Prankz

Scott Hardie | January 14, 2005
This news article (link) hypes the degree to which the crowd was angry, based on the much calmer account that I read initially. But I still find the story interesting, because I fucking hate Ali G. Somebody please tell me what humor there is in pranks. I'm not talking about the bizarre characters that Cohen plays, or the satirical value of asking dumb questions to VIPs, or deflating some egotistical celebrity with a humiliating prank, all of which have some comedic value. I'm talking specifically about the "ha ha, I got you!" level of the prank. Where's the humor in the victim taking the situation at face value and responding appropriately? Exactly what was supposed to happen did happen; there's no spark of surprise there. If I told you my favorite color was yellow, and you believed me, then I told you it was actually green, how could I laugh at you for believing what was said with a straight face? I'm boggled.

To provide a contrary example: Someone told me that when Cohen's character sang the "Throw the Jew Down the Well" song at the bar, the audience actually joined in, rather than be offended or shocked. If you leave aside the anti-Semitic nature of the occurrence for sake of hypothetical, that was funny, the audience doing the exact opposite of what one would expect them to do. Am I wrong?