You know the scene in the great film “Casablanca” where Captain Renault, impeccably played by the great Claude Rains, bursts into Rick’s Cafe and shuts the place down?
Then Rick, played of course even more impeccably by Humphrey Bogart, demands to know why he is being shut down, Renault replies that he is “Shocked…shocked to discover that gambling is going on in here.”
This moment is immediately followed by Peter Lorre as “Ugarte” walking up and handing the Captain a wad of bills and saying “Your winnings, sir.”
(You can watch this great scene now by clicking here.)
I instantly thought of this classic cinematic moment, when I read that the marketing geniuses at Microsoft have pulled their ads for Windows 7 from the upcoming FOX tv special “Family Guy presents: Seth and Alex’s Almost Live Comedy Show”. The sudden move is said to have come after some Microsoft execs sat through the taping of the special, which features Family Guy creator Seth McFarlane and Alex Borstein, who is the voice of “Lois” and a major creative force in the hit animated series.
Apparently the MS execs were shocked…shocked I say…to discover that “the content was not a fit with the Windows brand.”
In the words of one Mr. Peter Griffin of Quahog, Rhode Island: “Are you freakin’ kidding me?”
Because clearly no one–not one single person at Microsoft, had ever watched a single episode of the show Mr. Griffin is the star of. Because watching only five minutes would make it clear, I mean crystal freakin’ clear, that Family Guy respects only one thing in its sense of what is funny.
Nothing.
My friends, this is because there is pretty much no joke too crass, no scene too painful, and no premise too sensitive for McFarlane and his band of comic geniuses to stop and ask “maybe we shouldn’t quite do that?” Because every time that question comes up in the offices of Fuzzy Door Productions (McFarlane’s company that creates Family Guy along with “American Dad” and the new “The Cleveland Show”)–the answer, after a few seconds of pausing for maximum comedic effect, is obviously always the same:
“Well damn, that’s too funny!”
For all the cool new things that Windows 7 does, apparently NOT one of them is the repairing of anyone’s sense of humor. Because it is impossible to watch one episode of Family Guy and not realize it is the product of a group of true geniuses.
MediaMemo columnist Jason Kafka covers the story’s unbelievable details for “All Things D” which you can read right here.
I mean coming from the folks who brought you “Clippy”, does this really surprise anybody?