Pelosi to guest star on "30 Rock" finale

Nancy Pelosi is no stranger to television, having been featured on several political programs. However, she is about to go where few sitting politicians have ever gone: television sitcoms.

The California congresswoman, who made history as the first female Speaker of the House of Representatives during the mid-to-late 2000s, will juxtapose Tina Fey and Alec Baldwin on the series finale of NBC’s “30 Rock.” Considering Pelosi’s national image and Fey’s penchant for tongue-in-cheek political humor, this will likely be either a snoozer or a doozy of a finale. NBC, which announced the cameo Jan. 4, is keeping very tight-lipped about the matter, and Pelosi herself offered little insight into how it will play out in the statement she made the same day.

"I would do almost anything Tina Fey asks me to do. I'm flattered that they asked me to make a cameo in the series finale. I had a lot of fun."

The comedy, which portrays the daily life of a sketch comedy writer, is based on lead actress Tina Fey’s time as head writer for “Saturday Night Live.” The series has been rather adroit at sprinkling political humor into its storylines, and has seen the likes of New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, former Vice President Al Gore, and former Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice grace its set. While Pelosi was a guest judge on the reality TV series Top Chef and appeared on Comedy Central’s The Colbert Report, an unscripted competition and an off-the-cuff talk show are very different animals from a television comedy.

The universal joke appears to be "politics is easy; comedy is hard."

Ironically, though the announcement was the media world abuzz, few others have paid much to Pelosi’s jaunt onto network primetime. Though she remains House Minority Leader, and was considered by Democrats to be an important part of fiscal cliff talks, Pelosi’s stature in the House of Representatives has become increasingly marginalized since Republicans took control of the House in 2010. Despite her bombastic style having been regarded as essential to getting the Affordable Care Act passed, her more liberal allies have appeared to grativate to the even-more-bombastic Debbie Wasserman Schultz in recent years. Some see “30 Rock” finale as the swan song for both the series, and Pelosi’s own career in politics.

The greatest irony of all? The one-hour finale is set to be followed by the pilot of a new medical drama called “Do No Harm.”