notTilda gets all a-Twitter

SMALL PRINT:THERE COMES A point with celebrity where the parody is better than the real thing. This week, a Twitter account that flooded timelines was @NotTildaSwinton, depicting the Oscar-winning British actress as an otherworldly entity spouting existential philosophical tweets.

“When I spent time at the scale of an ant, I learned the lack of correlation between size and majesty. Have you climbed a blade of grass?” she mused yesterday afternoon, shortly after proclaiming, “I kick a pebble from a mountaintop. It becomes an avalanche. I soar to the village beneath, and help them flee, both devil and savior.”

Swinton, with her unusual relationship arrangements and striking anti-Hollywood looks, has always seemed like a bit of an outsider, but this parody account plunges into hidden depths even she didn’t know she had.

Appropriating a name and projecting an image on to it is nothing new, but it can often completely change the perception of the real-life personality. No doubt Craig David still shudders at Leigh Francis’s Bo Selecta! depiction of him as a kestrel-carrying northerner. Tina Fey was widely accredited with undermining Sarah Palin’s political career. Oliver Callan was criticised for going too far with his cross-dressing Enda Kenny, while Mario Rosenstock continues his reign of dropping Irish personalities into surrealist situations that somehow make sense - Declan Ganley as Batman being the latest genius stroke.

But Twitter somehow manages to take satire to another level, probably because so many celebrities have opened up in person on the site, presenting exaggerated versions of themselves online.

Rihanna’s real-life account is like a parody of her pot-smoking, pouting antics, and Rupert Murdoch’s grumpy apocalyptic ramblings beat any potential satire. @NotTildaSwinton is at the top of her game in the world of Twitter’s surrealist celebrity satire.

And all of a sudden, I’m beginning to think that’s what the real Tilda Swinton is actually like.