A-Z GUIDE TO MOVIES AND TV SHOWS PARODIED BY MAD, CRACKED, CRAZY, ETC. UP TO 1996. THEY HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH THIS. SPOILERS AND OTHER NON-SEQUITURS, TOO. SOMETIMES THESE THINGS HAVE WORDS OR SITUATIONS WE DON'T USE ANYMORE. YOU KNOW, 'CAUSE THEY'RE OLD.
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SICKLY MINUTES MEETS THE CORNBALL COMPANY
Australian MAD #284, January 1989
w & a: Robert Fidgeon
The Comedy Company was a sketch comedy show in Australia. Kylie Mole (Mary-Ann Fahey) was one of the most famous recurring characters, a teenager who often interviewed celebrities, similar to Jiminy Glick or Chris Farley doing The Chris Farley Show on SNL.
The cover gag refers to superstar Kylie Minogue and Jason Donovan.
Correspondents on their version of Sixty Minutes were Ian Leslie, Richard Carleton, Jennifer Byrne, Mike Munro, and Jeff McMullen. The cast of The Comedy Company, besides the aforementioned Kylie Mole, were Siobhan Tuke, Glenn Robbins, Kym Gyngell, Tim Smith, Ian McFadyen, and Mike Mitchell.
Another character who continued outside the show was Con the Fruiterer (Mark Mitchell), who became an actual health advocate.
COL'N CARPENTRY
Australian MAD #307, December 1991
w & a: Steve Lopes
The show spun off to a separate sitcom, with the character Col'n Carpenter (Kym Gyngell) sharing a home with Michael (Stig Wemyss) and Linda (Kaarin Fairfax)
SIXTY SECONDS
MAD #210, October 1979
w: Lou Silverstone
a: Jack Davis
This news show has been on every night... uh... like clockwork. MAD has done several parodies of them over the years. This first one was of the show in general with the original reporters Dan Rather, Mike Wallace, and Morley Safer.
SIX MINUTES ON “THE RETURN OF THE DRAFT”
MAD #215, June 1980
w: Lou Silverstone
a: Jack Davis
They parodied the show again using journalist Harry Reasoner.
SIX MINUTES LOOKS AT NUCLEAR POWER
MAD #233, September 1982
w: Lou Silverstone
a: Jack Davis
Their Sixty Minutes parodies started to become almost a recurring feature similar in MAD, similar to their “[---] of the Year” articles. The show also had reporters that came and went, like here they had Ed Bradley.
AN ANDY ROONEY “60 MINUTES” EDITORIAL WE'D LIKE TO SEE
MAD #239, June 1983
w: John Ficarra
Andy Rooney had a humor opinion piece at the end of the show in the early 80s. Mike Wallace had a mini-scandal when he was caught on tape commenting the fine print in housing contracts would be hard to read “over watermelon and tacos”
SICKY MINUTES LOOKES AT SEX AND VIOLENCE IN AMERICA TODAY
MAD #260, January 1986
w: Lou Silverstone
a: Angelo Torres
As you could see for their letters columns, the targets of MAD were usually in on the joke and you could argue their jokes may have been compromised as a result, but two places where they never pulled any punches were with smoking and religious hypocrisy.
Diane Sawyer was a correspondent for the show. The opening panel has North Carolina Senator Jesse Helms.
The next to last panel has a caricature of Phyllis Schlafly, anti-feminism architect.
Jerry Falwell, precursor to today's “war on wokeness” pundits.
Bob Guccione, as publisher of Penthouse, was Hefner's “hold my beer” competitor.
SIX MINUTES LOOKS AT SMOKING
MAD #292, January 1990
w: Lou Silverstone
a: Angelo Torres
Meredith Vieira was another reporter for Sixty Minutes.
The bellboy was a TV mascot for Philip Morris cigarettes.
Old Gold cigarettes had commercials with a box that had a woman's legs. What this aricle fails to mention is that decades before this Mike Wallace did cigarette commercials.
Morton Downey, Jr. was one of the last of the cigarette smoking talk-show hosts.
Sixty Minutes has covered all sorts of subjects in its long run, including the inner workings of MAD. This is from 1987, and they mention how MAD was an institution that had been around for years. This report is now older than the first issue of MAD was then.
SICKLY MINUTES
Cracked #277, December 1992
w: Lou Silverstone
a: Walter Brogan
Lesley Stahl became one of their regulars. Covering the George Bush Sr/Bill Clinton/H. Ross Perot presidential race This has Howard Stern, Bart Simpson, and Madonna as correspondents just in case you forger this was 1992.
>
Gennifer Flowers was one of the women who claimed Bill Clinton had an affair with her.
The first panel has Jesse Jackson and the second has Mario Cuomo.
FAR FETCHED
Australian MAD #293, February 1990
w & a: Andrew Fyfe
Sketch comedy show similar to I guess what Saturday Night Live has become with a regular cast and recurring characters. I've only seen about two or three episodes.
The splash page is their Eyeball News Team bit with weatherman Sunny Gales (Peter Moon), Pixie-Ann Wheatley (Magda Szubanski), Dirk Hartog (Steve Vizard), Jo-Beth Jo (Jane Turner), and Redmond Herring (Michael Veitch).
Darren Hunch (Steve Vizard) is a parody of Australian TV personality Derryn Hinch. One of their regular sketches was Chanille's L'institute de Boutique hosted by Chanille (Magda Szubinski) and Janelle (Marg Downey). Advertising executives were Brent Smythe and Barry (Steve Vizard and Peter Moon).
Often the bits would segue into another as if one were changing channels or fast forwarding (hence the name) on a VCR. Brent Smythe and Barry are being interviewed by Marg Downey's impersonation of Jana Wendt, hostess of A Current Affair, which is not associated with the US show of the same name.
Other characters included gay flight attendents (Michael Veitch, Steve Vizard). I haven't been able to find out who “Ita Buttock” was. But at the end the cast of Fast Forward are really members of the Australian sketch show The Comedy Company.
THE GREATEST TV SHOW EVER MADE
Cracked #161, August 1979
a:John Severin
Another comic, just like yesterday, where Cracked did what they did throughout most of the 70s and 80s by doing several parodies at once,usually combining them, they did movies last time, this time they set their sights on TV shows.
One of the tropes of Laverne and Shirley was Shirley's stuffed kitten.
They used Robin Williams as Mork from Mork and Mindy every chance they could, doing about five parodies and three specials with him.
For some reason Hawkeye (Alan Alda) and "Hot Lips" Houlihan (Loretta Swit) of M*A*S*H are married in this. Maybe they would be in post-Korea civilian life.
They also had Roarke (Ricardo Montalban) of Fantasy Island.
Cheryl Ladd, Kate Jackson, and Jaclyn Smith, the second wave of Charlie's Angels. Felix (Tony Randall) and Oscar (Jack Klugman) of The Odd Couple, which was off the air by then. Lorne Greene as Commander Adama on Battlestar Galactica, Ed Asner was Lou Grant in his own show by then. Archie (Carroll O'Connor) and Edith (Jean Stapleton) from All In the Family.
Mike Wallace of Sixty Minutes when they were more known for investigative reporting than profiles (they still do both). Back to Battlestar Galactica with Richard Hatch as Apollo. John Travolta had left the role of Vinnie Barbarino on Welcome Back, Kotter by then though Valerie Bertinelli was still Barbara on One Day at a Time.
Mork's commander was named Orson. Linda Lavin was Alice.
Fonz was another person they put in Cracked every chance they could. The only other two series of Don Rickles I know of were The Don Rickles Show and CPO Sharkey.
Yesterday I posted a bunch of different parodies of Dukes of Hazzard from different magazines. Click on "older post" at the bottom if you missed that and to see what the characters' names were. I said yesterday I didn't have time or enough room to get to all of them, so here are three more, all from Cracked.
Sorry in advance for apologizing for the Confederate flag and the trigger it may set off, it's just that a very small minority of people can't tell the difference between showing something and endorsing it.
THE DORKS OF HAZZARDOUS
Cracked #179, August 1981
a: John Severin
The same issue parodied the Popeye movie but didn't combine the two things like they usually do.
They did five parodies in total. That was the third. The first one was posted yesterday, The second was a crossover with CHiPS that I posted a couple months ago with the parodies of that show. Here's the fourth one.
THE DORKS OF HAZZARDOUS
Cracked #185, March 1982
a: John Severin
NIGHT RIDER MEETS THE DUKES OF HAZZARDOUS
Cracked #196, August 1983
a: John Severin
Always parodying shows repeatedly and crossing them over with other shows, they did a mash-up with Knight Rider, a program about Michael Knight (David Hasselhoff) and his intelligent car.
In the next to last season, Bo and Luke left the show to be NASCAR drivers, and were replaced by cousins Coy and Vance (Byron Cherry and Christopher Mayer). They returned, probably due to the actors renegotiating their contracts.
From If TV Shows Were Combined in Cracked #205, August 1984. Mike Wallace and Morley Safer were the hosts of Sixty Minutes.
UPDATE:
From cover to Mexican edition.
UPDATE 2:
THE DUPES OF HAZZARD
Bananas #65, c. 1983
w: Megan Stine & H. William Stine
a: Sam Viviano
Viviano always liked to put himself in his strips. Here he is in the splash panel.
In the first panel are Li'l Abner and Daisy Mae, hosts of their own rural venue.
From Isn't It Time That... in Bananas Looks at TV, c. 1981, probably reprinted from an earlier issue.
