Possibly the most tasteless joke ever was told by a comedian (sorry, I don’t remember which) on British TV:
“You know, I lost an uncle at Auschwitz.”
[Gasps and moans of sympathy from the audience. Then:]
“The dumb arse got drunk and fell out of a guard tower.”
I can never understand women.
I was at a Rodney Dangerfield show once. He was killing it, rapid fire. Then at one point he said, “It’s not easy being me…”. To which I yelled out, “How not easy is it?” He stopped, flummoxed, and the audience roared.
That’s one of my favorite lines in any movie. Until he said that, Rodney seemed a harmless, lovable buffoon. But we’re quickly reminded that you don’t stiff a Chicago real estate developer.
Speaking of old Vaudeville jokes:
"Tragedy is ME stubbing my toe,
comedy is YOU falling into an open sewer and dying."
What’s worse than biting into an apple and seeing half a worm?
The Holocaust
I’ve seen varioius histories and retrospectives of different game shows, but has anyone gone through the archives to find when that started on Match Game?
Was he from Chicago? I don’t know where Caddyshack was set (shot in Florida, I think), but I remember references to Al Czervik’s real estate developments being nearby.
Now that you mention it, there is no explicit location mentioned. I always thought it was set in suburban Chicago, possibly because Ramis and Bill Murry were from there.
Based on the scene at the marina, it’s near some large body of water. Doesn’t look like Lake Michigan to me, but I don’t know the Chicago waterfront very well.
I think it was first used in the 1970s iteration of the show, probably '73, when it started getting raunchy. I don’t remember hearing it in the '60s.
Of course, Carson had been using it for years as a setup:
“It was really cold today.”
“How cold was it?”
“It was so cold people were jumping into burning buildings”
Yes, I associate it with Carson, though that doesn’t mean he’s the only or even the first to do it.
I try to imply it whenever someone tells me a Polish joke — in that I chuckle amiably before asking, in a just-between-us tone, hey, did I ever tell you about the smartest Polish woman I ever met?
“Heh, no,” is usually the expectant reply.
“Well, she’s a lot smarter than me,” I explain.
This has never once gotten a laugh from the person I’m talking to, but tends to get a pretty good response from bystanders.
My favorite bit is from Airplane II
I read his books, and they made me chuckle.
Danny Kaye didnt do topical, his comedy is timeless. Bob Hope did very topical.
I tried to watch re-runs of Laugh In. They werent funny to me today- too topical.
I watched som Bob Hope comedy Specials, plus some clicks from his USO shows. His jokes at the USO show were mostly “you gotta be there”. OTOH, his Road films with Bing are hilarious. You havent seen any?
I thought they were funny, but not when they tried too hard.
Yep. Too topical to be funny today. But they were funny then, really. GIs said his USO shows were great.
And for that he should be remembered.
It had only one funny bit I remember- saying “shsst” to the doors to make them open- instead of the doors going shsst when they opened.
Spaceballs was horrible. Men in Tights had a few good lines " Because, unlike some other Robin Hoods, I can speak with an English accent." oohh snap!
Today his political views would almost be Liberal.
The conservative comedian spoke out for gay rights and gun control, and got boycotted and ostracized by friends on the right, including Ronald Reagan.…After a few months of this, the religious right boycotted him. “The Associated Press reported that comedian Bob Hope had been asked by Texaco to stop making jokes about me and ‘gay’ liberation,”… Hope didn’t mention his daughter, but he emphasized his firm support of gay rights. “We’re all entitled to our own sexual habits,” he said.
> I believe what these people do behind closed doors is their business…. Most of us today are aware of Anita Bryant’s stand on homosexuals…. I still think jobs should be based on talent, not whether a person is homosexual or heterosexual.
I found out that “Laugh-In” was airing a few years ago on one of the nostalgia channels. I Tivo’ed an episode, and shut it off before the first commercial because I just found it incredibly boring.
I don’t find Fatty Arbuckle’s brand of “humor”, which mainly consisted of falling down in a certain manner, funny either, not in itself.
Someone else who thought “Spaceballs” wasn’t funny either!
The concept’s great. The execution, not so much.
Also, Robin Hood explaining to the Sheriff of Nottingham that he had been away, fighting the Crusades with Richard III in the Holy Land. “My father couldn’t get me into the National Guard”.
My favorite Stooge bit was when they were down and out, and Moe points out to Curly a “Help Wanted” sign. Curly: “I ain’t smokin’!”
In one of the episodes where the Stooges were in the Old West, there was a wanted poster:
Wanted for Vagrancy
Reward: 50 Cents Each
Three for a Dollar
Spaceballs and Men In Tights are parodies, and they’re all about the jokes. IMHO some of the jokes are good ones, and some are bad in an enjoyable way. But different people have different senses of humor, and if you don’t find them funny, there’s not much reason otherwise to watch the movies.
Blazing Saddles, by contrast, is about something. It and Young Frankenstein (which is as much a Gene Wilder film as a Mel Brooks one) have storylines that are more than just an excuse for jokes, and have interesting performances and filmmaking.