One legged Tarzan, by Beyond the Fringe contains what I think is the most clever joke in a sketch ever. Dudley Moore is a guy with one leg auditioning for the part of Tarzan, and Peter Cooke is trying to let him down easy:
Your right leg, I like. It’s a lovely leg for the role. I’ve got nothing against your right leg. The trouble is, neither have you.
Cook and Moore also performed this routine in their two-man Broadway show, Good Evening (along with other bits from Beyond the Fringe, along with original material).
Another gem from Night Court - actors portraying George Washington, Abraham Lincoln and Theodore Roosevelt are brought before the court. Harry is ready to pronounce sentence, when…
Christine: We have a separation issue to deal with, your honor. The actor playing Thomas Jefferson hasn’t sobered up yet.
Harry: A little too much Yankee Doodle Brandy, eh?
Dan: He stuck a feather down his throat and threw up macaroni.
Foster Brooks: (drunk) Have you ever been in Schenectady?
Dean Martin: No I was never in Schenectady.
Foster Brooks: Me neither, must have been two other guys.
Most of this sketch really.
The Firesign Theater bit about remembering people’s names. To the effect of:
Say you meet a woman named Dorothy Snowdon. “Dorothy” is associated with The Wizard of Oz. “Snowdon” – you picture her with a big pile of snow on her head. No matter how long it’s been since you’ve seen her, you can confidently walk up to her: “Hello, Toto Slushhead!”
Dorothy: I think he said “oil can.”
Scarecrow: Oil can what?
“Now go away or I shall fart in your general direction…”
Also a variation in “Hound of the Baskervilles” with the one-legged man wanting to apply for a job as a runner on the moors.
Ditto. It’s a fair cop.
Rent The Sunshine Boys. Learn what is the origin of brilliance. Every line.
Not sure what this says about me, but:
Farquad: Do you know the muffin man?
Gingerbread Man (fearfully): The muffin man?
Farquad: THE MUFFIN MAN!! Do you know the MUFFIN MAN who lives on DRURY LANE?!?
Professor Fate: Escaped!?
General Kushter: With a small friar.
Professor Fate: Leslie escaped with a chicken?!?
No, it isn’t.
From Start the Revolution without Me:
Duke d’Escargot: What brings you to Paris?
Claude: Oh, you might say a little business…
Charles: …and a little pleasure.
Duke d’Escargot: Which do you prefer? Business, or pleasure?
Charles: Well, that depends on what you regard as business.
Claude: And, what you may regard as pleasure!
Duke d’Escargot: In Paris, we say business is pleasure.
Charles: And to us, pleasure is our business.
Duke d’Escargot: Then your business should be a pleasure, making my pleasure a business.
**Claude: **Unless some mistake business for pleasure. While others know no business but pleasure.
**Duke d’Escargot: **In that case, sir, I will show you my business.
Claude: My pleasure.
This should be a classic among animated films:
Don Lino: I tell you what’s what, and what?
Sykes: What?
Don Lino: What what?
Sykes: What what nothin’. You said what first.
Don Lino: I didn’t say what first.
Sykes: You said "and then what?’ and I said "what?’
Don Lino: No, I said “What, what?” as in “What, what?”
[pause]
Sykes: …You said what first.
From the Three Stooges’ short “Studio Stoops”:
(Shemp has fallen out a window in a tall building and is hanging for dear life to a telephone cord. Moe sends Larry out of the room after a rope.)
Larry [Mindful of the bad guys]: Hey–you oughta bolt that door in case our adversaries come back!
Moe: Yeah…(a beat) adversaries?
L: Yeah.
M: When did you get so smart?
L: Oh, I’ve been smart all along but you didn’t know it. Hey–when I come back, I’ll give you the password!
M: Brilliant. What* is* the password?
L:* (Pausing)* “Open the door.”
(Moe slaps Larry.)
I had in mind something else from the same pair. They did a series called The Games; a mockumentary about the organizing of the Sydney Olympics. They’re (John and Bryan) meeting with the contractor (Mr. Wilson) who built the running track in the stadium.
JOHN: Mr Wilson, have you measured the 100-metre track?
MR WILSON: Yes, of course.
JOHN: Well, let me ask you, how long is it?
MR WILSON: How long is the 100-metre track?
JOHN: Yes.
MR WILSON: It’s a 100-metre track.
JOHN: I know what it is, Mr Wilson. I’m asking you how long it is.
MR WILSON: It’s about 100 metres long.
…
JOHN: But what you’re telling me is the 100-metre track is about 100 metres long.
MR WILSON: Slightly different arrangement, the 100-metre track.
JOHN: Is a metre a slightly different concept in the 100 metres as against the 200?
MR WILSON: No.
JOHN: I don’t understand then, Mr Wilson, quite why in the construction of a 100-metre track you would want to depart too radically from the constraints laid down for us by the conventional calibration of distance.
…
JOHN: Mr Wilson. Do you know who is the current 100 metres all-comers Australian record holder?
MR WILSON: Can I guess?
JOHN: There’s not much point in guessing, Mr Wilson.
MR WILSON: Is he an African American?
JOHN: He’s not an African American, no.
MR WILSON: Is he that Canadian from Jamaica?
JOHN: No, he’s not a Canadian from Jamaica.
MR WILSON: I give up.
JOHN: The 100-metre record in this country, Mr Wilson, is currently held by Bryan.
MR WILSON: Bryan?
BRYAN: Yes.
(Mr Wilson extends his hand)
MR WILSON: Congratulations.
BRYAN: Thank you.
JOHN: A new mark, Mr Wilson, set at a blistering session last Wednesday. I wish you’d been there. We were down there and we had a bet.
MR WILSON: Was this wind assisted?
JOHN: No, and we’d had a couple, and in my view, Bryan is not in quite the nick he was in the same stage of last season.
(Mr Wilson considers the position)
MR WILSON: So you’ve measured the track?
JOHN: Yes, we’ve measured the track, Mr Wilson.
MR WILSON: So you know how long the 100-metre track is?
JOHN: Yes, we do.
MR WILSON: Okay.
JOHN: How long is it, Mr Wilson?
MR WILSON: You know how long it is.
JOHN: I want to hear you say it.
MR WILSON: Ninety-four metres.
Brilliant show. The full script for that episode is here. (warning: .pdf)
I’ll start off with Pronoun Trouble from “Rabbit Seasoning”.
And then, for your consideration, I submit The Dead Parrot Sketch
I hate when I click “post reply” too soon
A pair of Yugoslavian recidivists make their 3rd appearance on Night Court.
Howard and Raj double team Sheldon
Brian: Alright, I am the messiah…
Multitude: Ahh
Brian: Now FUCK OFF!
(pause)
Man: How shall we fuck off, oh Lord?
Who’s on First? because it is an all-time classic.
That said, Tim Conway’s ‘siamese elephants’ routine on the Carol Burnett Show (available on youtube) reduces me (and the cast) to hysterics every time I watch it.