T w e n t y S i d e d
Obligatory: To everyone who celebrates, I hope you have a great holiday. To those that don’t celebrate… er, have a nice day anyhow?
I’m very curious how much this video will appeal to people. It’s a very localized form of humor. It’s making fun of the “Pittsburgh accent” and poking fun of the general culture around the Steel City. It had me howling, but like I said, I don’t know how far the appeal goes. If I watched a video where people from Reinickendorf made fun of the people from Spandau, it might have the folks from Berlin in stitches, but I imagine the humor would be lost on me.
Link (YouTube) |
I have to say these guys do a remarkable job nailing the accent. I’ve known people that talk like this. In particular, about 10% of the guys in my graduating class looked and sounded like Donny. (The skinny one.) Amazingly, the accent is 100% acting: The actors don’t talk like this at all.
Anyway. Merry Christmas.
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“Amazingly, the accent is 10% acting”
10% is not all that amazing.Just sayin’.
Everyone have a happy holiday season, no matter what you choose to celebrate! I like to spend my holiday time… uh… visiting Twenty Sided. Yeah.
Can’t say I find the video too funny, but I understand the intention now that you’ve explained it; I guess I just can’t personally relate to it. As a simple Canadian heathen, I guess we have our own stereotypes to make fun of.
Luckily, Twenty Sided is still a pretty good holiday destination in the off season.
I am from Snyder County Pennsylvania (some even more localized humor http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q6s3tkkzWI8&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL ), in the center of the state. If you did not tell me that this was making fun of Pittsburgh accents I would have never known. So yeah. But then I am not the best at spotting regional accents.
Bullcrap
As a Canadian, I thought the video was funny. Even if it’s specific to Pittsburgh, there are local stereotypes here which are very similar.
Are you referring to the French bits or the “aboot” bits?
Because I make fun of both.
It’s long been my family’s tradition to accidentally watch the worst possible version of a Christmas Carol*, usually some reimagining of the story given local flavor. Berkeley Christmas Carol? Yeah, we’ve seen it. San Francisco Christmas Carol? Ate it with a spoon.
So: _yes_! Thanks for posting this. Best believe I’ll be sharing it with my family.
Also: Totally didn’t get the phili-humor, but the rest of it translated fairly well :)
*Just so we’re clear: This is meant lovingly :)
Anyone else do a double-take at the closing lyrics?
When I get on the site tomorrow, I’m expecting falling snowflake gifs, obnoxious sparkling text and Silent Night’s score fed through a MIDI converter (with the setting put on “so tinny, it had to be on purpose”) and played through a media player carefully hidden on the page.
As a Berliner, I can certainly confirm, that I don’t get the humor in the video. But I totally like the idea of making fun of “Spandauer”.
Oh and you should cut the “s” in Berliners, that looks plain silly.
In any case, Happy Holidays everyone. =)
That was fantastic. :D And yeah, they definitely nailed the accent.
Gregeneezer should have thrown down his Advantage Card to the kid, though. I definitely wouldn’t toss out the opportunity to get Fuel Perks!
I know nothing about Pittsburgh, and I enjoyed that quite a bit.
But then, I’m amused by lots of stuff that other people don’t care for. And now I’m waiting to see the Minnesota/Dakotas Christmas Carol….
Happy Christmas, Seamu . . . Shamus. And here’s to many more years of information, education and entertainment
I didn’t have any trouble with the humor in this adaptation at all, considering that Buffalo, NY has so many demographic parallels to Pittsburgh, PA with very slight variations. We even ahve our own version of that particular accent, though it’s much more seldom heard these days than it once was.
Hey Shamus, I’ve thrown a few (6ish?) e-mails your way in the past year and not gotten a response to any of them. I recall you saying something about your spam filters being a little… enthusiastic, so I figured I’d throw you the heads up that you still have a bit of tweaking to do.
Or you’re just ignoring me. That’s cool, too.
Interesting. Are you using the same email you use in the comments form?
Yes, I am.
EDIT:: Oh hey, I mentioned this because I sent you an e-mail one or two days ago and I figured you’d have responded by now. It was the first one I’ve sent since you tweaked the filter, if I remember correctly.
Also, have a happy holiday, etc. etc.
EDIT EDIT:: And hey while I have your attention, what happened to Hex?
Suffered from a divide by cucumber error. Shamus needs to reinstall the universe.
And the various service packs.
I think the service packs are the easiest part of reinstalling the universe, it’s finding the right drivers for all the dimensions and laws of physics that are the real headache.
And don’t get me started on reinstalling quantum, it’s like not even the manufacturers know how it works … but for some reason if you don’t install it at all, you get all sorts of crashes and errors and BSODs every five minutes. Instead of once or twice a month, that is. Whenever there’s a major problem with my universe, it’s always bloody quantum.
Quantum drivers aside, at least the universe populates itself.
It’s complex as hell, nobody likes it, and everyone seems to be playing it. No advertising, even!
It’s like there’s a monopoly over MUDs.
I can’t believe none of you have read the Discworld books. (Except possibly Yor Kramer.)
Okay, how about this, Will:
Shamus lost the FTB.
That cheer you up?
I was trying to extend the joke as-is and still reference Lu-Tze’s “there’s always bloody quantum.” ;)
Happy holiday to you as well, Mr. Young.
I just recently found this blog and have enjoyed reading many of your past rants. (It’s always a pleasure to encounter someone who hates Steam as much as I do.)
Well, I might not have gotten all of the specific references in that video, but it was still pretty hilarious. I don’t know if that cheesy, low-budget style and incredibly dry humor are Pittsburgh-specific, but it sure managed to make me laugh.
Thanks for the lovely Christmas gift, Shamus. :)
Being a Swede I thought this video was hilarious. The accent sounded really silly when put together with the script. I doubt I found it funny because it was a Pittsburgh-parody(-ish?).
G: “Keep the change”
D: “It’s a penny Greg.”
G: “I feel great.”
Loved it!
Oh, how I would love to see a New York version of this. I’m from upstate, lived away for 20 years, and still say “cawfee”. Also, we have some stereotypical phrases you may be familiar with.
Merry Christmas to you, the spoiler warning crew, and the community!
Thanks for the laughs / insightful commentary / Bethesda bashing all year long.
Some of the Philly-specific humour was probably over my head but the accent is mocked all the way over here in Texas (where we have mock-worthy accents of our own). And even quite a few of the “local” sayings were familiar or made perfect sense like being boiled in your own hot dog water. I hadn’t heard it before but I got the joke and it made me laugh.
I’m not from the Pittsburgh area, but I have family there. I didn’t really know that there was a “Pittsburgh accent” before watching this, but now that I have I can say that (1) my relatives in Pittsburgh have that accent (and the idioms, and the mannerisms) and (2) the actors in this video NAILED it.
Merry Christmas/Bullcrap!
I like the way that Pittsburgh keeps getting shortened to “Philly” in the comments.
Indeed. As everyone knows, it should be “Pity”.
8-)
Just wanted to say Merry Christmas to everyone. Seems to be the best place to do it :)
Bah, humbug.
Well, someone had to say it, and I think I fit the bill as well as anyone. (Wasn’t visited by three christmas spirits though.)
Please accept with no obligation, implied or implicit, my best wishes for an environmentally conscious, socially responsible, low-stress, non-addictive, gender-neutral celebration of the winter solstice holiday, practiced within the most enjoyable traditions of the religious persuasion of your choice, or secular practices of your choice, with respect for the religious/secular persuasion and/or traditions of others, or their choice not to practice religious or secular traditions at all. I also wish you a fiscally successful, personally fulfilling and medically uncomplicated recognition of the onset of the generally accepted calendar year 2011, but not without due respect for the calendars of choice of other cultures whose contributions to society have helped make America great. Not to imply that America is necessarily greater than any other country nor the only America in the Western Hemisphere. And without regard to the race, creed, color, age, physical ability, religious faith or sexual preference of the wishee. By accepting these greetings you are accepting these terms. This getting is subject to clarification or withdrawal. It is freely transferable with no alteration to the original greeting. It implies no promise by the wisher to actually implement any of the wishes for herself or himself or others, and is void where prohibited by law and is revocable at the sole discretion of the wisher. This wish is warranted to perform as expected within the usual application of good tidings for a period of one year or until the issuance of a subsequent holiday greeting, whichever comes first, and warranty is limited to replacement of this wish or issuance of a new wish at the sole discretion of the wisher.
Or Merry Christmas. ;-)
Have to say as a Malaysian I don’t get this at all… then again I didn’t like Fargo one bit so I might just be a soulless zombie who was reanimated to rain on Christmas videos…
Also why do they switch to British accents at times?
Thanks and merry Christmas :)
Not really getting this (reminds of William H Macy in Fargo though, ‘Aw jeez’) but as you say it’s a local thing. I suppose it’s like that other video about the new kid in class, I was baffled by the reaction to the little girl outside Ireland. Interesting to see though so keep ’em coming :D
Yeah… I didn’t find it all that entertaining. Guess the humour is lost on us Eurotrash. Or maybe just on me. ^^;
As for HOW FAR the appeal goes, I would say somewhat less than the 5 miles between your house and mine.