The Funniest Joke in the World
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"The Funniest Joke in the World" is the title most frequently used for written references to a Monty Python's Flying Circus comedy sketch, which is also known by two other phrases that appear within it, "Joke Warfare" and "Killer Joke", the latter being the most commonly used spoken title used to refer to it. The premise of the sketch is that the joke is so funny that anyone who reads or hears it promptly dies from laughter.
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[edit] Broadcast
The sketch appeared in the first episode of the television show Monty Python's Flying Circus ("Whither Canada"), first shown on October 5, 1969. The sketch was later remade in a shorter version for the film And Now For Something Completely Different; it is also available on the CD-ROM game of Monty Python's The Meaning of Life.
[edit] Summary
During World War II, Ernest Scribbler, a British "manufacturer of jokes" (Michael Palin), creates "the funniest joke in the world" and promptly dies laughing. His mother (Eric Idle) reads the joke and dies. A Scotland Yard inspector (Graham Chapman) retrieves the joke, but despite somber music to create a depressing mood, also dies laughing.
The British Army test the joke on Salisbury Plain, then translate it into a German version "over 60,000 times as powerful as Britain's great pre-war joke", a reference to Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain and the Munich Agreement. The nonsensical German translation is used for the first time on 8 July 1944 in the Ardennes, causing German soldiers to fall dead from laughter:
Wenn ist das Nunstruck git und Slotermeyer? Ja! Beiherhund das Oder die Flipperwaldt gersput!
In the version of the sketch featured in And Now For Something Completely Different, another scene of the joke being tested in open warfare is shown, with Tommies running through an open field amid artillery fire shouting the joke at the Germans, who die laughing in response. Afterward, a German field hospital is shown with Germans with bandages and blood stains, laughing incessantly.
In a following scene, a British officer from the Joke Brigade (Michael Palin) has been taken prisoner and is being interrogated and tortured by Nazi Gestapo officers. The torturing is completely benign but the prisoner is eventually persuaded to recite the joke after being tickled. One of the Nazi officers (Graham Chapman) erupts in laughter and dies. The second (John Cleese) retorts "Ach! Zat iss not funny!" but then he too starts to giggle hysterically before falling dead. Another captor (Terry Gilliam) notices the two deceased officers and points his gun at Palin, who recites the joke to the captor, who is, too, killed by the joke.
The Germans attempt counter-jokes. Eventually their best joke is used in action, but proves in English to be hopelessly bad, reflecting a British perception that "Germans have no sense of humour" (see also John Cleese in a Fawlty Towers episode, "The Germans"). The British joke is laid to rest when "peace broke out" at the end of the war as countries agree to a Joke Warfare ban at the Geneva convention. The last paper copy of the joke is under a monument bearing the inscription "To the Unknown Joke".
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
- Script of the sketch, www.jumpstation.ca
