Justin: What’s so funny about being a Minnesotan?

Minnesotans are back to being a punchline.

Tim Walz’s ascent into the national spotlight has given late-night TV an excuse to poke fun at the folksy nature of our governor and his constituents.

For the last two episodes of “Saturday Night Live,” Jim Gaffigan has played the vice-presidential candidate as a guy who’s over the moon about a deal on a leaf blower at Menards. Andy Richter’s portrayal of Walz on “Jimmy Kimmel Live” found him taking time from the campaign trail to fix a clogged toilet at the home of Mike Lindell’s mom.

Stephen Colbert recently invited two of his Midwestern-raised staff members to explain our mysterious ways. They bragged about the Paul Bunyan statues, 10,000 lakes and Spam.

“Adding green peas to casserole makes you a registered sex offender,” said head writer Ariel Dumas, who grew up in Minnesota, leaning into the same exaggerated accent she used eight years ago in a verbal showdown with Duluth native Maria Bamford.

A lot of these digs have been pretty funny — unless you’ve got a thin skin. If you’re one of those people, this is the worst trend since the Coen brothers, those rascals from St. Louis Park, betrayed us with their film, “Fargo.”

“Here’s our screwed-up sensibility about that,” said Stevie Ray, co-founder of Stevie Ray’s Comedy Cabaret in Chanhassen. ”It’s a movie about kidnapping, murder, extortion and putting someone through a wood chipper and what are we the most upset about? Making fun of the way we talk.”

Twenty-eight years since its release, the Oscar-winning film still resonates with Americans who think of Minnesota as the land where moose can become mayors.

“All the people down South have just as many stereotypes as we have about them,” said Ray, who recently gave a keynote speech in Alabama. “I just tell them that they can consider ‘Fargo’ a documentary.”

Most audience members at the Cabaret’s improv-driven shows are more than happy to contribute to the ribbing.

During a recurring bit that plays off Jeff Foxworthy’s “You Know You’re a Redneck” routine, at least one spectator at every show will request the cast do a take on “You Know You’re a Minnesotan” or “You Know You’re a Vikings Fan.”

“Nobody laughs harder at Minnesotans than Minnesotans,” Ray said.

The trick is not to make us look stupid.

A crowd favorite during the holiday shows at Brave New Workshop, our version of “Saturday Night Live,” is an irreverent version of “The 12 Days of Christmas” with Lauren Anderson anchoring the antics as Minnesota Mom. The character is full of Christmas spirit as well as intelligence.

“We may sound slack-jawed, but we pride ourselves on our education,” said Anderson, who is celebrating her 20th year with the downtown Minneapolis troupe. “When I watch Hollywood make us sound as hokey as possible and not smart, that bothers me.”

For the most part, jokes about Walz seem to be getting it right. Both Gaffigan and Richter portray him as cheerful, but far from clueless.

That’s also the tack taken by Anderson’s castmate, Doug Neithercott, who does a Walz impersonation in the company’s current production, “No Country for Two Old Men.”

“You try to play both sides of the coin,” said Neithercott, who joined BNW in 2018. ”You want to poke fun a little bit, but you also want to raise the audience up.”

One of the reasons James Adomian’s impression of Lindell has been a mainstay of “Jimmy Kimmel Live” for three years is that the comedian brings several layers to the role.

“In terms of his facial expressions, I try to mimic that grimace that he has,” Adomian told the Star Tribune in 2021. “At the same time, he’s very happy about his pillow. Once you wind him up, he doesn’t stop talking. He keeps going, even if he doesn’t know what he’s going to say next.”

Kimmel’s show gets bonus points for tossing in local references to Hüsker Dü and our State Fair whenever they send up Minnesota. Those jokes may not have completely landed with outsiders, but it shows that the writers did their homework

Tom Reed, a local actor who specializes in Minnesotans, is a fan of Gaffigan’s Walz on “SNL.”

“He really leaned into the dad and coach part of his personality, this high-energy cheerleader,” said Reed, starring in “Scotland, PA” at Theater Latté Da in Minneapolis. “Walz can sometimes be a parody of himself.”

Reed, who grew up in a small town near Fargo, said the danger is basing too much of an impersonation on Frances McDormand’s Marge Gunderson.

“I would say to an actor, watch five minutes of ‘Fargo’ and then dial it back 40 percent,” he said. “Maybe 200 percent.”

If you really want to capture us, Reed advises, be a little duplicitous.

“Earnestness is an important facet of how we communicate, but also try to find little moments of danger while you’re being as sweet as maple syrup,” he said. “If you want to go to the next level, have some fun with folksy sayings when what you really mean is ‘Get out of my house.’”