What could happen worse, but really worse, in the career of a Quebec comedian? To be more relevant as a TV host than on a stage?
To do the first part of the three tenors of humor? Or make ends meet by selling pizza ovens?
None of that, even if these three situations remain highly traumatic. The ultimate disaster for a comedian is that his numbers do not trigger any laughter in the room. Like, nothing at all. Like in a show by (insert here the name of a humorous group from the Foubrac era).
Do not laugh, ironically here is the goal of the great comic game LOL – Who will have the last laugh? piloted by the excellent Patrick Huard for Amazon’s Prime Video platform.
It’s really very, very good. Simple, effective and very entertaining. I never thought I would laugh so much while trying not to laugh. The first three half hours of LOL – Who will have the last laugh? went live on January 6, with the final three to follow on Friday. This is the first production financed by the American giant Amazon here.
The concept, which derives from the Japanese format LOL: Last One Laughing, can be summed up succinctly. Ten comedians – or funny people like Edith Cochrane – spend six hours in a colorful mansion at the Big Brother. The only instruction that Patrick Huard imposes on them: ban on giggling, giggling or even the beginning of a smile during their stay in the loft.
It’s poker face, po-po-po-ker face for everyone, as Lady Gaga would say. Installed in a control room with multiple screens, the host Patrick Huard watches for the slightest grin forming at the corner of the lips of the ten players. On first offence, yellow card warning. Like on a soccer field. At the second hitch, red card and expulsion from the house.
At the very end, whoever resists the sympathetic attacks of his colleagues will pocket $100,000, which he will donate to the charity of his choice.
Compete in this unusual contest of improvisation: Marie-Lyne Joncas, Christine Morency, Rachid Badouri, Virginie Fortin, Arnaud Soly, Richardson Zéphir, Yves P. Pelletier, Laurent Paquin, Édith Cochrane and Mathieu Dufour.
To try to crack each other, the candidates have colorful wigs, wacky costumes and a small stage, where they each perform an original number.
There, you surely sigh: good, another party comedians who talk to each other, who fool around in a closed circuit and who find themselves so funny, help, it’s boring and boring. No way. From your sofa, just try not to smile while looking at them and you will understand the extent of the challenge imposed.
To avoid eviction, the ten candidates bite their cheeks or make the mouth of fish, a question of erasing any laughing expression on their face. Virginie Fortin offers hilarious moments, Marie-Lyne Joncas too, but it’s Christine Morency who steals the show in the second episode in a burlesque scene that involves a fart and the face of Arnaud Soly.
The number of Laurent Paquin and his inflatable dolls is dying. The diction course of Cherze Siachon (Yves P. Pelletier) would have made me flinch in two seconds.
The interest of LOL – Who will have the last laugh? also lies in the valves that competitors exchange without batting an eyelid. It takes repartee, control and agility to triumph on this show. When the players are about to falter, either they walk staring at the ground, or they advertise their status: “I’m fragile, I’m fragile”.
Patrick Huard evolves in this fragmented universe with remarkable ease. He is a good public, very involved, but firm in the application of the rules. In this super fun production, just because we’re not laughing doesn’t mean it’s not funny. On the contrary.
Where is the audience, lord?
Obviously, if we trust the listening data of Numeris, fewer and fewer people watch their favorite series live. Take Tuesday night, for example, one of the most news-packed nights this winter.
Obviously, STAT (1,357,000 viewers) and Indefensible (1,187,000) continue to prance at the top. But at 8 p.m., the battleground for big winter dramas, no program has crossed the 700,000 viewers mark. The first episode of Red Wristbands 2 was seen by 681,000 followers on TVA, sneaking past the new soap opera With beating heart of Radio-Canada, which interested 676,000 faithful. At Noovo, Turn: Double fault obtained an estimated rating of 176,000 curious people.
The 9 p.m. numbers weren’t more impressive. The soap opera We (418,000) on TVA and the detective series larry (393,000) from Radio-Canada did not rock the boat, while The week of the 4 Julies was viewed by 198,000 fans. It is Big Brother Celebrities (549,000) which gave Noovo its best score of the evening.
There are only series that only draw 400,000 viewers at 9 p.m., which is a weak and worrying performance. Where did all those people go who had something to watch?