The premiere of Sacha Baron Cohen’s new Showtime show, Who Is America?, was accompanied by alternatively outraged and bemused statements from a number of unwitting co-stars.
Some politicians were in their feelings about Cohen’s tactics. Sarah Palin wrote at length about her experience being filmed for what she thought would be “a legit Showtime historical documentary,” labeling the prank as “yet another example of the sick nature that is media-slash-entertainment today.” Roy Moore, the former Senate candidate who was accused of sexual misconduct by nine women, issued a similar statement, writing, “As for Mr. Cohen, whose art is trickery, deception, and dishonesty, Alabama does not respect cowards who exhibit such traits!…As an American, I would never hide my identity and deceive others only to mock and ridicule them as this Showtime Series was designed to do.”
Other marks were more amused than enraged. GOP representative Matt Gaetz confirmed to The Daily Beast that “they totally got me,” and said that he was excited to watch his appearance once it aired. Christy Cones, the gallerist featured on Who Is America?’s premiere, went a step further, praising Sacha Baron Cohen’s work as performance art and telling Vulture that, “Essentially, Sacha is carrying on a long tradition that was started thousands of years ago by guys like Aristophanes and Petronius and Jonathan Swift and Voltaire.”
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Corinne Olympios, the Bachelor universe phenomenon, is the latest of Cohen’s “victims” to proclaim herself entirely game. Of course, unlike most elected officials, Olympios has experience creating entertaining television. She has never shied away from making outrageous statements on camera, and she’s no stranger to scandal. This is a woman who told the entire country about her “platinum vagine,” and went on to cleverly sell shirts emblazoned with the catchphrase. So perhaps it’s not so surprising that Cohen would finally find a fitting scene partner in Olympios—or that Olympios has become a huge Sacha Baron Cohen fan in the wake of their surreal encounter.
Cohen and Olympios appear to come from different worlds. He’s a cult comedy icon known for incisive cultural commentary, and she’s a Miami native who skyrocketed to fame on The Bachelor, earning fans and haters alike with her tales of napping presidents and devoted nannies. But in a larger cosmic sense Corinne, who’s promised to Make America Corinne Again, and Sacha, whose work straddles the shrinking line between politics and entertainment, have been careening towards one another for years. That being said, when the reality-TV star and the satirist did finally meet, Olympios had no idea who she was dealing with—literally. “He played this crazy Italian man,” the Bachelor star told The Daily Beast. “He was screaming in a cheesy Italian accent the whole time, I was like, what’s this dude’s problem?”
Olympios laughed, recalling, “I was looking at his hair and I’m like, ewww, he has hair implants! This guy’s gross!”
Corinne was lured onto the show with the promise of a reality star of the year award, orchestrated by “a company from the UK.”
“I was like cool, fun,” Olympios explained. At first, everything seemed normal. “I go there, I’m in hair and makeup, my manager’s with me, he’s signing papers for me, they’re picking out my outfits, everything’s really awesome, and then all of a sudden he starts asking me very, very strange questions. And I’m so confused. I’m like wait, what’s going on?”
“By the way,” she continued, “they took my phone away and they wouldn’t let my manager come with me into the warehouse where they were shooting. So no manager, no phone.”
Olympios played along. “So I’m answering all the questions, I’m saying all the stuff he’s telling me to say, I’m visibly getting upset, and they were just trying to keep me calm basically, they were telling me like, ‘Oh [your manager]’s just on a phone call, don’t worry, I’ll go get your phone for you.’ They kept telling me stuff to keep me calm...And finally I just got so upset and was like what is going on here, this is really crazy, you guys are asking me really unprofessional things! And they were like don’t worry, you’re doing really great, and I was like, I know I’m doing great! You guys are the problem here!”
“So basically I was getting really upset and I had no idea what was going on,” Olympios summarized. “I was changing into all these different outfits. I wound up in a hazmat suit! It was just the craziest day of my life.”
While Olympios can see the humor now, at the time she was pretty pissed about being trapped in the most uncomfortable interview/photoshoot of all time. “I was like, I’m leaving, and they were like no you’re not, you cannot step outside the building right now,” She continued. “I’m like, are you guys kidnapping me? I don’t get it. It was like, you’re holding me here against my will, what the fuck is going on? You guys are fucking out of your minds!”
According to Olympios, the crew was so committed to the bit that they even pretended they couldn’t speak English. “I was like grabbing every cameraman, like, am I going to die? Am I ok? Where’s the exit? why can’t I leave?” she recalled. “And they’re all looking at me like trying not to laugh or say anything, and they’re like, no English, no English. I’m like, oh my god, I’m going to die here. It’s going to happen!”
“So they saw that I was getting really mad and they were like ok, we just have one more thing for you to do, [your manager]’s waiting right outside for you, so I’m like, fine. I’m reading this child with gun thing, and I’m like what the fuck is wrong with you guys, I can’t say this, I don’t believe in this. They’re like no, no, it’s fine, it’s just for Italy, you have no friends in Italy, who cares…At this point I just want to get out of there, so I just did it.”
Once Olympios was finally able to leave, she was shocked to find that her manager had actually been sent home at the beginning of the shoot. “I called [my manager] and was like why the fuck did you leave, that was insane, and he was like, they told me you wanted me to leave! He said, this really sounds like a prank. And I’m like no, it was real!” Olympios laughed. “And then I started crying, I was like everyone’s going to think I’m a supporter of children with guns, and I said that I helped cure Ebola and that I went to Africa for three months, everyone knows I didn’t live in Africa for three months!”
When Olmypios eventually learned that Sacha Baron Cohen had a new project coming out, everything started to make sense. When she officially realized that she had been duped, Olympios started “hysterically laughing and crying at the same time.”
“I was almost relieved that it was him,” she recalled, “and not some random crazy people trying to do something really scary to me.”
While Olympios sheepishly admitted that she hadn’t been familiar with Cohen’s work, she did a deep dive on the satirist after their encounter. “I love Ali G!” She gushed. “Now that I know more about him, I’m kind of honored that he chose me to talk to. I think it’s really, really cool.” While she’s “nervous,” adding, “I don’t know what they’re going to show, I don’t know how people are going to react to it,” she’s already a fan of the series. “I saw the first episode, and I thought it was funny,” Olympios said, adding, “I think he’s great. I’m so excited to be a part of his new project.”
“I mean, not everyone gets to just be a cameo as themselves, so it’s fucking awesome.”
Olympios says she has “no fucking idea” what will make it to air, but she mused, “I feel like people know that Corinne can handle herself in an awkward situation. So I kept my cool really the whole time…until I couldn’t keep my cool.”
“Hopefully people just see that it is a Sacha Baron Cohen prank. He’s pranked a bunch of people with big names. It’s light, it’s funny, it’s nothing serious.” She concluded, “I hope people can see that and they’re not going to freak out about me saying certain things, because people that know me know that I’m a really amazing person. And so, yeah, I just hope that I don’t offend anyone, but none of it was serious anyways!”
While Olympios first made a splash for her entertaining presence on The Bachelor, she’s perhaps best known amongst the general public as the contestant at the center of the infamous Bachelor in Paradise shutdown. In the wake of a rumored sexual assault on set, Olympios was the subject of 24/7 headlines and scrutiny. She previously told The Daily Beast about her experience moving on from the scandal, saying, “It was just really hard because I was trying to keep myself OK and also keep my close friends and family OK at the same time.” Asked if her Paradise hell helped her grow a thicker skin, Olympios quipped, “Girl, I have an invisible shield on at all times. I am so prepared for my world crumbling down around me, I am so fine.”
And with that, Olympios had to go—she was in the middle of a busy day, launching her Platinum cosmetics line of liquid lipsticks. But before she ran off, the soon-to-be Showtime star wanted to send Sacha Baron Cohen a warning: “I think I’m going to try to prank him one day. All I have to say to him is watch out.”
