TV Tuesday—Buster appeared on the Canadian show "Flashback" on October 10, 1965, while he was in Toronto shooting his final film, "The Scribe." Here he talks about how he accomplished his famous falling house-front stunt for Steamboat Bill, Jr.
The 15 rules of Filmmaking for comedy movies by Zucker, Abrahams and Zucker (ZAZ):
"1. JOKE ON A JOKE: Two jokes at the same time cancel each other out. If the joke is in the background, the foreground action should be serious, and vice versa. Focus on one joke at a time.
2. ACKNOWLEDGEMENT: Sometimes referred to as “winking.” Don’t acknowledge the joke, or that you made a joke. Actors in the foreground must ignore jokes happening behind them.
3. MERELY CLEVER: A “clever” joke isn’t good enough. It has to get a laugh.
4. BREAKING THE FRAME: Don’t remind the audience they’re watching a movie. Jokes about the movie itself, the movie business, or comedy itself are a strict no-no, although it’s possible to sneak one in if you don’t dwell on it. See Rule #11: That didn’t happen.
5. TRIVIA: A joke using references so arcane that few people will ever get it.
6. JERRY LEWIS: A comedian who is doing every possible crazy thing he can to get a laugh. As a result, when something was over the top, we would just say, “Jerry Lewis.”
7. AXE GRINDING: When the joke is overshadowed by some message, it gets unfunny fast.
8. KNOCKING DOWN THE POSTS: Conceptual jokes are fine, but people don’t laugh at concepts; they laugh at verbal or visual punch lines. In 'Airplane!' (1980) the gag of the soldier leaning out the door as his girlfriend runs alongside is merely referencing the same scene we’ve seen in hundreds of films where it makes sense—or a train. Fortunately, we decided to put old-style railroad posts on the runway and have the girl knock them over. People clearly get the concept of the scene, but they don’t laugh until she knocks down the posts.
9. STRAW DUMMY: A hollow setup for a joke where the target has been invented by the writer. You can’t satirize something that doesn’t exist. Like a block-long, nuclear-powered bus.
10. CAN YOU LIVE WITH IT?: Once a joke is made, it can’t be allowed to hang around (Rule #14). Like a personalized license plate, how long can “LV2FART” be funny?
11. THAT DIDN’T HAPPEN: Something that totally defies all logic but is on and off the screen so fast that we get away with it. Robert Stack in 'Airplane!' yells, “They’re on instruments!” Cut to the cockpit—the actors are playing musical instruments. Seconds later, the saxophone and clarinets have disappeared. If it’s done right, no one in the audience will ask where the instruments went.
12. UNRELATED BACKGROUND: A joke happening in the background, though unacknowledged, still needs to be related in some way to the action in the foreground. This rule was put into effect after the release of Airplane!, when we desperately trying to figure out why no one laughed at the spear striking the wall behind Robert Stack and a watermelon crashing on the table behind Lloyd Bridges. It made us laugh so hard when we wrote it, filmed it, saw it in dailies, as well as the finished film. Unfortunately we were the only ones. It was craziness without an actual joke. We left it in, and probably in some way it adds to the irreverent tone of the film, but it never gets a laugh.
13. TECHNICAL PIZZAZZ: Special effects and big action don’t necessarily mean funny.
14. HANGING ON: Don’t play a joke too long. When it reaches its peak, get out. The film should move off a joke before the audience does.
15. THERE ARE NO RULES: We try to follow these rules as closely as possible, realizing that perhaps what is most important is knowing when to ignore them."
("Surely You Can't be Serious - The True Story of Airplane!", ZAZ interviewed by Will Harris, 2023)
P.S: On this day, 46 years ago, "Airplane!" (1980) was released in the USA.