My friends at Videogum shared this short digital allegation earlier today, in which YouTube user juanjuan5768 claims that a 30 Rock plot is way too similar to an earlier episode of The Sarah Silverman Program that aired on Comedy Central. Watch:
My first thought: Meh. This literal take on a racial-facial face-off isn't anything new, from the groundbreaking work of "Black Like Me" to the what-were-they-thinking efforts of C. Thomas Howell in Soul Man and Shawn and Marlon Wayans in White Chicks. Who did it best? NBC's 30 Rock certainly goes for it more than Silverman's simpleton black clown look, although the latter's choice makes the outrage in her episode absurdist. But the correct answer is and always will be: Eddie Murphy in his "White Like Me" short film for Saturday Night Live.
That YouTube video is ridiculous. Neither episode was that creative, something I thought when I saw them. Both felt like far-too-late parodies of “Soul Man” and “White Chicks.”
Saying 30 Rock stole from Sarah Silverman is like saying SNL stole from the Internet because both had Sarah Palin impressions.