JUST FOR LAUGH: GAGS

1. Introduction

- Just For Laughs Gags ( JFLG ) was a sister program of Just For Laugh ( Juste pour Rire ) which was a comedy festival held each July in Montréal, Québec, Canada in 1983. Gilbert Rozon and Andy Nulman, known as the founders, have made the Francophone and Anglophone events popular worldwide since 1985.

- JFLG is the silent comedy or television reality show which appeared first time on channel Canal D in 2000. The program was soon introduced to the world. Nowadays, over 100 countries and lots of airports and airlines have purchased for use.

- Organizers have actors and actresses play silly pranks with technical support on the street while hidden cameras capture people's responses. The pranks and jokes vary from inane to cross-cultural.

-They have music, brief sound effect, and laughers in the background but no dialogue. The shows were filmed mainly in Montréal, rural Québec, and sometimes in Mexico or US. Many places in the world got their own versions in their countries.




2. Cultural Base

- The program originated from Just For Laugh and born in Quebec where 95 % population is Francophone. Therefore, it shared a lot in common with the comedy festival and Quebec culture.

- The purpose of July festival was to bring fun and happiness to public. In addition, the founders also wanna look for some potential artists in the crowd (acrobat, comedian, magician…) that’s the reason why most of the Sitcoms don’t focus on criticism, judgments, comment but fun only.

- The main living philosophy in Quebec society is still involved dramatically in Catholic background and all of morality standards along. However, viewers may observe plenty of different cultural features in JFLGs.

- This cultural diversity exists in Quebec which was considered as the crossroad of the two continents Europe and America. As the result, though Quebec population is mainly Francophone, they also inspire from the cultures in US, UK, and local people too.




3. Highlight

The program makers mean to put people into unexpected and unusual situations. They then record and capture those responses and reactions. Generally, there are 5 main situations

1.The belief in religion of people is challenged. With well-prepared techniques and machines, some actors who play Jesus Christ will do some miraculous and magical things on the streets. Those ideas of the tricks are mainly inspired from the Bible book like: God walk on the water surface, God cure the blind and handicapped man, God bless the donators, God fly… Besides, priests and nuns are made into mean, greedy, dissolute people which strikes strongly to the followers' faith with big nasty surprises.




2. Some pranks that really scare people and make them react in order to protect themselves from dangers. Alien, beast, terrorist, poisonous animals... are made or overused to cause panicking situations.


Besides, police force is the popular choice too. People are put into hard circumstances to see how they will do to escape.

3. People are required to help the poor and the weak like: handicapped, blind, old, unlucky, sick…then they are fooled around or cheated. Hidden cameras will capture their reactions. A lot of people show their calm, patience, kindness, and forgiveness. Above all, humanity and civilization are emphasized.




4. Temptation and Passion are encouraged in some situations. Beautiful and sexy women really challenge people-mainly men-about their honesty, self-esteem, gentleness and patience. People also respond hard to easy money and sudden rewards.




5. Some situations are made just to see how people surprise themselves because the illogical and magical things happen in their faces. Some scenes like: kid runs on the wall, man shoots rabbits but destroys his own car; old woman is stronger than young man…

CONCLUDE

Above all, JFLGs is the wonderful sitcom series that make people laugh. However, people enjoy it not for relaxation only nor learning what messages the makers send to the audiences; actually, they read and find the most beautiful part deep in themselves:

HUMANITY

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