So funny they forgot to laugh

We may live in a crazy mixed-up world, but most matters seem to follow a fairly predictable set of cause-and-effect rules. Take comedy. Since forever it’s worked like this: Someone tells a joke; if it’s funny, people laugh, if it’s not, they remain stone-faced. Simple.

But not so on the late-night talk shows. When Jay or Dave or Conan or Jimmy or any of the rest do their monologue, the punch line as often as not is met with ... applause. Oh, sure, you’ll hear a few guffaws, but most of the jokes deliver clapping, not laughing. Apparently, a memo went out announcing that from now on, it’s better to respond with hands, rather than mouths. It wasn’t always so. When Johnny Carson ruled late night all those decades, his monologue either produced real laughs or silence, and he used that silence as the launching point for another joke, which usually did get the desired result.

What’s odd is that these shows are often quite funny. Letterman’s misanthropy, Leno’s observations, O’Brien’s off-kilter humor, even Jimmy Kimmel’s naughty-boy antics are sometimes genuinely funny. Does that matter? Don’t make us laugh.

-- Jonathan Taylor