COMMENTARY | Anderson Cooper, the CNN anchor of "Anderson Cooper 360," broke down into a fit of giggles during a "Ridiculist" episode Wednesday night. Cooper was reporting on actor Gerard Depardieu's urination incident on an Air France plane. Granted, his report was full of bad puns and potty jokes; it was surprisingly enough to completely break his normally stoic demeanor.
It started innocently enough with "oui, oui" remarks and thes-peein comments, but Depar-doo was the final straw. Anderson could simply not continue after repeating this phrase, according to TIME NewsFeed. The anchor repeatedly wiped his eyes and tried to suppress the fit of giggles without a lot of success. "Sorry, this has actually never happened to me," he said as he dissolved into laughter.
Who hasn't been there? Laughing at unfortunate times is part of human nature. Random things just strike you as hilarious and it takes herculean amounts of willpower to turn off the laugh track. This can be a career hazard for news anchors; not only are the cameras rolling, the stories are sometimes just naturally humorous. Sadly, though, some are entirely not funny. No judgment passed here -- odd connections can result in sheer hilarity.
BBC buzzing
Charlotte Green of BBC Radio 4 tried to read a bulletin over the death of Abby Mann. Her fit of laughter had nothing to do with this distinguished Hollywood screenwriter.
"I'm afraid I just lost it," Green said, according to The Telegraph. She was ambushed by a remark whispered to her about the 1860 recording of a woman singing "Au Clair de la Lune." A coworker said it sounded like a "bee buzzing in a bottle." Guess you never know what will set a person off.
Why was a pig there?
Feeling a little down today? Try to watch Russian host Tatiana Subotina give reporting a simple news story her best shot. Her task was to report on the news of a plantation in Canada being guarded by 13 bears, a dog, a Vietnamese pig and a raccoon. Truly it does have the makings of a TV sitcom. She repeatedly tried to fight through the humorous images this story created, but just could not make it through.
Not only was she unable to breathe over the fact the bears were sitting -- "Why were the bears found sitting? They could at least be standing!" -- the part that made her scream with laughter involved another animal, reports NewsFlavor: "So, what the hell is a pig doing there?"
Shocked into laughter
Other times, though, the stories are anything but funny. The ill-timed laughter of a Michigan reporter came across as heartless. While describing a gruesome murder and the subsequent arrest of the husband for chopping up his wife, the reporter could not stop laughing, according to the Huffington Post.
Chalk this up to laughing at a funeral. She may have found the suspect's mug shot shockingly funny. His bug-eyed, wild look may have simply thrown her over the edge.
What do you expect?
There are times when news anchors are seemingly set up for failure. Like Anderson Cooper reporting on the peeing incident, complete with a litany of puns, Toronto anchors were faced with an absurd story. They tried to report on a new invention, a suitcase that turns into a flotation device, but lost control. The ridiculous image of a person wearing a giant suitcase over their head with arms and legs encased in a flotation suit in the water was just too much for two anchors to handle. Finally, after giggling their way through the main part of the story, one finally says, "Oh, this is not looking good," reports the Huffington Post.
Come on, it's funny. When perfectly coiffed news anchors lose it in fits of giggles, often inappropriately timed, the result is a glimpse at their humanity. We've all been there.
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