Overthinking her role as Wonder Woman, Gal Gadot led a star-studded cover of John Lennon’s “Imagine” on Thursday that featured Sia, Norah Jones, Will Ferrell, Natalie Portman, Zoë Kravitz, and others singing along. The video arrived unprompted in the midst of a worldwide panic about the coronavirus pandemic, prompting many viewers to call the clip tone-deaf. The best take of all, though, comes in the form of another “Imagine” cover — this time by the irreplaceable comedian and actor Gilbert Gottfried.
Twitter users immediately called out the “Imagine” compilation as a gimmick from the rich who would be better off donating money than masquerading as a celebrity choir. After seeing it go viral, comedy writer Jordan VanDina reached out to Gilbert Gottfried on Cameo to see if he would film his own cover of The Beatles member’s track. It turns out Gottfried was not only down to do so, but he didn’t overthink his performance like everyone else did, too.
“Hi, this is Gilbert Gottfried!” he half-yells, half-says in the video from what looks to be the comfort of his own bed. Without wasting another second, Gottfriend then launches into “Imagine”. Instead of keeping tempo or even attempting pitch, he barges through the song, using his trademark squawky delivery to make sweet sentiments sound hilarious and the random “ooo’s” sound like a bad table reading. It will make you laugh, it will make you smile, and it will make you feel like life is its amusing, trivial, normal self again. In other words, it does everything Gal Gadot and crew’s version hoped to do but didn’t. Watch it below.
Over the brief stretch of time when Gadot and company’s video went viral, coronavirus news kept on churning. Conan O’Brien announced he’s returning with new episodes re-tooled for the current crisis, Trapt went on a racist Twitter tirade defending Trump’s coronavirus response, Cannes Film Festival was postponed indefinitely, Simon Pegg and Nick Frost made a Shaun of the Dead parody about social distancing, and Lost actor Evangeline Lilly bragged about not self-quarantining hours after her co-star Daniel Dae Kim tested positive for coronavirus.
Kim is the latest celebrity to find out he has COVID-19, joining the likes of actor Idris Elba, NBA All-Star Kevin Durant, Game of Thrones actor Kristofer Hivju, James Bond actress Olga Kurylenko, record producer Andrew Watt, Universal Music head Lucian Grainge, and the beloved Tom Hanks and his wife Rita Wilson.
Keep up with the news about coronavirus impacting TV shows, movies, tours, music festivals, and other productions by following our updated list here.
The real deal @RealGilbert helping us through this pic.twitter.com/4aAMAwBEe7
— Jon Daly (@jondaly) March 19, 2020
Imagine me singing “Imagine”, well you don’t have to imagine it. Here it is. For your own personalize video shoutout from ME, click this link: https://t.co/3pgW3Ri0tP @BookCameo https://t.co/cppUqmWllE
— Gilbert Gottfried (@RealGilbert) March 19, 2020
Gilbert Gottfried Sings “Imagine” Better Than Gal Gadot and All Those Other Celebrities: Watch
Nina Corcoran
