Zachary Levi completes his loser arc by inevitably endorsing Trump for President
It would appear the actor got tired of pretending to be something he's not (which is ironic, since that's literally what he does for a living).
In a bid to rival the conservative assholishness of his former Chuck co-star Adam Baldwin, actor and prolific mega-flop headliner Zachary Levi has publicly announced his support for Donald Trump in the 2024 presidential election.
Going full mask-off in confirming what most had suspected for years about his politics, the Harold and the Purple Crayon “star” has accelerated from his erstwhile endorsement of brainworm-riddled, anti-vaxxer madman Robert F. Kennedy Jr., to flat out embracing Trump as what he refers to as the best of “the two options we have”.
In sharing this opinion unambiguously in a public forum, Levi has essentially reenacted in reality that famous meme of his character from Tangled, which he will ironically probably never voice again because of this.1
Appearing on stage at the Ford Community & Performing Arts Centre in Dearborn, Michigan, the typically jittery, overly genial, quietly desperate used-car salesman energy Levi exhibits at any given time was out in full force, as he introduced the panel with RFK Jr. and Tulsi Gabbard he was there to act as moderator for, taking on the only acting job he’s any good for anymore. All three were there as part of Team Trump’s so-called Reclaim America Tour, in an effort to spread the unholy gospel that Trump is somehow worth getting into the White House for a second godforsaken term.
The following clip of Levi’s introduction to the panel is taken from the livestream of the event, hosted on RFK Jr.’s YouTube channel, but which is included here so you don’t have to give that Central-Park-bear-cub-corpse-dumping lunatic any AdSense revenue with your views.
(Yes, this is the best the video quality gets, low-bitrate artefacting and all.)
It is a sad, hollow harkening to Levi’s halcyon days of hosting panels at San Diego Comic-Con, back when he had nerd culture credibility to cash in with audiences who still liked him. Now he’s reduced to awkwardly coming out onstage to the strains of Bachman-Turner Overdrive’s ‘Taking Care of Business’ playing him on, while feeble applause ushers him in.
Naturally, he brings up being Shazam, but nobody laughs, cheers, or claps for the reference (because how many Trump supporters would even know or care?), and you can see him die a little on the inside at the newest micro-humiliation he has to swallow to keep going.
Stretching his range farther than Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel ever prepared him for, Levi’s actings chops were considerably challenged by the need to spout such bullshit with a straight face, but in a weaselly attempt to burnish his support for Trump with juuuuust a little bit of distance to keep an unconvincing semblance of plausible deniability should the election not go his way, eagle-eyed/sharp-eared viewers will have noted how Levi says:
“I stand with Bobby [Kennedy Jr.], and I stand with Tulsi [Gabbard], and I stand with everyone else who is standing with President Trump.”
The distinction between saying “I stand with Trump” and “I stand with the people who stand with Trump” is nebulous at best, but one can discern from that slyly dissociative wording that Levi is too spineless to even fully commit to his right-wing loyalties with his whole chest, as he semantically puts Kennedy Jr. and Gabbard between himself and Trump, like a cushion meant to superficially divide occupants from sitting too close to each other on a couch. (Uh oh! Don’t mention couches three times, or J.D. Vance will appear like a divan-diddling Beetlejuice!)
There are many displays of cringeworthy audience interactions, not to mention flagrant hypocritical fuckery afoot in the various things said by Spy Kids: Armageddon’s Zachary Levi in his opening monologue. To begin with, he asks the captive audience:
“Do me a favour really quick. A little unorthodox, but turn to the person next to you, and say, ‘hey, I’m really glad that you’re alive, and I’m really glad that you’re here right now.’ Just do that real quick.
[*audience chattering as they do that for a few moments*]
“That’s called love, and that’s called unity, right? We’re here for unity, right? We’re here to make sure that we value every single person. Every single person. Whether you’re a Democrat, whether you’re a Republican, whether you’re a Libertarian, an Independent, every single one of us is a child of God, every single one of us is deserving of being seen and heard and loved and valued.”
A nice sentiment.
Too bad it’s an absolute crock of horse shit, especially coming from the camp that’s on the side of DONALD. Goddamn. Motherfucking. TRUMP.
The audacity of this man!
He may hate The Rock for robbing him of his chances to have Shazam and Black Adam fight on-screen, but that doesn’t mean Levi has been living under a rock all these years.
Did Levi forget, or is he just self-servingly willing to ignore, the years and years and years and years AND YEARS AND YEARS worth of infinite examples of both the Republican party in general, and Donald Trump in particular, being LITERALLY ANYTHING BUT PILLARS OF UNITY?
He can’t seriously believe this ‘Kumbaya, My Lord’ codswallop he’s preaching, right? Is he seriously trying to peddle this naive notion of non-partisan togetherness and collaboration being possible with Trump and the right-wing?
“Every single one of us is a child of God”, huh? “Every single one of us is deserving of being seen and heard and loved and valued”, right?
Okay, Mr. Preacher-Man! Then explain to me like I’m five years old how you can say that about Robert F. Kennedy Jr., when his staunch anti-vaccine rhetoric has likely put so many people’s lives at risk before, during, and after COVID?
How can you say that about Donald Trump, when - just to name a few examples out of fucking thousands we don’t have the time to go into - he documentedly palled around with Jeffrey Epstein; called all Mexicans rapists; told his followers while he was President to try injecting bleach to beat the coronavirus that his terrible leadership allowed to spread unimpeded in the first place; and got the police to violently disperse and tear-gas peaceful protestors, just so he could have a photoshoot in front of a church while he held a copy of the Bible upside down?
How can you say that, Zachary, about the Republican party as a whole, when all they ever do is impede societal progress at every turn by blocking legislative bills meant to introduce real change, hire corrupt judges for the Supreme Court, gerrymander their way into hoarding more power, impose their conservative beliefs onto women’s rights to choose what they do with their own bodies, dehumanise and vilify trans people, and allow the proliferation of guns across America that allow multiple mass shootings and multiple massacres of children to happen all the goddamn time? You think the party that’s bought and paid for by the NRA, and who had no interest in using their power and policy decisions to ensure another Sandy Hook massacre never took place again, really values the lives of anyone but themselves?
Oh! And I almost forgot, Zach - and maybe you did, too - so let me refresh your memory: REMEMBER JANUARY 6TH, ZACHARY? REMEMBER TRUMP GOT IMPEACHED TWICE, ZACHARY? REMEMBER TRUMP IS OFFICIALLY A CONVICTED FELON, AND THE FIRST FORMER PRESIDENT TO EVER BE CONVICTED OF MULTIPLE COUNTS OF A CRIME, ZACHARY?
That’s who you’re throwing your weight behind, even in your aforementioned half-heartedly cowardly manner of really just supporting Trump by-proxy of RFK Jr., your previous presidential pick?
Bitch, please.
Just this year, Levi published a memoir entitled Radical Love: Learning to Accept Yourself and Others.
As a vocal proponent of prioritising mental health, and talking about his struggles therein, Levi should’ve stayed in that worthwhile lane.
But that subtitle’s addendum about “accepting others”?
NEWSFLASH, SHAZAM! THE POLITICAL PARTY YOU’RE PROMOTING IS NOT ABOUT “ACCEPTING OTHERS”! IN FACT, THEY’RE THE ONES WHO ARE MOST KNOWN FOR DESPISING ANYONE THEY DEEM AS AN “OTHER”! DO THEY EVER TRULY ACCEPT PEOPLE OF COLOUR, OR LGBTQ+ PEOPLE, OR THE RIGHTS OF WOMEN, OR IMMIGRANTS, OR ANYONE THAT ISN’T RICH, WHITE, STRAIGHT, MALE, AND/OR EVANGELICALLY CHRISTIAN, ZACHARY?
NO?
THEN THAT GOES AGAINST WHAT YOU CLAIMED TO BELIEVE IN, DOES IT NOT?
Congratulations, Zachary Levi! You’re everything people always say Chris Pratt is (and may one day still fully become, though one hopes he doesn’t)!
You’re the new Scott Baio!
You’ve made yourself a laughing stock of your own volition, and no amount of milquetoast preachy pandering to a supposed shared humanity among those with different political beliefs can cover up how much you reek of hypocrisy, stupidity, and pitiful boot-licking subservience.
In related news:
The cast and crew at Smosh are said to be collectively screaming into pillows and/or the void at yet again having another old guest on their channels fall afoul of the Guest Star Curse.
Levi was once a guest on Try Not To Laugh #18 back when he was promoting the first Shazam! in 2019, and with this “cancellation” of his reputation (as he will undoubtedly refer to it any day now, per the predictable lexicon of the right-wing), Levi joins the ranks of other Smosh guests who sooner or later got “cancelled”, such as Gus Johnson, Ned Fulmer, CallMeCarson, The Completionist, and even Chris Pratt at one point.
Smosh’s founders and owners, Ian Hecox and Anthony Padilla, are alleged to be waiting with baited breath for when this new addition to the Guest Star Curse pantheon gets worked into a joke for the next Try Not To Laugh episode that’s to be filmed after this news broke.
More on this as it develops…
(Then again, outspoken conservative James Woods has continued getting Disney-affiliated work voicing his Hades character from Hercules in various video games, even as recently as 2019’s Kingdom Hearts III, and 2023’s Disney Speedstorm, so maybe Levi won’t face the fate of someone like Gina Carano getting cast out from the Mouse House for stupid, harmful, right-wing beliefs.)
I do think you can keep getting work in Hollywood as a Trump supporter as long as you're not a tremendous asshole. See: Dennis Quaid. (For now).
James Woods is such a great performer, but his ring-wing allegiance is probably a problem compounded by his relentless obnoxiousness. People like him and Gina Carano do themselves no favors by being the Person You Didn't Want To Come To The Party But They Came Anyway.
Fromtheyardtothearthouse.substack.com