President Obama faces a challenge like Lauryn Hill after her album "Miseducation of Lauryn Hill" won five Grammys or the Coen Brothers after Blood Simple won the Sundance Grand Jury Prize. Will it take a while for his own Fargo or No Country for Old Men?
Barack Obama is exactly like John Travolta. His ascendence to the State Senate was his "Welcome Back Kotter." Then he exploded with his 2004 DNC speech -- his Grease and Saturday Night Fever rolled into one. That was pretty impossible to follow up though, so he just laid low for awhile in the Senate, while Travolta did the same with the Look Who's Talking series. And yet all this time, everyone was like "Fuck this, Obama should be prez," and "Where's John -- he's one of Hollywood's finest!"
Then he roared back with his very own Pulp Fiction -- announcing his candidacy for POTUS. And yet despite a lot of hype, he was about to learn that Hollywood -- err, campaigning, was anything but easy. He tried to cast himself as different, in Michael and Phenomenon -- not adherent to the same old stale rules. And after the agents and strategists tirelessly toiled for many months, they seized the day.
His win in Iowa was his Swordfish. We are going to change things forever. No more of the same old lobbying or trite action sequences. Yeah, he had to deal with the Clintons to get here, but so did John in Primary Colors. Some detractors would say hey, this guy is just more of the same; hey, bullet-time slo-mo has already been done. But he'd pitch my own message to the people he cares about. Just like Travolta would break through the old Jewish-Hollywood mold with Battlefield Earth, Obama would take Ohio and Texas and Pennsylvania and say FUCK OFF, I'm winning Nebraska and Idaho.
He'd flaunt his fame sometimes, embarking on a gawdy Euro-tour in the summer, and stretching his wings a la Wild Hogs. He reclaimed old themes when he starred in Hairspray and selected Joe Biden as his running mate. But he knew he needed to connect with normal people -- the masses -- in the debates, which is why he buckled down and laid out his vision. His Bolt, if you will.
And then Obama became president and Travolta's kid died, which is where the analogy goes to shit.
