KEY POINTS:
All happy families are happy in the same way, all unhappy families are unhappy in a different way, says Tolstoy.
No disrespect to the author of Anna Karenina, but I beg to differ. Happiness expresses itself through smiles and laughter, and of all of the attributes of individuality, one's sense of humour is the most singular, unique and impossible to replicate.
The precise combination of situation and sensation that leads to laughter is a different equation in every single person. We know this - it is one of the first things we realise as our consciousness develops. And yet, if the first instinct is to laugh, the second one is always to share the joke.
And a joke shared is a powerful, intoxicating thing. It's the reason why we find ourselves making friends without even trying, the reason why some marriages will last a lifetime, and the reason why an average-looking bloke with the right sort of twinkle in his eye will have you into bed before you have a chance to draw breath from your giggling.
On the other hand, it's the same reason why The Office might have you rolling around in stitches or grimacing with unease. Why the fish-slapping song from Monty Python is either the most hilarious, or the stupidest thing you've ever seen. Why you might just not get it.
Laughter is a strange, mysterious force and its power should not be underestimated. Is there a science to it? Probably there is, but I haven't the heart, really, to delve into the mathematics of a chuckle.
There are a few general guidelines you can follow though if you want to make people laugh. I saw them in action a few weeks ago when I made a short radio feature on the Classic Comedy Club here in Auckland.
The Classic is New Zealand's only full-time comedy venue, and pretty much the home of live comedy in this country. I went along for "10 for 10" night. You might think 10 comedians for $10 is a pretty good deal, and you'd be right in terms of sheer volume.
The quality varied, though. Note to the self-declared "hilarious Hori" who was first on: some people do manage to be funny by sheer fact of ethnicity alone. Billy T. James was one of them perhaps. You are not.
Battle fatigue does set in after the fifth bloke who expects to get a laugh by virtue of saying "f ***" as well. At the end of the evening, though, I had reached a few conclusions about what constitutes funny, for an Auckland audience at least.
Namely: jokes about sex are funny. Jokes about having sex on buses, planes, trains and cars are especially funny.
All jokes about drugs are funny. Especially funny are jokes about being stoned, being on acid, and being stoned and on acid while driving.
Jokes about being drunk while driving are also very funny.
Jokes about hitting cyclists wearing brightly coloured lycra are especially funny. As are jokes about speeding.
This may be more of a comment on the attitude of Aucklanders to road safety than a civically shared sense of humour, but it was interesting to watch the spectacle of laughter as it ebbed and flowed throughout the night.
Some comics got laughs because they made fun of the audience, some because they made fun of themselves. Some were charmingly witty, some were plain abusive.
One young guy was so bad (or good?) that his act, with all of its long pauses, and swallowed sentences and trailing off into space, was practically Beckettian in its modernism. One guy just had really funny hair. The ones who were funny, were funny for different reasons and in wildly different ways.
Perhaps it's easier to get a consensus on what is not funny. There are quite a few things that are universially regarded as unfunny. Cancer most famously so, along with whimpering puppies and orphaned children and natural disasters of all shapes and persuasions.
There is nothing to laugh at in the trials and privations of others, in devastation, or in the suffering of dumb beasts. Unless of course one is possessed of a sense of humour that runs to the mordant, the dark or the perverse.
In which case, there is no need to make judgment calls on what can or cannot be funny. When humour is a necessary weapon, no source of laughter can be ruled out. As somebody somewhere once said, maybe, many things are far too important not to be laughed at.
The real reason I'm writing this column however, is that I have spent the last two hours doubled over helplessly at a YouTube video that has been doing the rounds. It's a pivotal scene from the German film Downfall, in which Hitler is made to realise that his war cannot be won.
Except in this version, the subtitles have been altered so Hitler's towering rage stems from hearing the news that Ronaldo has been sold by Manchester United. So he's freaking out you see, but because of a soccer transfer, not because of the war.
And there are other raging Hitlers, many others. Open up YouTube and behold the wrath of Hitler inspired by such subjects as Xbox, Obama or the poor election performance of the British Labour Party. Is Hitler funny?
Well Mel Brooks thought so, but I've never found him inherently so myself. Until now that is.
Thanks to this latest, brilliant, perfect little internet meme, I've been forced to reassess my own idea of funny and place a German dictator squarely in the canon. I could make excuses, explain it, or write reams more so you'll see what I mean. Or I could just say it's funny. Have a look. You'll either get it. Or you won't.
