The Philosopher's Comedy Club

Transcript

OPHIRA EISENBERG, HOST:

Here are our next two contestants. Stan Lee and Charlie Esser are settling in behind their puzzle podiums. Charlie?

CHARLIE ESSER: Uh-huh.

EISENBERG: Have you ever taken any philosophy?

ESSER: No.

(LAUGHTER)

EISENBERG: None at all?

ESSER: Not really, no. No, none at all. I read "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy."

JOHN CHANESKI: There you go.

(LAUGHTER)

EISENBERG: And you are joined by Stan Lee, who I just have to point out...

STAN LEE: Hi.

EISENBERG: Welcome. Stan Lee is not the co-creator of Spider-Man. He is a much more important person.

LEE: Actually, that's my secret identity.

EISENBERG: How about you, any philosophy in your background?

LEE: My academic adviser advised me to take intro and call her in the morning, and I majored in it for undergrad.

EISENBERG: Our next game is called The Philosopher's Comedy Club. And as a standup comic myself, just imaging this place sends chills down my spine. I can't imagine, I guess you'd find out what the sound of one hand clapping feels like, and the heckling would be out of control. "Not enlightening enough." "An unexamined joke is not worth telling." "I think, therefore you suck."

(LAUGHTER)

EISENBERG: Tell me it's not going to be like that, John.

CHANESKI: No, it's going to be a little worse actually.

(LAUGHTER)

CHANESKI: Philosophers get a bad rap for being a bit boring, serious people, but in this game we find out that many of them were originally standup comedians. It's true. It was Jean-Paul Sartre who said, "I just flew in from hell, and boy am I tired of other people."

(LAUGHTER)

CHANESKI: So, contestants, you have to identify the philosophers who just might have told the following hacky jokes. And please, try the veal. Here we go. A lawyer, a plumber and a used car salesman all die in a plane crash and find themselves at the Pearly Gates, except they don't because God is dead.

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

CHANESKI: Stan?

LEE: Nietzsche.

CHANESKI: Nietzsche is right, very good.

EISENBERG: There you go.

(APPLAUSE)

CHANESKI: Did you ever notice how the end justifies the means? What's the deal with that?

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

CHANESKI: Charlie?

ESSER: Immanuel Kant.

CHANESKI: Not Kant, no.

ESSER: No.

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

CHANESKI: Stan?

LEE: Niccolo Machiavelli.

CHANESKI: Machiavelli is right. Yes, way to go. Good steal.

(APPLAUSE)

CHANESKI: Take my wife, or at least the shadow of her that appears on the cave wall to which I spend my life chained, please.

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

CHANESKI: Charlie?

ESSER: Plato.

CHANESKI: Plato is right.

(APPLAUSE)

CHANESKI: What you do not wish for yourself, do not do to others in bed.

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

(LAUGHTER)

CHANESKI: Stan?

LEE: That was the Tao Te Ching, Lao Tzu.

CHANESKI: Not Lao Tzu, no. Charlie, for the steal?

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

ESSER: That would be Hillel.

CHANESKI: No, not Hillel. Anybody here, anybody else know it?

Yes, Confucius.

EISENBERG: Confucius.

CHANESKI: Give that lady one point. Very good.

(APPLAUSE)

CHANESKI: How many philosophers does it take to screw in a light bulb? Only one, if he acts according to the maxim whereby he can, at the same time will that it should become a universal law. Besides, it doesn't matter because the light bulb is, in itself, unknowable.

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

CHANESKI: Charlie?

ESSER: Bacon.

CHANESKI: Not Bacon. Stan?

LEE: Either Immanuel Kant or Ludwig Wittgenstein.

CHANESKI: Pick one.

(LAUGHTER)

EISENBERG: I like that idea though.

LEE: The right one.

CHANESKI: Sorry. Flip a coin if you have to.

LEE: Kant. Kant.

CHANESKI: Kant is right.

(APPLAUSE)

CHANESKI: I do not agree with what she said, but I'll defend to the death her right to have said it. That's what she said.

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

(LAUGHTER)

CHANESKI: Charlie?

ESSER: Locke.

CHANESKI: No, not Locke.

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

CHANESKI: Stan?

LEE: Thomas Paine.

CHANESKI: Not Paine.

(SOUNDBITE OF AUDIENCE YELLING)

CHANESKI: Voltaire is right. Give that lady another point.

EISENBERG: Voltaire.

(APPLAUSE)

CHANESKI: I don't know who she is, but she's doing pretty well.

EISENBERG: Voltaire, I don't even know where.

CHANESKI: Right.

(LAUGHTER)

CHANESKI: A guy walks into a bar and the bartender says "What can I get you?" the guy says nothing. He who is attached to things will suffer much, according to the Tao.

Stan?

LEE: Lao Tzu.

CHANESKI: That's Lao Tzu, very good.

EISENBERG: There you go.

(APPLAUSE)

CHANESKI: Okay, get ready. So a guy goes to a talent agent and says "Have I got an act for you. It's a family and the dad realizes that achievement of his own happiness is the only moral purpose of life. And the mom, she rejects ethical altruism. And the son knows that government help is just as dangerous as government persecution." And the agent says, "I love it. What's the act called?" And the guy says "The Objectivists."

(LAUGHTER)

(SOUNDBITE OF BELL)

CHANESKI: Stan?

LEE: Ayn Rand.

CHANESKI: Ayn Rand is right.

(APPLAUSE)

EISENBERG: Stan, congratulations, you have won this philosophical round. Stan Lee will be continuing to our final round. How about a hand for Charlie, everybody?

(APPLAUSE) Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.