Comedy Flashback: Sacha Baron Cohen as Ali G. Leads Religion Roundtable with Rabbi Barry Freundel and Others

For years, English comedian Sacha Baron Cohen adopted the persona of Ali G, an unorthodox journalist who asks absurd and ridiculous questions to seemingly unsuspecting guests on his interview show.

After a year of doing the show in England, it came to the USA for two years. One of the episodes was a "religion roundtable" in April 2011 during which Cohen asks downright offensive questions to the four guests representing Judaism, Catholicism, and religion in general. 

They included Rabbi Barry Freundel of the Georgetown Synagogue in Washington, Dr. Francisca Cho of Georgetown University, Bobbie Kirkhart of Atheist Alliance International, and Father William Byron, a Catholic priest.

Watching the episode, it's hard to believe that these serious guests didn't realize that they were pawns in an elaborate put-on and put-down of religion for the sake of comic relief. But Cohen, as we later saw in his movie role as Borat, can be very funny.

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