Loni Love, America’s Sister opens with a performance by an African dance and drums troupe, which Loni introduces as “The Zimbabwe Village Girls.” She joins them in their energetic, joyful number and tells us, “I did that dance for my people; I’m not talking about the black people, I’m talking about the fat people.” Love has set her audience up for an assortment of food and fat gags.
“God bless the man who made the buffet,” Loni says, “I don’t want one thing, I want everything.” She is indignant that KFC (“Kentucky Fake Chicken”) is now grilling chicken and is annoyed by vegetarians (“Fat people, let’s eat all the vegetarians”). On the subject of tofu, she says, “T-o-F-U, that’s what you need to do.”
Skinny people ask her dumb questions like, “Are you gonna eat all of that?” and “I thought you were on a diet.” Love has all the right answers. Despite obesity being her bread and butter (sorry, I couldn’t resist) Loni Love doesn’t condone being fat; instead, one of the things she advises is “love yourself and try to lose weight.”
Viewers will suspect that Love is addicted to fried chicken (“I don’t need weed, I need wings, I get the munchies naturally”). In a discourse on famous fat people in history, she explains Benjamin Franklin discovered electricity so he could fry chicken. Her delivery is flawless; her expressive face accentuates everything she says.
Love is not a one-note performer. She has opinions on a multitude of subjects and puts an amusing spin on politics in particular. In explaining Barack Obama’s black and white sides, one of the examples she gives is that he travels with an entourage (white), but they ride in Cadillac Escalades (black).
An admirer of Obama (except for his dancing [white]), she speaks of his intelligence and intellectualism. “We went from a president that would make up words to a president that would make us look up words when he talked.”
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