Clint Eastwood interviewed an empty chair Thursday night at the RNC, in a speech that took a remarkably maverick tone even without the stunt.
Punks on Twitter couldn’t believe how lucky they got. (Except Tom Brokaw.) A British correspondent tried to make sense of American Democracy. People took their own photos of empty chairs, and naturally there’s now a Twitter account for Clint’s.
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- Actor Clint Eastwood talks to an empty chair during his address to the Republican National Convention in Tampa, Fla., on Thursday, Aug. 30, 2012. (J. Scott Applewhite/AP)
More important, this was the fourth incidence of an Elijah seat on TV since the beginning of the year. Piers Morgan had one on his CNN show this month after U.S. Rep. Todd Akin canceled an appearance. Lawrence O’Donnell interviewed a chair in March, after a lawyer for George Zimmerman left the studio unexpectedly. Also on MSNBC that month, Thomas Roberts interviewed an empty chair after a guest didn’t show — and had to apologize after the network admitted it had brought her to the wrong studio.
It may be difficult for print journalists to hop on this trend, which, it should be noted, has only a 50 percent success rate. But please send examples of your own attempts. Here’s one guy who tried to capitalize on it:
This seat’s taken. OFA.BO/c2gbfi, twitter.com/BarackObama/st…
— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) August 31, 2012
Related: Fake Simpsons graphic circulates on Internet after Eastwood’s speech (The New York Times) | Debates with empty chairs an American tradition going back to at least 1920s (Smithsonian)
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