2020 may well be looking up. Let’s allow ourselves to continue basking in the glory of Donald Trump getting fired from the White House (and ignore his wittering about lawsuits and the like). Something good happened! In 2020! It’s unheard of!
Add this to the tentative news of a coronavirus vaccine and all we need now is for Nigel Farage to be deported under Priti Patel’s new immigration rules after it’s revealed he was actually born in Europe and we won’t even care that we probably can’t spend Christmas with our families. We’ll be high on justice! How could it possibly get better? Four Seasons Total Landscaping, and a song about it – that’s how.
In a scene that surely confirmed that someone in Trump’s team had it in for him (the same person who chose ‘YMCA’ as his post-rally anthems), his personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani (yes, the guy from the new Borat movie) held a post-election press conference in what he seemingly thought was the Four Seasons off of all the films from the ‘90s, but which was actually the car park outside a small landscaping firm in Philadelphia. Like a real-life The Thick Of It, Veep, or Parks and Rec, this couldn’t have been any more perfect. In true the-internet-is-wonderful-style, Four Seasons Total Landscaping have released a Zoom background of said car park, which we should all take advantage of.
And now comedian Tim Heidecker has blessed us with ‘Rudy At The 4 Seasons’, a song about this momentous moment in our global history. You might know Tim as a successful stand-up, one half of comedy due Tim & Eric, or as fiance Dougie in Bridesmaids, in which he didn’t say one word throughout the whole film.
Full "Rudy At The 4 Seasons" Song pic.twitter.com/z6e3LL6Egg
— Lord Goo Goo (@timheidecker) November 10, 2020
Tim’s dramatic ballad is a fitting tribute to Giuliani, who booked the press conference to allege voter fraud resulting in Trump’s loss (with no evidence, of course). The lawyer was exposed, for want of a better word, with his hands down his boxers in front of what he thought was a TV reporter (she was an actor) in the aforementioned Borat movie. Hence the song’s lyrics: “Oh, with your hands down your pants / Maybe you don’t want to do a hotel”. In Tim’s surprisingly catchy tune (I’ve been humming it constantly around the house since I heard it), he also touches on the truly bizarre nature of the whole debacle, as this particular four seasons is located between a sex shop and a crematorium.
Four Seasons Total Landscaping, meanwhile, have been milking it – and why not? In addition to the Zoom background, they have of course launched merch. Should you wish to get one of the limited edition t-shirts, featuring their catchphrases ‘Lawn & Order!’ and ‘Make America Rake Again’, you can do so here. It’s such a silly, perfect take-down of that clusterfuck of an administration.
What I like to sit and imagine, in my quieter, contemplative moments, with a large smile on my face, is the moment at which Giuliani and Trump were made aware that they were, in fact, headed to a small landscaping firm. I hope nobody lost their job and I really hope whoever booked it, did it on purpose, smirking to themselves in the process.
2020 has felt like a real-life doom scroll. Every time you watch the news, you see our Government having no clue how to deal with any given situation while they worship the ruins of Empire – see the pitiful debate about the cringeworthy patriotic song ‘Land of Hope & Glory’ at the BBC Proms in summer – and, through Brexit, cling on to some antiquated notion of Britishness. Throw in a pandemic and climate change and if you’ve managed to stay upbeat you deserve a small, biodegradable medal.
That’s why songs like Tim’s – in the wake of the most chaotic, bigoted and downright evil administration America has seen in modern times – are so welcome. Those in power have created their own comedy that’s so unbelievable, it seems they’re challenging us to make it even funnier.
Last week we saw most of America appear to wake thinking that maybe – just maybe – this group of ageing right-wing white men with seemingly little grip on reality, led by a President who has famously made sexist remarks (for posterity: “Grab ’em by the pussy. You can do anything”), aren’t the best choice to be running the Land of the Free. But you can’t deny that we’ve also realised they’re the best at making the world laugh at them.