The Power of Satire, Sacha Baron Cohen Takes the Stage at 92NY

Sacha Baron Cohen built a career on people who did not know the joke was on camera. On Wednesday night he walks into a room where everyone knows exactly who he is.

92NY lists "Sacha Baron Cohen: The Power of Satire" for Wednesday, October 21, on its fall season page, filed under Talks. That listing is nearly all the public detail there is. It gives no start time and no moderator, and the event's own page would not load for us, so check the time and seats with the box office before you head uptown.

The timing is not subtle. *Ali G: Who Iz I?*, his directorial debut, opens in theaters on Friday, October 23, for one weekend only, according to TheWrap.

Sunday Night's Argument

On Sunday, Baron Cohen sat down with Ariel Levy for *60 Minutes*, and CBS posted a transcript the same evening. It is the first Ali G film since *Ali G Indahouse* in 2002, TheWrap notes.

The transcript recalls the man's earlier creations, Ali G, Borat and Bruno, and says that in the new film he also plays a deranged leftist professor and a former Mossad agent. Levy asked him whether he went into the movie with a question he wanted to answer. Part of his reply was that he wanted to examine "this idea of conspiracies and lies."

The Defense

The interview turned to the old complaint about this kind of comedy, that it makes fools of ordinary people. Baron Cohen did not accept it.

"I think a lot of the times, they're not making fools of themselves," he said, as TheWrap quotes him. He told Levy that "there's a huge amount of stuff that you don't see," and that the people in his films often "come across well, actually." On Borat, he said the character can show the kindness of the people who are nice to him, and also expose "the layer of hate and bigotry below the surface."

"I think a lot of the times, they're not making fools of themselves." Sacha Baron Cohen on 60 Minutes

That is the thesis of a whole career in one sentence. Expect it to come up on Wednesday.

A Film With a Fight Attached

The release has not been calm. TheWrap reports that some U.K. watchdog activists accused the film of racism and urged theaters not to show it. TheWrap does not name the groups, so neither can we. The film's own trailer leans into the fight, with Borat announcing that "there have been reportings that this film is racist."

A talk titled "The Power of Satire" two nights before opening is the obvious place to keep that argument going.

What to Know Before You Go

92NY is at 1395 Lexington Avenue, at East 92nd Street on the Upper East Side. The talk is Wednesday, October 21. Tickets run through the venue's events listings, and the season page gives no time or price, so confirm both before you go.

If you want a second famous voice on a New York stage this week, Billy Crystal is telling his own story in 860 at the Imperial Theatre.

Ali G has been off the screen for more than two decades. He comes back on Friday. First, his maker has to explain himself.