Impressing Ben Elton
1983 - the heyday of 'alternative' comedy (based on storytelling not punchlines) and I go to the Winter Gardens in Bournemouth to see Ryk Mayall, Ben Elton and Andy De La Tour on their national tour. After the gig, my friend Richard (we've had to call him 'Ryk' ever since!) wanted to get Mr Mayall's autograph as did many others and we went backstage where he joined the queue. Not being so enamoured I found myself standing against a wall next to Messrs Elton and DeLaTour.
Well, what an opportunity! I had only recently heard what I considered to be a BRILLIANT joke. Made me chortle and was my current favourite. So I started to tell it to my new best mate Ben.
Now... although I was 18, I was VERY naive! I didn't even realise that Mr Elton was of Jewish descent. The joke consisted of some Jewish gentlemen discovering a German tank in the desert and one-by-one dying of exhaustion in an attempt to push it to a scrapyard to get some money for it. I must admit the punchline (head pops out of turret, looks around and says into the tank "Hey Hans I think we've run out of Jews") didn't go down very well.
After a few seconds of awkward silence B.E. turns to me, says "I don't do jokes" then walks off.
I don't to this day really know if he was being honest, utterly offended or whether he was just pissed off because no-one was queueing for his autograph.
(mikey2gorgeous4u, Wed 28 Aug 2013, 11:42, 8 replies)

You know his name is Rik Mayall, right?
Also, I imagine Elton didn't laugh because that wasn't funny and you were a lolwacky prick.
( BraynDedd Natasha Kaplinsky's labia majora, Wed 28 Aug 2013, 12:39, closed)

Isn't that the point of the question?
(mikey2gorgeous4u, Wed 28 Aug 2013, 13:37, closed)

i dunno
the question isn't 'why don't jews find my racism funny?'

i don't think
(alright alright, Wed 28 Aug 2013, 13:57, closed)

#creepingzionism

( drimble he'd been white, he'd been black, Wed 28 Aug 2013, 13:59, closed)

it's only dirty jews who don't find crass antisemitism funny

(alright alright, Wed 28 Aug 2013, 12:52, closed)

Having had the misfortune of watching a few minutes of "The Wright Way"...
...I'd say that "I don't do jokes" is pretty much spot-on
( skullfunkerry In case of implosion do not look into implosion, Wed 28 Aug 2013, 14:26, closed)

^this

( Locus213 Slightly to the left of Bakunin, Wed 28 Aug 2013, 15:59, closed)

I liked this

(McChinaman banned, Wed 28 Aug 2013, 16:35, closed)