"Life on the D-List": Kathy Griffin's Back, Emmy in Hand and Still Biting the Hand That Feeds It

 

Cable TV’s favorite frenemy is back! Kathy Griffin is living Life on the D-Listfor a fourth season on Bravo (10 p.m. ET Thursdays).

But something is off. Instead of judging dog fashion shows and getting booted off red-carpet jobs, Griffin now is seen in Times Square aboard the CNN platform, co-hosting New Year’s Eve 2007 with Anderson Cooper. She’s a headliner at the Producers’ Guild Awards, with megabillionaire Steve Wozniak as her arm-candy. And she’s never less than impeccably coiffed and heavily lacquered with glossy lips and Lucy-esque high eyebrows.

Whattup, Kath? Have you gone A-list on us?

Not quite. She still maintains that she’s been blacklisted from A-list guest shots on all the major network talk shows, even after winning a 2007 Emmy for best reality show. And the Woz, while being a high-profile date, turns out to be the super-nerd with no pop culture acumen. He gets none of Griffin’s references. She speaks Hollywood; he hears Charlie Brown’s teacher going “wahWAHwah.”

That Emmy, by the way, co-stars on the season opener of D-List. She wags it around like a puppy and plonks it in front of Wozniak when he comes over to meet Griffin’s widowed mom (who’s still pouring wine from a box and begging her daughter to stop saying “Suck it, Jesus”).

Griffin’s poor-me act is a little harder to buy now as aerial cameras sweep over her Los Angeles home, cantilevered off a hillside like a crashed UFO. She rides in limos and gets free gowns via ubiquitous celebrity stylist Robert Verdi.

If this is D-list, where does the line start?

Lots of stars are D-lister than Griffin. By blowing up the inside secrets of the tabloids’ favorite celebrities, and sharing them with her audience like a rejected cheerleader gossiping at a slumber party, Griffin has risen above some of her A-list targets—including Paris Hilton, Nicole Richie, Lindsay Lohan and even Brit-Brit. Working harder than they do and staying sober helps. She’s also damn funny. But if there are fewer quotables on the Bravo show it’s because Griffin seems to be working too hard at seeming spontaneous. It feels as scripted as The Hills.

Getting bigger laughs (the hard way) are Griffin’s trio of helpers, Jessica, Tom and Tiffany. On New Year’s, as their boss quips alongside Anderson Cooper, they play a drinking game. Every time Griffin calls Cooper “Andy,” they do a shot. Five Andys later, Jessica is bombed, stumbling back to the hotel muttering “five shots too many, five shots too many.”

One season too many is how this round of D-List feels. We love Griffin…but the act is starting to grow stale. Now about Jessica….how about Life as a D-List Assistant? Bet SHE has some stories.