When People Magazine called Paul Krassner the father of the underground press, he promptly demanded a paternity test. His brainchild, The Realist, published "extreme satire," and ran from 1958-1974. Just over a decade later, in 1985, it staged a return in newsletter form and proceeded to raise hell for another 16 years. Now, the complete archive of this hilarious muckraking rag is making yet another dramatic reappearance, this time in an online version. It's a must-click dilly. Check out this partial index of articles and contributors, or head right to some of these gems:
And you won't want to miss Krassner's notorious hoax: Parts That Were Left Out of the Kennedy book, and Wally Wood's Disneyland Memorial Orgy poster. Of this last, we're not going to link to it, because, um... we're not crazy. But it's in there.
We first featured the San Francisco-based sketch comedy group Kasper Hauser in 2005, pointing to their witty take-off of Craigslist. We then re-visited the troupe last year, after the launch of their parody of "Skymall," that catalog-in-the-sky airlines like to tuck behind the emergency landing procedures in the seat pocket in front of you. Obviously, this is one group that's funny both online and off. When we emailed the fabulous foursome, they told us what it's like to haggle with a Nigerian email scammer, how imitating Ira Glass can be spooky, and how it feels to be one of iTunes' best podcasts of 2006...
So why the name "Kasper Hauser"?
In the early 90s, James found an old New Yorker magazine in a dumpster. It had a story about feral children (The Karpfen Bear Girl, The Justadel Snow Hen, the goat boy, etc...) and Kasper Hauser was one of the cases. He was the boy who wandered into the town of Nuremberg in 1828. When it came time to name our sketch troupe, we kept coming back to the name Kasper Hauser. It's nice and pretentious, and he was a wild kid with bad manners, just like us.
How much more exposure have you gained by putting your stuff on the Web? Do you have any "Web-only" fans that you know about?
Tons. We get emails all the time from fans who've discovered us through the podcast or the website. The Internet has given us a much broader reach than playing onstage for 50, 100... or 4 people at a time. Thank you, Internet. Although dial-up is driving us crazy. Read the full profile...
Filed under: Podcasts, Humor, Parody, Craigslist, Yahoo! Picks Profiles
This is how it ends: Sitcom writer David Penn is trapped in a closet, tied to a chair, with "the sounds of a fake laugh track in his ears." He's got a black eye, he's wearing a T-shirt that says "I HATE MY GIRLFRIEND," and a man is pointing a gun at his head. Thus begins "Break a Leg," a funny web spoof of television and its adherents "brought to you by the acclaimed viewers of Arrested Development, Scrubs and The Office." Michael Scott would be so proud. How David gets into the storage room and why the wild-eyed man wants him dead remains to be seen. Tune in now as the talented group of filmmakers behind (and in front of) the camera finishes out the season—and winds their way back to David's final moments with the revolver, the rope, and the piped-in guffaws.
Filed under: Videos, Television, Humor, Parody
Several weeks ago, we featured Cube News 1, the online "newscast" that dispenses advice to office drones and cubicle slaves everywhere. Now, we touch base with Kim Waldauer, the show's anchor and creative force, to find out how it feels to vent about past bosses on the Web, who's writing her from China, and what's next for this broadcast comic...
Hey Kim, you've been running Cube News 1 for almost a year. Looking back, what surprises you about the experience?
That I would be having so much fun still! The problem now is that we still do Cube News 1 in our free time, and there is a growing demand for more frequent content; we'd like it to be something we dedicate all our time to. There are episodes sitting in my notebook that we just haven't gotten to yet.
How did you get started?
I started this after serving a five-year sentence in a cubicle, as a way for me to cope with some of the b.s. that comes with the job. I did some research and found out that the majority of people working in the U.S. work out of a cubicle, so I knew it had an audience. Read the full profile...
Filed under: Videos, Work Humor, Vlogs, Parody, Yahoo! Picks Profiles
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