At heart Tickling Giants is a backstage documentary, and Taksler, whose press bio describes her as a 24-7 diehard at the Daily Show, includes plenty of sympathetic material about Youssef’s loyal staff, described by the boss as a motley crew of former attorneys, architects, and students who came to the show with no background in TV. After the election of President Sisi, as the protests mount, staffers are told they can work from home for their own safety; they show up anyway. Yet Tickling Giants has little to tell us about ordinary Egyptians outside this media bubble. There are shots of people gathering in public places to enjoy Al Bernameg, and a few outraged comments from right-wing protesters, but little hard information about the particular gags that ignited the public firestorm, the issues that consumed Egypt as Sisi was consolidating power, or whether the demonstrations against Youssef and his show were organic or orchestrated by the government.
Directed by Sara Taksler
