It must be hard coming up with brand new speeches, day after day. As a politician, you essentially want to make the same points most of the time, to get across exactly what you stand for and to assert your (correct) opinions. But how to keep it interesting?
Well, it seems the easiest thing to do is simply to rip off other people. But not other politicians; no, that would be too obvious. Instead, you look to Hollywood for inspiration.
And the latest to do so is Sam Gyimah, the Conservative MP for East Surrey and current Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Childcare and Education, who appeared on Question Time last night and gave what seemed to be a profound statement on the recent behaviour of Donald Trump and Theresa May’s response to it saying: “It takes great bravery to stand up to your enemies, it takes even more bravery to stand up to your friends.”
Wise words Sam, except one eagle-eyed Twitter user had heard them somewhere before:
That’s right - virtually word-for-word the same as that ‘philosopher’ Albus Dumbledore. And people said he was just a big beard.
Still, while Sam may have decided to rip off Harry Potter, at least he clearly had a good knowledge of it - Scottish Labour politician Kezia Dugdale managed to get a question about it wrong on a recent episode of I’m a Celebrity.
When asked whether Voldemort’s real name was Tom Riddle or Tom Malfoy, she replied: “I think he must be a Malfoy.”
Perhaps the most unexpected piece of Hollywood plagiarism occurred via that man Trump back on May 13, when his commencement speech at Liberty University became the subject of derision when it was pointed out, by people on social media and chat show host Jimmy Fallon, that it was remarkably similar to Elle Wood’s (played by Reese Witherspoon) speech in the 2001 film Legally Blonde:
But that wasn’t even his first time, with his inauguration speech remarkably similar to that of Bane’s dialogue in The Dark Knight Rises:
And, of course, he’s not the only Trump who was called out for ripping someone else off - Melania Trump’s speech at the Republican National Convention heavily plagiarised Michelle Obama’s 2008 speech at the Democratic National Convention.
(Image: Rex)
