h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I fully support RiffRaff's choice of Denis Leary. Now there's an American who can be critical about his country. And his clips for MTV were absolutely hilarious sometimes, even if he made fun of some of my favourite artists at least he did it in style...

And by the way : 'Why a duck ?' Or has everybody forgotten about Groucho ?

TM.

Phil Hartman and Alanis- CANADIAN!!!!!!!!!

Uhm.. Would I be teetering on the edge of insanity or just plunging in head first if I mentioned Steve Allen?

The Americans almost had Red Dwarf.. I've seen NBC's pilot for an American version of the series..... the best thing in it is Kryten, and that's probably because they used the same actor as the UK series (Robert Llewellyn). It didn't raise a smile once. With anyone I've shown it to. And I'm told it's the better of the two pilots that were shot.

I never saw even a hint of it.

Oh well.. I'd still much rather see the original.. I'm relatively sure that Canada shows it...

America does need to import its humor, with the exception of Janeane Garofalo and Kathy Griffin, because Denis Leary is acting in movies now, Steven Wright has gotten stale, and Bill Hicks is no longer alive. If Bill had been appreciated here, where the damn standards-and-practices automatons are so afraid to offend people they silence anyone with a brain, he might not have had to spend most of his last few years in the UK. And what goes over as humor for black audiences in the States is both better and more insulting than what is produced with a white cast and directors. If we had just one Lenny Henry for all the Tommy Davidsons and Martin Lawrences we have here, it would be a hell of a better place. The US needs to import humour simply because our media haven't any appreciation for the ironic and absurd, and no skill to craft good product.

Are we restricting ourselves to living and working comedians or can we include the dead and gone as well...? Because ThEn I think we should include Lenny Bruce to the list. Oh Yes, definitely...

And Eddie Murphy but only live on stage(does he still do comedy in the U.S.?).

And I would just like to say that good humor never dies so Steve is still quite allright. The problem is probably that americans have heard or seen it so often that you know part of his act by heart. Believe me there is nothing stale in 'Why are there no Class-B batteries ?' when you hear it for the first time

TM.

His jokes change about every four to eight years.

I've seen worse Anonymouse !!

Heh.. So have I... but then, that's just me.

I've seen people from both sides of the pond who are popularized as great entertainers whom I personally think stink. I'm sure some that you would voice the same opinion of some I like. Can you say 'Individual' ?

No, that I can only BE

And yes I agree, as soon as these guys hit the mainstream/moneyflow they almost always get worse. That's why I hate it when someone already knows the artists when I tell them about them...
Fortunately Steve Wright is still quite unknown here in the Netherlands, hope that lasts a little while...

Then again there is Freek de Jonge(abroad Freak the Young). As soon as I have the time I'll post some of his stuff and boy you can bet your life that it's a whole lot tougher than the stuff we see from the states. Even in England they don't have these kind of guys. He tried a tour there but his humor was just to weird, can you imagine that...!!!

CUL8ER,

TM.

er... aren't Trey Parker and Matt Stone Canadians?

I live in the UK, and was a great fan of MASH. Then I saw it in it's original American version on satellite and hated it immediately. The difference - The American version had a "laugh track" surgically inserted because Americans, apparently, are too dumb to work out for themselves which bits are funny, which ironic and which just plain sad. (Repeat those last three words for my opinion of the US sense of humor - "Frasier"'s all right, though...)

O.K. I have the time now...

Good evening ladies and gentlemen and welcome to our show here in Vietnam, we must say you're a very nice audience, in fact you're one of the nicest audiences we ever performed for.
I asked the president if I could go to Vietnam and he said 'Why not, we've tried everything else'. Last year the government sent you Bob Hope but this year we're here to tell you there's no more hope.
This show is fully sponsored by the Mafia and the CocaCola Company, 'War goes better with Coke'.
We are here in this show with Jane Fonda, and in style 'we sing the hits while she shows her tits'. Spies told me there are about 50 Vietcong soldiers somewhere among the audience but Don't You Worry, they're only here for two things ; Jane Fonda.

We are here because tomorrow you have to go out and shoot at everything you see move and I want to ask you as a human being 'Please don't shoot at animals'. Yes you will have to go and kill Steve, kill John and kill Roy...and maybe you'll be wounded or killed, or even worse. And that's why I want to sing you one of my favourite songs no let me tell it IS my favourite song because I only have one song...

*music sets in, etcetera*

Excerpts :
You are a most fantastic woman
but there is something something in your steps
that make me feel a little housemouse
I love cheese but I hate traps

You are reading(Yes you are reading)
Kama Sutra(Winnie the Pooh)
but there is something something in your looks
etc. etc.


TM.

'Sunny Afternoon' was a big hit and if you were at the beach it was way too hot for ice. If you left the icecart with a 25 cent icecream you'd arrive with a 10 cent icecream. I left the vendor with 15 cent icecreams.. I was followed by a trail of burned sunbathers who had just received a small but cold token of appreciation from me. The last bit I dropped on the back of a German who had fortunately left his leftleg at Stalingrad...Only later did you get prepackaged ice...

How close is that to Steve W. ?

TM.

When John Denber said 'Let's get high tonight everybody !!' I doubt if he was referring to reefers...

Sorry, Denver ofcourse.

TM(I'm leeaavvviiinnnnggggg on a Jetplane...hols are almost here...)

Most of the error regarding the insertion of a laugh track is on the side of the production, not the audience. The people who test programmes underestimate the intelligence of their audience, and when they produce unfunny product, they have to compensate by telling the audience what was supposed to be funny. What's really unfortunate is when a show is filmed with a studio audience and even they are cued for laughter, cheering, etc. When a small portion of the entire country decides what the nation, and now the world, sees of America, it's bound to have some flaws. That's not to excuse the results, merely a possible explanation.

The laugh track is both bogus and sad, but it is meant to simulate a live audience in MASH. The tradition was for all shows to have a live audience. But, as executives always will, they blew the idea out of proportion. When the show was unfunny, they would add canned laughter to replace what the real audience wouldn't give them. Then they started cajoling the audience into doing what they wanted with the flashing "laughter" light above the stage. And finally, they cut the audience completely out of the picture, and had only canned laughter. This is what they had on MASH. Don't mistake the American people for being too stupid to get the funny parts. The stupidity is all on the shoulders of the studio executives. But then again, only the truly imbecilic can rise to executive level.

I have actually met some Americans who are so thrown by a BBC-standard accent or even a Frasier-like vocabulary that they cannot understand what's being said, much less the humor. They are the ones who dominate focus groups, on whom programming is tested. As an aside, I believe "Frasier" the show became successful simply because of that stupid dog, Daphne's tight outfits, and the familiarity of Frasier as an established character from "Cheers"--none of which involves brilliant dialogue or contrived situations.