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Planet Funny
- Narrated by: Ken Jennings
- Length: 9 hrs and 11 mins
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Publisher's summary
From the brilliantly witty and exuberant New York Times best-selling author Ken Jennings, a history of humor - from fart jokes on clay Sumerian tablets all the way up to the latest Twitter gags and Facebook memes - that tells the story of how comedy came to rule the modern world.
For millennia of human history, the future belonged to the strong. To the parent who could kill the most animals with sticks and to the child who could survive the winter or the epidemic. When the Industrial Revolution came, masters of business efficiency prospered instead, and after that we placed our hope in scientific visionaries. Today, in a clear sign of evolution totally sliding off the rails, our most coveted trait is not strength or productivity or even innovation but being funny. Yes, funniness.
Consider: presidential candidates now have to prepare funny "zingers" for debates. Newspaper headlines and church marquees, once fairly staid affairs, must now be clever, stuffed with puns and winks. Airline safety tutorials - those terrifying laminated cards about the possibilities of fire, explosion, depressurization, and drowning - have been replaced by joke-filled videos with multimillion-dollar budgets and dance routines.
In Planet Funny, Ken Jennings explores this brave new comedic world and what it means - or doesn’t - to be funny in it now. Tracing the evolution of humor from the caveman days to the bawdy middle-class antics of Chaucer to Monty Python’s game-changing silliness to the fast-paced meta-humor of The Simpsons, Jennings explains how we built our humor-saturated modern age, where lots of us get our news from comedy shows and a comic figure can even be elected president of the United States purely on showmanship. Entertaining, astounding, and completely head-scratching, Planet Funny is a full taxonomy of what spawned and defines the modern sense of humor.
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When the first episode aired on Nov. 10, 1969, Sesame Street revolutionized the way education was presented to children on television. It has since become the longest-running children's show in history, and today reaches 8 million pre-schoolers on 350 PBS stations and airs in 120 countries. Street Gang is the compelling and often comical story of the creation and history of this media masterpiece and pop culture landmark.
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An important subject, but hardly gripping
- By Scott T. Hards on 09-24-10
By: Michael Davis
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The Partly Cloudy Patriot
- By: Sarah Vowell
- Narrated by: Sarah Vowell, Conan O'Brien, Seth Green, and others
- Length: 5 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
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Sarah Vowell travels through the American past and investigates the dusty, bumpy roads of her own life. Her essays confront a wide range of subjects, icons, and historical moments: Ike, Teddy Roosevelt, and Bill Clinton; Canadian Mounties and German Filmmakers; Tom Cruise and Buffy the Vampire Slayer; twins and nerds; the Gettysburg Address, the State of the Union, and George W. Bush's inauguration. The result is an engrossing audiobook, capturing Vowell's memorable wit and her keen social commentary.
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One of the best surprises on AUDIBLE.COM!!
- By Doggy Bird on 04-14-04
By: Sarah Vowell
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Best. Movie. Year. Ever.
- How 1999 Blew Up the Big Screen
- By: Brian Raftery
- Narrated by: George Newbern
- Length: 10 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
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From a veteran culture writer and modern movie expert, a celebration and analysis of the movies of 1999 - arguably the most groundbreaking year in American cinematic history.
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Like talking about movies with a friend
- By Shawn Inmon on 05-30-19
By: Brian Raftery
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Harry, a History
- The True Story of a Boy Wizard, His Fans, and Life Inside the Harry Potter Phenomenon
- By: Melissa Anelli
- Narrated by: Renée Raudman
- Length: 10 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
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With remembrances from J. K. Rowling's editors, agents, publicists, fans, and Rowling herself, Melissa Anelli takes us on a personal journey through every aspect of the Harry Potter phenomenon - from his very first spell to his lasting impact on the way we live and dream.
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Relive the magic!
- By Heather on 03-19-09
By: Melissa Anelli
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Ladies Who Punch
- The Explosive Inside Story of "The View"
- By: Ramin Setoodeh
- Narrated by: Ramin Setoodeh
- Length: 9 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
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When Barbara Walters launched The View, network executives told her that hosting it would tarnish her reputation. Instead, within 10 years, she’d revolutionized morning TV and made household names of her cohosts: Joy Behar, Star Jones, Meredith Vieira, and Elisabeth Hasselbeck. But the daily chat fest didn’t just comment on the news. It became the news. And the headlines barely scratched the surface. Based on unprecedented access, award-winning journalist Ramin Setoodeh takes you backstage where the stars really spoke their minds.
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Please never let this author narrate again! Ever!
- By Sean McCormack on 04-05-19
By: Ramin Setoodeh
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Rush Limbaugh
- An Army of One
- By: Zev Chafets
- Narrated by: Erik Synnestvedt
- Length: 8 hrs
- Unabridged
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Do you remember your first time? People tend to remember the moment they first heard The Rush Limbaugh Show on the radio. For Zev Chafets, it was in a car in Detroit, driving down Woodward Avenue. Limbaugh's braggadocio, the outrageous satire, the slaughtering of liberal sacred cows performed with the verve of a rock-n-roll DJ-it seemed fresh, funny and completely subversive.
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Enjoyed it, despite poor narration
- By David on 06-02-10
By: Zev Chafets
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Caddyshack
- The Making of a Hollywood Cinderella Story
- By: Chris Nashawaty
- Narrated by: Peter Berkrot
- Length: 7 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
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Caddyshack is one of the most beloved comedies of all time, a classic snobs vs. slobs story of working-class kids and the white-collar buffoons that make them haul their golf bags in the hot summer sun. It has sex, drugs, and one very memorable candy bar, but the movie we all know and love didn't start out that way, and everyone who made it certainly didn't have the word classic in mind as the cameras were rolling.
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Not Really About Caddyshack Until Hour 5
- By William M. on 07-01-18
By: Chris Nashawaty
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Pictures at a Revolution
- Five Movies and the Birth of the New Hollywood
- By: Mark Harris
- Narrated by: Lloyd James
- Length: 17 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
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Here is the epic human drama behind the making of the five movies nominated for Best Picture in 1967 - Guess Who's Coming to Dinner, The Graduate, In the Heat of the Night, Doctor Dolittle, and Bonnie and Clyde - and through them, the larger story of the cultural revolution that transformed Hollywood and America forever.
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Would It Be Too Much To Ask?
- By Casey Keller on 12-31-08
By: Mark Harris
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You Couldn't Ignore Me If You Tried
- The Brat Pack, John Hughes, and Their Impact on a Generation
- By: Susannah Gora
- Narrated by: Kelli Tager
- Length: 15 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
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The landscape that the Brat Pack memorialized is rich with cultural themes and significance, and has influenced an entire generation who still believe that life always turns out like an '80s movie. You Couldn't Ignore Me If You Tried takes us back to that era, through Susannah Gora's interviews with key players such as Molly Ringwald, Anthony Michael Hall, Judd Nelson, Andrew McCarthy, and John Cusack, and mines all the material from the movies to the music to the way the films were made to show how they helped shape our visions for romance, friendship, society, and success.
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Brings me back to my teenage years! Fantastic Narration! ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
- By Amazmama on 06-24-22
By: Susannah Gora
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The Horror of It All
- One Moviegoer’s Love Affair with Masked Maniacs, Frightened Virgins, and the Living Dead…
- By: Adam Rockoff
- Narrated by: R.C. Bray
- Length: 7 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
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The Horror of It All is a memoir from the front lines of the industry that dissects (and occasionally defends) the hugely popular phenomenon of scary movies. Author Adam Rockoff traces the highs and lows of the horror genre through the lens of his own obsessive fandom, born in the aisles of his local video store and nurtured with a steady diet of cable trash.
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Great book, if you were a teen in the 80's
- By Lila Fowler on 10-02-15
By: Adam Rockoff
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Superman
- The High-Flying History of America's Most Enduring Hero
- By: Larry Tye
- Narrated by: Scott Brick
- Length: 13 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
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From two-fisted crimebuster to über-patriot, social crusader to spiritual savior, Superman—perhaps like no other mythical character before or since—has evolved in a way that offers a Rorschach test of his times and our aspirations. In this deftly realized appreciation, Larry Tye reveals a portrait of America over seventy years through the lens of that otherworldly hero who continues to embody our best selves.
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This Superman soars
- By tru britty on 07-13-15
By: Larry Tye
What listeners say about Planet Funny
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Adam
- 04-29-20
Sincere, Sweeping
This is an excellent, sweeping history of humor that comes to sharp, earnest point. Written by a man who is actually funny, it rewards listening as much with amusement as with education. Great work, Ken! (And I mean that in a totally un-ironic way).
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- Elizabeth
- 12-01-18
Fascinating take on the business of humor
Ken Jennings offers a look at what makes us laugh now and what worked in the past.
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- Jeremy
- 10-27-21
insightful and funny
very informative and horseshoe to take a new unapproached look at an everyday subject, comedy. full of information I would have never considered knowing before this book. The history of comedy the effects of comedy identifying comedy in my everyday life.
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- Anonymous User
- 02-15-24
Though provoking
Very solid book! Big Ken Jennings fan as well as comedy in general. I will admit there were small portions of the book I feel he droned on about the point he was trying to make. Overall though, some very funny stories, and thought provoking points from points of view I'd never considered. Which makes it well worth a read!
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- Matthew Beyer
- 03-25-19
Pleasant read, nothing more nothing less
Ken Jennings, for those who don’t remember, was the guy who won Jeopardy 70-something times in a row. I’ve been a fan of his since then, originally for his old blog entries, sporadically for his hilarious Reddit AMA’s, and recently for his ‘historical detritus’ podcast The Omnibus. I never got into Twitter but apparently he’s the bee’s knee’s over there too.
What I like about his writings, I think, stems from his massive knowledge base. He’s like an old stoic war veteran calmly rattling off life stories, except instead of grizzled tales of torture and beheadings, he speaks of Damn Girl memes and old episodes of Freaks and Geeks. What I mean by that is that he doesn’t embellish meaning or overstate significance. I imagine that for his trivia-stuffed brain, no one piece of information feels overly significant.
This is appropriate here because this is a minor work. I don’t mean that in any negative sense - the book just takes a social trend, delineates it well, explains it concisely, and does so in an enjoyable package. The main thesis of the book is that due to various technological and social trends, humor has pervaded modern lifestyles to an all encompassing degree. There’s some thought put into whether this is a good thing, but the only consequence mentioned is that it may be taking something from sincere expression of emotion. The most biting the book becomes is from a short section against the vaguely fascist humor troupe Million Dollar Extreme, but even that’s more generally against the inherent uncertainty associated with that infinitely-ironic dadaist style of humor they use.
The most enjoyable moments of the book to me came in Ken’s recollection of his own humor background. His admiration for MST3K, his citing of random twitter jokes, and even just minor stories about his quaint family life. Perhaps the slightness of the book also comes from Ken’s own sense of humor, since it’s inevitably hard for a constant-joker to argue a case that humor has any seriously deleterious effect on the world.
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- Sahil
- 03-16-19
Kinda long for the points made
The premise is that comedy has entered all sorts of places in our lives: news (e.g., The Daily Show), etc. However, the book is really long to make the point. I would listen sometimes and wonder why something is being discussed beyond simply being related to comedy. It wasn't bad enough to return but not good enough to recommend to someone else.
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- Tom Craven
- 06-06-18
A disappointing effort from a sharp wit
PLANET FUNNY is a broad set of essays on contemporary American comedy without much of a central thesis. Jennings does make assertions about various aspects of comedy, but he supports them with evidence on par with a newspaper editorial or a well-written high school essay. He also is constantly hedging, resulting in observations that are more descriptive than insightful. Some of the assertions, especially around the historical progression of comedy, seemingly contradict each other, though each is hedged in the specific context of its own section.
The book is at its best when it leverages Jennings' access to notable and interesting figures in the comedy world, as well as his own experience as a successful Twitter user and podcaster. Twitter gets outsized treatment in the book, but that is entirely warranted given the insight Jennings has from his 20+ thousand tweets to over a quarter-million followers. The humility and detached observational tone he uses actually end up making it seem like he assumes every American has an active Twitter account with at least a few tens of thousands of followers responding to their every quip, which provides a bit of unintentional amusement for the listener who does not.
Toward the end of the book it gets a bit more personal and reflective, but it never goes far enough to make more than the most anodyne statement. I could not tell you the author's actual affirmative view on morality, for instance, except that he seems sensitive to general standards about regretting harm or offense, and his values are likely in-line with the cultural milieu of his Twitter wit peers. But he never really lays his soul bare about post-modern relativism, comic hedonism, Twitter addiction, alternatives to screen time, his work or personal life, or anything you'd call impressively honest autobiographical writing. The tone remains almost entirely anthropological until the too-short last chapter, when he seems to be approaching some interesting personal reflection that he chooses not to engage - at least, not in this book. This is disappointing because to the extent there is a central thesis, it would be something like "Comedy is taking over everything and maybe it shouldn't," which naturally leads the listener to wonder why, and what alternatives the author has in mind.
I strongly recommend BRAINIAC and MAPHEAD (though the latter in print), which also take an anthropological view but do so with more depth. I read BECAUSE I SAID SO before I was a parent; I recall enjoying it then, and I wish there were an audio version to revisit now. Jennings' great strengths are his fluency with obscure and interesting angles on a topic (well-represented in PLANET FUNNY) and his actual sense of humor. Ironically (I believe I am using that right - there's an excellent essay on it in the book!), his actual wit is a bit neutered by the subject matter of comedy. It's hard to be funny about comedy.
I look forward to listening to whatever Jennings does next, including staying current on his above-average podcast Omnibus, but I hope that he can return to form with either a more focused exploration of a specific topic (like Brainiac and Maphead) written in his clever and insightful voice. And I really hope to someday get a more personal and revealing work. I have the sense that Jennnings feels maybe comedy has become too large a part of his own personal and professional identity, and would really enjoy hearing him work through that in the confessional style of some many public-therapy podcasters and comedians.
The audio version is read capably by the author. He does some light tonal and impression work without fully committing to it, which is consistent with his written voice as described above. The .pdf with a half dozen or so hand-drawn charts is excellent and worth looking at.
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9 people found this helpful
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- Kirsten
- 06-08-18
The negative take.
I write the negative take because when I go to look at reviews, I always start with the most critical. Hype is easy - I want to know why people DIDN'T like a book. As evidenced by the 4 and 5 stars, I quite enjoyed this book. I did not like the noises. First, there were tweet-y noises to signify tweets. Annoying and I thought unnecessary. The book was also peppered throughout with "four-letter-words," each one bleeped. Ugh! First, the "bleeps" didn't completely cover the word in question, so if one were to be offended by the language, it just got a whole lot more highlighted! I wish they would have either completely covered the words, chose different less-offensive words, or best of all just left them as is and put an "some explicit language" warning on the summary.
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2 people found this helpful
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- Customer
- 05-26-19
Good but too much personal politics
I was honestly enjoying the first 2/3 until he climbed up, it felt like, on a soapbox of sorts and started pushing his political views. Otherwise, I appreciated the history, the theorizing of humor mechanics, and overall flair.
Also, he didn't mention some of the biggest names in comedy today. I guess the work is ultimately biased towards his preferred type of humor.
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2 people found this helpful
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- David W
- 01-28-19
More (and less) than funny
A very funny man questions where the humour should stop in our modern society. Thought-provoking.
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