All language subtitles for Episode 07 Making Fun

Is there a difference
between parody and satire?

I mean, obviously parody is -- man!

I don't know.

Well...

You know, Jerry, my brother,

and Jim Abrahams always
have an answer for that.

I think of...

I don't know.

Go look it up in the dictionary.

I'm sure they have wonderful,

better descriptions of what the word is.

Parody is essentially a take-off.

Parody is like what
"Weird" Al Yankovic goes.

I think we're done here.

Oh, hold on one second.
Satire is hard.

Satire is a more serious

an intensive form of comic derision.

Satire is humor with a moral purpose.

Making fun of things
so that they might get better.

You are trying to make a social point.

To me, good satire is...

The greatest weapon against assholes.

And, you know, the world
is full of assholes.

This is Captain James T. Kirk
of the Starship Enterprise.

Identify yourself.

"SNL" does parody all the time.

Name a cartoon, they trade in it.

"Lord of the Rings."

Name a late-night talk show,

they trade in it.
Why?

Because it's common reference.

Like, we all know
the thing they're parodying.

Parody is very much taking
something that we recognize,

a song that everybody knows,
a movie that everybody knows.

It's a very grand tradition
of taking known forms

and skewing them just enough
to make a comment about them.

O'Brien: In "Your Show of Shows"
in the 1950s,

they were parodying things that people knew,

like the famous kissing scene
in "From Here to Eternity."

Everybody in America had seen that movie.

It was something that
everybody could relate to.

And then everyone feels like,

"Yes, we're all in this together."

When we did a takeoff
on "Gone With the Wind,"

the younger audience didn't know
the original movie.

For those who did know the movie,

it was a double whammy.

That gown is gorgeous!

Thank you, I saw it in the window,

and I just couldn't resist it.

Parody tends to make me laugh harder,

but satire tends to make me
go, "Ooh, that's good."

That's 11 votes for Amy Schumer

not hot enough for television.

Is anybody voting the other way?

Reiner: Amy Schumer did a piece
about "12 Angry Men."

That's a great gem piece of satire.

You look at people who just get it.

They get what it is,

and they don't try to make it too big,

they don't try to go too broad with it.

They just stay a little close to the bone

and just twist it a little bit.

It's an undisputed fact
that a woman's value

is mostly determined by her looks.

As it should be.

The verdict is in.

The jury agreed that they would bang you.

Yes!

You're hot enough for basic cable television.

Thank you, Your Honor!
Thank you so much!

You earn the right to be
transgressive by being funny --

really funny, and then making sure

that you're not making fun of the victims.

Satire is comedy aimed at the powerful.

Is that who I think it is?

Uh, yes, that's
Adolf Hitler in a home movie.

Looks a little like Mel Brooks.

In terms of parody and satire,
there really is Mel Brooks,

and there's everybody else.

When I was a kid,
VHS tapes were invented,

so we had "The Godfather,"

and then we had every Mel Brooks movie,

and he was just the funniest.

I'd like to go back
to your television days,

'cause, I mean, you were
in television for something

like 20 years, writing for Sid Caesar.

It was very good for me
to be part of the writing staff

of "The Show of Shows,"
"The Sid Caesar Show."

You talk about as though
it was a training ground

for your film work.
Yes.

I mean, is that how you see it?

Comedy university, it really was.

Mel Brooks was one of
the highest paid comedy writers

in the history of show business

when he worked for "Your Show of Shows."

So by the time of "The Producers,"

he was one of the most critically acclaimed

people in comedy.

Joseph? You are smoking
in the presence of the Fuhrer.

I'm sorry, big daddy.

"The Producers" was not the
first attempt to parody Hitler.

Ernst Lubitsch had done it.

Heil myself.

The Three Stooges did it
in a couple of film shorts.

But it really was the embodiment

of a lot of what Mel Brooks was about.

He does have this Hitler obsession.

Brooks: There's only one way to get even.

You have to bring him down with ridicule,

and it's been one of my life-long jobs

has been to make the world
laugh at Adolf Hitler.

You never had any
aspirations to be serious.

Bullshit.

All my films are serious.

You examine any one of them,
they're serious,

because they are passionate,

and they depict human behavior

at given points
in the history of humanity.

Mel Brooks grew up loving westerns.

And as he got older, still
loved them from his childhood,

but you look back on some of them and go,

"Wow, that's really racist.

Some of this stuff is really messed up."

And that's where
"Blazing Saddles" comes from.

"Blazing Saddles" was very satirical,

but it did it by...

...making you shit your pants laughing.

What he manages to do
with the high and the low,

I think, is astonishing.

You can have one scene where a horse

is knocked out with a punch,

and then deal with race relations

about an African-American sheriff.

That's pretty heady stuff.

As chairman of the welcoming committee,

it is my privilege to extent a laurel

and hearty handshake to our new...

...nigger.

Mel Brooks tells a story

about saying to the head
of the studio, "Can I do this?"

And the head of the studio is saying,

"Well, if you're gonna
walk up to the bell,

you got to ring it."

And Mel Brooks rings it.

You can't make a successful comedy

that doesn't say something
about the system,

about the social structure,
about prejudice,

about people, about behavior.

"Blazing Saddles"
is all about racial prejudice.

It's all about the hypocritical west

shitting all over a black sheriff

and wanting him dead.

And now for my next
impression, Jesse Owens!

Seize them!

Satire is something that
touches the heart of everyone.

We can go, "This is a problem
that our society has."

"Blazing Saddles" is
comedy's indictment of racism.

They darker than us.

And showing its absurdity

in this great parody of an American genre.

Life!

Life, do you hear me?!

There was a certain grammar
to those old movies,

and Mel Brooks stuck to the form of them.

He just twisted it
a little bit here and there,

and it's brilliant.

You see his love of cinema
in all of his parodies.

"High Anxiety" is a satire
of all the Hitchcock films.

And "Silent Movie," obviously,
a satire of silent movies.

And "Spaceballs,"
a satire of George Lucas.

May the Schwartz be with you!

What I love about him
is lots of times, people say,

"Oh, that is very funny,
but we can't say that."

Mel would go, "That's very funny,

we're gonna say that."

Oh!

It good to be the king.

The magazine Madmagazine,

the edition number one,

the date, 1952.

In the '40s, there were things

that you should never joke about --

religion, politics.

Things were still sacred.

Madmagazine helped change that.

It was very, very influential.

It was embraced by the comedy community,

and it was sort of like a precursor

to underground comics in the late '60s.

I'd never been exposed

to that kind of irreverent humor before.

It was sort of like shaking
your fist at authority

in a very clever and funny way.

In case you're not familiar with Mad,

it's a magazine of broad satire aimed

at practically everything
Americans hold dear --

sex, success, beauty, patriotism,

anti-patriotism, pro-war groups,

anti-war groups.

You name it, in one issue or another,

Madhas aimed its blunt instrument at it.

Smith: I remember when I was
a kid, begging my father

to buy the issue of "King Kong" Madmagazine

because "Network" was also parodied.

And I remember telling my dad,

like, "Dad, they're doing 'Network.'

It's called 'Nutwork,'
and you liked 'Network,'"

trying to sell him on it.
Like, you'll enjoy this, too --

as if he'd ever read Madmagazine.

Madmagazine was aggressive
to a certain extent,

but they always pulled their punches.

It was nothing that would
get you thrown out of school.

Now, National Lampoon put nothing in there

that wouldn'tget you
kicked out of school.

You know, here was a magazine

to hide from your parents, you know?

And your wife.

It had, like, some nasty pictures in it.

These are not magazines
you can open in this office now.

That's all I can say.

They are so politically incorrect.

To see people using humor as a weapon

the way that the kids that
started National Lampoondid

was just, I thought, "This is great."

It's often the only magazine
that a lot of younger hip people

today read.

And why that is is, I think they trust us.

Another clue to the success of the magazine

was that unlike Madmagazine,

all the artwork was done very intentionally

to replicate whatever was being parodied.

And that was a big difference
from what had been

in the counterculture prior to that.

The 1970s were a fertile time for humor,

and you people were bitter, caustic, smutty,

dirty, funny, and...

Drunk.
...drunk,

and largely outrageous.

The hopes of the '60s had given way

to the frustrations of the '70s.

The Vietnam War was obviously lost.

The civil rights movement had won,

and the argument was over,
but, of course, it wasn't.

The craziness of that period
is one of the things

that made National Lampoon a success.

People needed to laugh.

You did a very interesting parody

of "The Joy of Sex,"
"The Job of Sex."

We called the book "The Job of Sex,"

and divided it up into punching in,

down time, overtime, on the job injuries,

and workman's compensation.

At the National Lampoon,

there was certainly an enjoyment
of being edgy and shocking.

You're listening to
the National Lampoon Radio Hour.

The National Lampoon Radio Hour

was a syndicated radio show

written and produced by the National Lampoon,

which was magazine an audio form.

And that's where I was first exposed

to people that went on
to much bigger fame,

people like Bill Murray.

A lot of the "Saturday Night Live" people

started out as National Lampoonpeople.

Let's do 20 face slaps.

Gilda and John did the show
in this sort of weird space.

It was under the Time-Life Building.

They are the cast of the new

National Lampoonshow,

which opens this Friday
at the new Palladium Cabaret.

And then Lorne Michaels,
he came in and poached

all these people.

Gilda Radner.
Gilda.

John Belushi.
And, uh...

Laraine Newman.

Lorne Michaels pitched
"SNL" to me as a cross

between "Monty Python" and "60 Minutes."

He said, "It's gonna work."

For outstanding comedy,
variety, or music series,

NBC's "Saturday Night."

I'd also like to thank
the city of New York

for the correct combination of, um...

rejection and alienation,

which keeps the comedy spirit alive.

When something really revolutionary happens,

when you first see it,
it should look wrong.

And "Saturday Night Live,"
when you first saw it,

what is this?

Rule number one is
if you're gonna do parody,

you better have somebody
who can deliver it --

both in the writer's room and on stage.

Hey, Norton?!

Hey, Robby Bee.

What made "Saturday Night Live" different

was this phenomenon that
happened in the '60s,

which was the youth culture
and the youth market.

Our show was the first one

to really have a voice
for a younger generation.

Land Shark! Still the cleverest
species of them all.

It was the first time that our generation

was allowed to do TV,

and be on TV and write TV.

And so we were parodying things

that "The Carol Burnett Show"
didn't parody.

Your mama eats kitty litter.

Don't nobody talk about my mama!

I got put in charge of producing
the commercial parodies

because I had worked in advertising.

You have to establish the product,

say why people need it,

and also allow for the comedy.

I have a certain fondness
for Royal Deluxe II

where the rabbi circumcises a baby

in the back seat of a car

to show how smooth
the ride of the car is.

Commercial parodies became
a kind of trademark

of "Saturday Night Live."

Hey, You...

Just one whiff does the trick.

Some of their parodies were
really speaking to the times.

Hey, you.

In the sexual awakening
of the '60s and '70s,

there was a connection to reality.

Hey, You, for that special someone

you never expect to see again.

When you have 18 minutes of commercials

in your time period, then to not comment

on commercials would be ridiculous.

Who am I?
Why am I here?

When I'm done rolling up this booger,

should I eat it
or throw it out the window?

The commercial parodies endure
because they reflected

not only the culture at the time...

Super Colon Blow?

...but also the way

that Madison Avenue tried to sell things.

Where are all out of
Cracklin' Oat Flakes.

How about new Cracklin' Oat Flakes,

now with ecstasy?

We get to talk back
to these corporate monoliths.

Everywhere we go, there's billboards.

Every time we turn on the TV,
there's commercials.

And it's the one time "SNL"
has really figured it out

where you can strike back.

I can't hear you, dude!

What?

Piece of crap!

Hey, I think that phone
you bought me is busted.

Samuel L. Bronkowitz
presents "Cleopatra Schwartz."

Never again will one man and one woman

defy such incredible odds.

Together, no one could stop them.

I don't think parody
and satire is important.

But it's important to me

because, you know, I've done it a lot.

"Kentucky Fried Movie" started
with Kentucky Fried Theater.

We did these sketches
in 1971 in Madison, Wisconsin,

and 1972, moved the show to L.A.

Quiet, please!
Hold still.

We wanted to make
that show into a movie.

Poisonous fish.
Poisonous fish.

"Kentucky Fried Movie"
was just doing individual bits

without a story.

I'm not wearing any pants.

Film at 11:00.

What we were trying to do

with "Kentucky Friend Movie"
was get into the movie business.

There's a certain Z-A-Z sense
of humor, whatever that is.

For me, the most fun was
making David and Jim laugh.

We each trusted the other two
as arbiters of whether our ideas

were funny or not.

Something about the three of us,
we had a common vision.

Sound your alarm bell now!

All right now, everybody,
get in crash positions!

"Airplane" had that anarchic
anything-can-happen quality.

That, to me, is a seminal movie.

That, to me, is a movie

that changed my perspective on comedy.

Okay, boys, let's get some pictures.

These brilliant people had collected

100,000 of the funniest jokes
and crammed them into a movie,

and they were so relentlessly funny.

What the hell's going on up there?

Every moment of it, it
transports you to the land

of magic mushrooms.

If you're wondering
what magic mushrooms feels like,

it feels like you are "Airplane."

Was the idea for this motion picture

a well-planned vehicle
or more accidental in nature?

We all watched a movie
on late-night television

called "Zero Hour,"
and that actually was lucky,

because it was essentially,

well, at least a very similar plot

to what "Airplane" is.

We have never found a movie since

that was as perfect for satire or parody.

It worked great, but not a joke
in the whole thing.

But we thought it was hilarious.

You'd better tell the captain.

We've got to land as soon as we can.

This woman has to be gotten to a hospital.

What do you think it is?

Well, I can't be sure yet.

But I know it's serious enough
to land at the nearest city

with hospital facilities.

Better tell the captain
I want to speak to him.

Certainly.
It's really film noir acting.

Please help me.

Not only does it fit the style of acting

that we love, but also because
we had the film to look at,

there were a lot of shots
that we just took.

We said, "Hey, this is great."

We wanted to go shot for shot,

so it really would look like an old movie.

In fact, scene for scene,
we just copied it.

Because of my mistake,

six men didn't return from that raid.

Because of my mistake, six men
didn't return from that raid.

We have visitors.
Hello.

Hi.
We have a visitor.

Hello.
Hi.

Basically, what we do is just
set up familiar situations

and then we reverse
the audiences' expectation

of the outcome.

Would you like to have it?

Thank you.
Thanks a lot.

Sure.
You ever been in a cockpit before?

No, sir, I've never been
up in a plane before.

You ever seen a grown man naked?

The acting style and the committing

to the absolutely serious
dramatic portrayal of the roles

is the essence of the film

and why we insisted on directing it.

You better tell the captain

we've got to land as soon as we can.

This woman has to be gotten to a hospital.

A hospital?
What is it?

It's a big building with patients,

but that's not important right now.

Tell the captain I must speak to him.

Certainly.

Leslie was such a character actor,

unknown at the time.

I'm amazed that he could have done

all those serious movies all those years,

'cause he really is a closet comedian.

And, well, out of the closet
after we got through with him.

When I see five weirdos dressed in togas

stabbing a guy in the middle of the park

in full view of 100 people,
I shoot the bastards.

That's my policy.

That was a Shakespeare
in the Park production

of "Julius Caesar," you moron.

Even the most crazy, zany comedy

still needs a good story.

By the time we got to "The Naked Gun,"

we knew how to do the plot
and the character.

Everywhere I look,
something reminds me of her.

We love doing visual puns.

You just have to stay
ahead of the audience.

A lot of people see the joke developing.

It's always a contest
to beat them to the punch.

Bingo.

The audience can't be expecting it,

otherwise, I mean, it won't be funny.

Nice beaver.
Thank you.

I just had it stuffed.
Let me help you with that.

There are certain kinds of jokes

that the sexual content is in
the eye of the beholder.

We're just talking about
this stuffed beaver up there.

We don't mean anything sexual, you know.

And so that's --
that's your fault

if you think that.

The Zucker brothers
proved this time and again.

It's somehow not as funny

to have some kind
of goofy guy being goofy,

but it works when
you have serious people

doing outrageous things.

If we had anything
to do with all the great satires

that came after us,

I'm thrilled, if we encouraged people.

That smells like pure gasoline.

They've done studies, you know.

60% of the time, it works every time.

That doesn't make sense.

Maybe people said, "Oh, gee,
I could do that, you know.

That doesn't look that difficult."

Oh, behave.

Yeah.

Yeah, baby!

Yeah.

Ladies and gentlemen, I'd like to reaffirm

that the art of ventriloquism is not dead.

Would you welcome the very funny
Mr. Albert Brooks.

I was around a lot
of comedians in my group.

I mean, with Billy Crystal
and Robin Williams.

Whenever Albert was in the group,

everybody recognized that
there was nobody like that.

It was like a challenge dance.

You just stepped back and let him go.

Well, good evening, everybody.

Yes, hello, everybody!

I'm Dave.
And I'm Danny.

When you see early Albert Brooks footage,

he's often parodying
old-school show business.

That's what he knew.

His father was a comedian,

his brother is a comedian.

Albert was very meta,
and all of his stuff

was about the conventions of the trade.

Danny and Dave was about
the lameness of ventriloquism.

You know, Danny, I'm a little nervous

being here on television and everything.

Well, why don't you have a cigarette?

That always calms you down.

Great.

There was content, there was funniness,

but the target of the comedy

was the standard forms of show business.

Hello.

I'm Albert Brooks.

And I'm speaking to you on behalf

of the famous School for Comedians.

One of the first things
I ever saw him do

was the School for Comedians.

Let's see how these kids are doing.

He was walking past the spit-take class.

I've just walked into the room.
Now start to drink.

Good.
Now I speak.

Guess what!
I just heard from the bank,

and not only don't you have any money,

but your sister is dead!

That was funny.

What was special about him

was his singular vision, his style.

This was alternative comedy, for sure.

During the next hour,
you will see the first

in a series of programs entitled
"An American Family."

Albert had been
watching "An American Family,"

which was the first reality show.

It was on PBS.

They spent a year filming a real family,

the "Loud" family.

You got all the boys, I got all the girls.

You can't beat it.

Both of us shared the sense

that there was a lie
at the heart of this,

which is that the camera can be there

without changing things.

When we did "Real Life,"
the movie together,

the underlying motion
was to poke fun at that idea.

Welcome home!
Aloha!

Look at this now!
Ah.

And Albert Brooks
plays himself, a filmmaker,

and I play the head
of this American family

that has been chosen
to be filmed for a year.

Honey, do you think
it's safe for you to be eating

with your heating pad in your lap?

I have terrible cramps,
I am bleeding profusely,

and I want to vomit on the table.

What are you doing?

No, I just want to let them know

that this is not the way
we usually talk,

especially at the dinner table.

"Real Life" is about reality TV.

And this was years
before it had even existed.

So Albert Brooks is dealing
on a whole different level.

Whereas with "Spinal Tap,"
you're making fun

of a group of idiots who are likable,

but not the smartest people in the world.

Hi, I'm Rob Reiner.

I've just directed my first feature film

for Embassy Pictures.

It's called "Spinal Tap."

It's a comedy about
a British rock and roll band.

"Spinal Tap" was a mockumentary.

It was a mock-documentary.

Dialogue wasn't written,
it was improvised,

but it was shot like a documentary.

During the "Flower People" period,

who was your drummer?

It was tragic, really.
He exploded on stage.

Just like that.
He just went up.

He just was like a flash of green light...

and that was it.
Nothing was left.

You know, dozens of people
spontaneously combust each year.

It's just not really widely reported.

Movies kept getting
rock and roll wrong.

And so the real drive
of the project was,

"It's not that hard,
let's get it right."

Helps to really like
something enough to pay

close attention to it

so that when time comes to parodize it,

it comes naturally.

It's not parodize lost.

Ooh.
Oh, that's not bad.

Is that in the film?
No, it will be in the sequel.

How much more black could this
be, and the answer is...

...none, none more black.

Rock and roll!
We made this movie,

and the guy who was shooting it,
I hired him because he had shot

all these rock and roll documentaries.

And I thought he'll be perfect.

Hello, Cleveland!
Hello, Cleveland!

And he's watching this, and he says,

"What's funny about this?

This isn't funny.

This is exactly what goes on."

But, to me, that was a great compliment

because it was saying
we're capturing real life

what people actually experience
in that rock and roll world,

and that, to me, is the best comedy,

the comedy that connects
with real experience.

People said, "Oh, this is so new."

And then you say, "Well, no, actually,

you could take that back

to Woody Allen's
'Take the Money and Run.'"

Woody Allen's "Zelig,"

"The Rutles" with Eric Idle

was a mockumentary that was a precursor.

But "Spinal Tap" was the one

that really became
a huge critical success.

Now, mockumentary is a style

that has infiltrated
not just cinema, but television.

That herky-jerky camera motion

we see on "Modern Family" or "The Office."

Christopher Guest's whole trajectory

has been mockumentary.

Hey, judge, look at me.

His stuff is very specific.

It's in the crate!
Where is it?

It's in the crate!

The fact that it was improvised,
that became a style

of storytelling.

And any time that you introduce something

that is effective and nothing
like everything else...

Really good.

...that's where you get
something that's revolutionary.

I've just always thought that
rock and roll should be fun,

which is why it's healthy
for me to sometimes

prick the bubble of pretentiousness

that sometimes pervades the industry.

I give myself several guidelines

and parameters when I'm writing
my parody songs.

It needs to be funny
even if people aren't familiar

with the original source material.

But I would say probably 90% of the time,

I'm just dealing with
what is a very current,

popular mainstream song,

and how can I somehow make that strange?

"Eat It" is Weird Al's

most successful parody to date.

As you can see, it is a video

as well as a musical parody
of Michael Jackson's work.

I did a parody of
every single shot in that video,

because people were so familiar with it,

and it was like they knew
every little detail.

So all I had to do was
just tweak everything

just a little bit, and it became funny.

Weird Al Yankovic, when he does a parody

or a satire of a song,
it's a song that he has to admit

on one level, like,
"That is a good song,

but I can have some fun with it."

When he did the song "Perform This Way,"

he asked Lady Gaga,

and she said, "Well,
that song is very important.

I'd really you rather not you not."

And her fans said,
"You let Weird Al do that!"

Like, they got -- like,
"Oh, sorry, I didn't know.

Never mind, go ahead."

What I like about my job
is I'm a pop culture Cuisinart.

I get all this input from everywhere,

and I mix it all up, and I spew it out.

I'm providing cultural commentary,

and, hopefully, it's amusing to people.

That's dandy.

Ho, ho, that's rich, I'll say.

Now, how about some color, stupid?!

Hey!

My big influence when I was a kid

was Warner Bros cartoons.

The timing on those is brilliant.

They were parodying things
that I didn't understand,

but it was still really funny.

Heil Hitler.

One of the things that animation has

that gives it certain advantages

is that on the surface,

it has the appearance of being very safe.

And so animators can be
more be more satirical.

It just feels a little bit more benign

because it's animated.

Well, Dave, I have a hilarious new movie

coming out on HBO next month.

It's all about 9/11.

The movie's called "September 11, 2000-Fun."

Anybody that's gonna do parody or satire

can say so many things.

You can go so many places.

Just the practicality of not having

to build these things in the real world

and having an actor do them.

You can have Homer roll out
the door, roll out the hill,

oh, and roll back into the car

as it then plummets off a cliff.

Aaah!

"The Simpsons" can cram
650 pop culture references

quietly into an episode,

and you either pick it up or you don't.

But it's there.

So they're just the little
parody Easter eggs

all over the place.

"The Simpsons," to
pretty much all comedy writers,

they're the cathedral that
you walk 800 miles to go see.

I mean, they the are definitive.

I always had a little
bit of a cartoon sensibility,

and then, lo and behold,
all these years later,

I get a job at "The Simpsons."

There was an episode when I worked there

that was a "Cape Fear" parody.

It was all about Sideshow Bob

coming to get his revenge against Bart.

What's great is that you don't
need to have seen "Cape Fear."

The beauty of "The Simpsons"
is you don't need

to know the reference
in order to still think

that something funny is happening.

How's it going, guys?

When "South Park" happened,

the vessel of animation,
it could look like shit,

it could look like your kid did it.

The car that gets you there don't matter,

it's what's inside the car,

it's the content that's traveling.

Ramadan!

Hey, look, an infidel!

Ooh!
Oh, pig-kebab!

Don't let the fact that it's animated

and don't let the fact

that it's about a bunch
of children fool you.

It is about satire.

This year, we're taking the boys
on a weekend boat trip

to discuss Jesus' role
as the navigator of our lives.

A Catholic boat trip?

People who hate religion have,
like, really glommed on

to our show, too, 'cause we
make fun of a lot of religion.

We've made fun of...
Everything.

...everything.

I have, in my possession,

an ancient book written on gold plates

that tells of Jesus Christ's second coming --

here, in America!

In America?
Really?

That sounds kind of...

Those "South Park" guys
clearly just live in a bunker.

Or they're sociopaths.

They do not care who they offend.

They burn every bridge,

and they have absolutely no fear.

The category is "People Who Annoy You."

Audience, keep quiet.

I know it, but I don't think
I should say it.

Five seconds, Mr. Marsh.

All right, I'd like to solve the puzzle.

Niggers!

Huh?

I don't think we've
ever come up with something

and the been like, "Oh, that's
really going too far,"

you know, because you can't do that.

The groups that come
and get angry at us,

once we start saying,
"Okay, we better not

make fun of them anymore,"

then all of a sudden, none of it's okay.

It either has to all be okay
or none of it's okay.

There was just one thing
you didn't count on.

That more people besides me
hate "Family Guy."

Yeah.

Tonight, "Family Guy"
creator Seth MacFarlane.

He's an equal opportunity offender.

Christians, gays, Sarah Palin,

you name it, nothing, no one off limits.

They live in a crummy neighborhood.

The Bradys?
Oh, hell yeah!

They got robbers, thugs,
drug dealers, oh, you name it.

You folks want some pancakes?
No, thank you.

See, that's the worst we got
is Jemima's Witnesses.

What is the line for you?
Is there a line?

The JFK Pez dispenser, I wish we'd never done.

Really?
Yeah.

That was just over the line.

Take him out.
No!

Check it out.
It's a John F. Kennedy Pez dispenser.

Oh.

Well, good thing I still have
my Bobby Kennedy Pez dispenser.

Seth MacFarlane pushes the envelope

more than I've ever seen anyone else do.

Oh, screw this.

I just came over to buy some fireworks.

It's a little bit hateful,
a little bit hurtful.

But it's -- Oh, my God,
it's so fucking funny.

Sorry, Wonder Woman, I got three kings.

Now, let's see your pair.

All right.

Hey, Robin, what are you
looking at me for?

Look at her.

Animation allows you

to do whatever you want.

It's probably the freest form

for your imagination there is.

Down in front!
In that sense,

it's a comedy writer's dream.

If I were 23 again and starting over,

I would beeline towards animation.

You may not be old enough to drive,

but if you're a safe passenger,
you've got a job to do.

Gary is checking to make sure
that the parking brake

is in the proper release position.

All clear, Gary?

The ability to tell outlandish stories

and very small jokes
at the same time is yours

if you've mastered animation.

I'm Han Solo, captain of
the Millennium Falcon

and the only actor whose career
isn't destroyed by this movie.

Ewokoniad Sigourneth Juniorstein,

Oklahoma State University.

Eqqsquizitine Buble-Schwingslow,
University of Nebraska.

I don't know that the Internet

has changed comedy itself that much.

There's a lot more of it.

But still when you look
at the individual pieces,

it's still comedy.

Rushing.

It's the way we experience
it that's changed.

The reason that parody is so enduring

and is even stronger now is because

we are in this viral Internet culture,

where most stuff is now
watched online in little bits,

and it's presented in
an, "Oh, you got to see this.

Click on this, you're not gonna believe."

Hey, don't call me bitch!
I'm a grown man!

God, you're mean.

The idea was everything.
The idea was parody.

Why are there newspapers
all over the place?

Political satire,
crazy characters, sketches.

It was anything that was fun
that you wanted to try

that a network would never put on.

I would like to welcome my first guest,

Jessica Cheststain.

Jessica Chastain.

With "Between Two Ferns,"

you had a program that
it's a send-up of talk shows,

so it's a satire of talk shows.

Real interested in the work
you've been doing down in Haiti.

Tell us a little bit about that.

Well --
Is there a Six Flags

down there?
There's not, no.

Okay, we can move on.

The new media stuff, especially sites

that are just for comedy,

I think that they're a good
thing for the business.

Especially Funny or Die,
which is great because

there is a democratization there.

Hey, dude, you want to play Madden?

The things that succeed on the Internet

is happening organically.

If I'm seeing a really hilarious video,

it's largely because someone shared it.

It all began with this,

when a comedy rap video pirated
from "Saturday Night Live"...

...turned up on the web site YouTube,

the suits at NBC took notice.

They didn't like the piracy,
but they sure loved the buzz.

It spread like wildfire.

Six million streams.

Baby-boomers who grew up with "SNL,"

they stopped watching at a certain point.

And if you're gonna be on network television

for 40 years, you adapt or die.

Lonely Island and those digital shorts

gave a whole new port of entry
for younger viewers

who maybe hadn't even seen the show.

Digital shorts are obviously

how you made your name.

My favorite is "Blank in a Box."

"Blank in a Box."
Yes.

That's what we can say in the morning.

What they do isn't direct
parodies, like I'm famous for.

But they'll take various memes,
if you will, in pop music,

and they'll make it more
ridiculous than it is already.

It's a kind of a caricature.

And we have breaking news!
Baby Lakeisha has gone missing.

For the next hour, we will --
what's that?

Nobody cares? Moving on, let's
check in with Baby Prudence.

Her 14th day home,
and she's still safe and sound.

New media and YouTube
and the Internet in regard

to the success of our show
isthe success of our show.

For example, I was stopped
one day on the street by a girl,

and she said to me,

"I've been with you guys
since the beginning,

when you guys were making videos."

She had no idea
that we had a television show.

Could be worse.
Not that bad.

Their show was mostly online.

Their show was mostly YouTube clips.

I watched one of their sketches
on YouTube, and then at the end,

Jordan and Keegan come on,
and they're basically like,

"Look, we appreciate you watching.

Would you please watch
the broadcast show?"

They were, like, begging.

That's the way networks make money.

That's where the profit is,
is on the network,

is broadcasting.

Jequallin.

We didn't know this was gonna happen.

If you told me that "Substitute Teacher"

was gonna have 98 million hits online,

I'm like, "What?"

Uh, do you mean Jacqueline?

Okay.
So that's how it's gonna be.

Y'all want to play.

Okay, then.

I've got my eye on you, Jequallin.

Or that in the aggregate,

we're approaching a billion hits.

This is Key and Peele, a billion?!

Like, "What?!"

Pack your fucking knifes.

Get out.
You're off the show.

Sorry, Chef.

Because...

you should be working

in the finest restaurant in the world.

Thank you, Chef.
Just not any world

that I live in.

One of the things that
humor and humor and comedy does

is it gets your attention.

If it comes in the form of a joke,

if it comes in the form of satire,

if it has an entertainment value,

you know, people will listen to it.

Working off of something
that's in pop culture

is very satisfying because
it gives everyone a sense

that we're all in on it.

And in a fractured age
where people feel very alone,

I think a lot of mankind's desire

is to feel like we're together.

I know y'all do these
parodies on your show.

Oh, thank you.

Well, "thank you," no.

Don't do one of "Empire."

I wouldn't do that.

Okay.
Okay.

Well, I'm gonna things up

if you're with me, man.

What if -- we may be there already.

But what if, as a nation --
or as a world,

too many of us are spending too much time

parodying and satirizing culture?

No one's gonna be growing crops.

No one's going to be
trucking them into cities.

No one's going to be canning goods.

We're all just gonna be,

"Look what I just made.
I just made this funny thing."

And future aliens will come to this earth

and find our skeletons holding our devices.

They'll realize that the Romans collapsed

because there was lead in the water.

We might be killed by
too much parody and satire.