There are some folks that think that Billy on the Street is a bit over the top and kind of, well, odd. But it’s been running for long enough that it’s obviously attracted a healthy following and has been deemed as nothing less than hilarious. As Bethany Guerrero from ScreenRant has shown in her article it still doesn’t fail to get laughs, especially when people couldn’t figure out that they were talking to Kate McKinnon posing as Reese Witherspoon. At this point I kind of have to stop and scratch my head a bit as I wonder how anyone could possibly get the two of them mixed up. Looking at Kate and Reese side by side it’s still not possible since quite honestly their looks aren’t that alike to really confuse them with one another, even with their hair down. But you can at least give it up for McKinnon and Eichner since honestly they’re both funny as hell and know how to make something like this work in their favor.
If you can believe it, and many can, the show has been around since 2011 and has been steadily gaining in fans and popularity ever since. It’s pretty basic, Billy Eichner walks around New York asking people about pop culture and seeing if they know enough to compete in the game show he’s filming while he’s on the street. As an idea it’s kind of off the wall and really out there in a way, but in terms of innovation it was something we hadn’t really seen, at least not for some time, that really captured our attention. Apart from just walking up to pedestrians the show has also featured several famous celebrities as Eichner has quizzed them as well and tried to see just how much they know about pop culture and if they can answer his questions. Honestly it’s kind of funny when a celebrity can’t answer the questions since one would think that they would know a little more about pop culture as a lot them are big contributors to the culture itself in many ways. But then again its a big assumption that they’d know that much since some of them don’t even follow the movies and shows they’re in and are just there to get paid and gain recognition.
As Ree Hines from Today wrote about he even managed to get Will Ferrell out for a holiday episode in which they wore matching onesies, (huh boy) and quizzed people about Christmas movies. You can imagine the hilarity if you haven’t seen it, and the shock that must have stopped people cold when asked if they liked Bill Murray’s movie Scrooged or Will Farrell’s movie Elf better. Some people might have been frank but when the man himself is staring you in the face and is known to have a penchant for flipping out as part of his act, well….let’s just say it was still amusing and hilarious all the same. A show like this has the advantage of not having to deal with the space issue that many shows have, but one could argue that there might be a bit of a problem with just coming up to people on the street and quizzing them about pop culture out of the blue. In reality it would seem that some people might be freaked out and it would be necessary to stage the show in a way that wouldn’t provoke anyone or incite an incident of some sort, but the show is actually not scripted. It does take a bit to get the right kind of take that they want but there’s no script and it’s all just Billy interacting with people in a way that might rub some folks the wrong way or might get their attention.
The common though is that in a place like New York this would be kind of a rough way to go about hosting a show like this, but Billy has proven to be just versatile enough and just on the cusp of being famous so people don’t gush over him and try to come up and be on TV. In fact a lot of people during the show are just doing their own thing and don’t seem to mind that a camera is filming pretty much whatever comes into the frame. Billy has taken this show and ran with it for so many years now that it’s hard to think that New Yorkers don’t know who he is by dint of his having been out on the streets doing his thing for so long. But then again a lot of folks in a lot of different cities tend to keep their heads down or their eyes forward when going about their day. The reason why a lot of us find this show hilarious is that we’re focused on the show and nothing else when it comes on.
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