Concept
Written by Jack Handey and voiced by Phil Hartman, the ad featured three "kids" portrayed by Dana Carvey, Jan Hooks and Mike Myers. The brief commercial declared that Happy Fun Ball (produced by Wacky Products Incorporated, and its parent company, Global Chemical Unlimited), just $14.95, was "the toy sensation that's sweeping the nation!" However, this positive message about the innocuous-seeming toy was undercut by a much lengthier number of bizarre disclaimers and warnings, including "may suddenly accelerate to dangerous speeds" and "If Happy Fun Ball begins to smoke, seek shelter and cover head." Ingredients include "an unknown glowing substance which fell to Earth, presumably from outer space"; said ingredients are not to be "touched, inhaled, or looked at" if exposed due to rupture. Viewers were also warned, "Do not taunt Happy Fun Ball." The sketch ends with a slogan for Happy Fun Ball: "Accept no substitutes!"
The parody lampooned advertisers, toy manufacturers, chemical companies, absurdly long legal disclaimers, alien conspiracies, and even mentioned the 1991 Gulf War (stating that Happy Fun Ball was being dropped by US warplanes on Iraq).
Happy Fun Ball was presented as one of the sponsors of one of the Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer sketches later in the decade, with the claim that Happy Fun Ball was "Still legal in 16 states. It's happy. It's fun. It's Happy Fun Ball."
Read more about this topic: Happy Fun Ball
Famous quotes containing the word concept:
“The latest creed that has to be believed
And entered in our childish catechism
Is that the All’s a concept self-conceived,
Which is no more than good old Pantheism.”
—Robert Frost (1874–1963)
“The two most far-reaching critical theories at the beginning of the latest phase of industrial society were those of Marx and Freud. Marx showed the moving powers and the conflicts in the social-historical process. Freud aimed at the critical uncovering of the inner conflicts. Both worked for the liberation of man, even though Marx’s concept was more comprehensive and less time-bound than Freud’s.”
—Erich Fromm (1900–1980)
“The new concept of the child as equal and the new integration of children into adult life has helped bring about a gradual but certain erosion of these boundaries that once separated the world of children from the word of adults, boundaries that allowed adults to treat children differently than they treated other adults because they understood that children are different.”
—Marie Winn (20th century)