Party on: Capitol Steps keeps skits (and crowds) rolling

By John Benson

Long before “The Daily Show” and “Colbert Report” delved into political comedy for the masses, Capitol Steps were entertaining audiences with their song and prance productions.

These days, the Washington, D.C.-based outfit is focusing on the presidential election with skits involving Dick Cheney tutoring Sarah Palin on how to be a vice president, George W. Bush singing a rock song, Kim Jong-il performing a show tune, Vladimir Putin singing “Midnight Raid to Georgia” and the Supreme Court doing a disco.

It’s all funny stuff for this ragtag group of former Capitol Hill staffers, who got their start in the unlikeliest of ways.

“We have kind of an odd story,” said co-founder Elaina Newport, calling from Washington, D.C. “We started in 1981 at a Senate office Christmas party. We were just working for Sen. Percy from Illinois at the time, and thought we would do this once for a Christmas party and then they’d tell us to stop or maybe just fire us.

“Now 27 years later, no one has told us to stop. We’ve been pleasantly surprised over the years that the politicians themselves have let us do this and laughed and have even invited us to perform for them.”

Over the past few decades, the Capitol Steps have recorded 28 albums, been featured on NBC, CBS, ABC and PBS, and toured all 50 states. While the act boasts 30 performers, not all tour at the same time. You can see the Capitol Steps return to Youngstown on Oct. 2 at Stambaugh Auditorium.

Granted the material may have changed over the years, but the sentiment of lampooning elected officials seemingly never goes out of style.

“When something happens in the news, you can go right to our Web site [www.capsteps.com] to find out something that rhymes with it,” Newport laughed. “But it’s a constant process for us.

“I think we’ve benefited from the 24-hour news channels. Now as soon as Sarah Palin is announced, everyone knows about it. They know a few facts about her, because you do need something to quickly hang a joke on as soon as the story breaks.”

Naturally, the one risk for anyone doing political comedy is polarizing the audience with partisan material. Newport said Capitol Steps writers do their best to stay as impartial as possible.

“Throughout our history, it’s been hard to be totally 50/50 in the shows because the party in power is always funnier,” Newport said. “When Bill Clinton was in, he was hysterical, and it was hard to find Republicans quite as funny. And something that’s been true over the last eight years, especially when the Senate was Republican, they were going to be funnier because they’re in power. We try to always balance it, but during an election year it’s a little bit easier.”

For the sake of idealists out there, it is conceivable that the Capitol Steps could one day run out of jokes. Then again, considering the lion’s share of the Capitol Steps’ material comes from political missteps or idiosyncrasies, odds are the group’s future remains bright.

“You always think, ‘What if the politicians get confident and solve all the problems? What will we do?’ You usually worry about that for five minutes,” Newport laughed.

“It’s totally screwed up because we look at the news that what’s bad for the country is totally good for us. So we’re not normal people, and what we do for a living is not normal. We’re kind of like funeral directors and car repossessors, there’s always going to be this as long as people are having trouble.”