A Sunday Funny:Why Does Johnny Carson’s “Sis Boom Bah” Joke Make Me Laugh?

An occasional series on things that crack me up, and for reasons I can never fully explain

I’ll confess something that probably reveals more about my sense of humor than I should share:

Do I enjoy sharp wit, amusing parody, and subtle satire?

Complex, layered and deep comedic structure?

I sure do. But:

I’m also a big fan of “purely silly.”

In fact, some of my favorite, “Well, now, this is funny” things are so dumbed-down, so simple: I have a hard time figuring out my own, sometimes-puzzled perception of their brilliance.

But, hey, I’ll take a shot. Let’s start today and go back 40+ years ago, to have a look at one of my favorite “greatest hits,” and try to figure out why it puts me away every time I watch it.

A Setup Is So Dumb, It’s Brilliant

Let’s be honest: Johnny Carson doing his Carnac the Magnificent bit? We’re not exactly in David Sedaris territory.

You know the one:

Carson, clad in a ridiculous, over-the-top turban and cape, pretending to do the old magician’s billet reading trick, holding sealed envelopes to his forehead, divining the answers before reading the questions.

He’d shuffle on stage in full mystical regalia:

…While announcer and sidekick Ed McMahon boomed his “Carnac… the Magnificent!” introduction, as if he were presenting royalty.

A fake psychic predicting punchlines from unopened envelopes? It’s absurd. It’s amateur theatricality. Just typing it out here, I realize that it reads like a rejected high school talent show skit.

And yet, Carson made it work beautifully.

The Jokes Were Terrible (In the Best Way)

Uh… The… jokes?

I fully realize that more than a few of, and maybe most of the Carnac jokes were… awful. But delivered with such faux mystical solemnity, they somehow transcended from the inane to became hilarious.

Gloriously dumb. Pun-laden. Groan-worthy.
Some examples:

The maybe-somehow-risqué-adjacent:

A: Dustin Hoffman.
Q: Describe someone cleaning his Hoffman.

The topical-in-their-day:

A: Pat and Debby Boone.
Q: Name the only two people who aren’t sick of hearing “You Light Up My Life.”

The just plain dumb:

A: Black and white and twenty feet tall.
Q: Describe Sister Mary Kong

None of these are what we’d term as “highbrow.” Or, really, any other brow. Save perhaps, “Pretty low.” And somehow, in the hands of Carson?

The groaners become laugh-out-loud funny.

Maybe it’s the delivery. Maybe it’s the timing. Maybe it’s just the sheer audacity of it all.

Maybe it’s because the audience got to play along.

When a particularly bad pun yielded a negative audience response, Carnac would stare back for and instant and then cast a cliched “Middle Eastern curse” on the crowd, such as “May a bag of Pop Rocks explode in your shorts.”

Fun fact: the “curse joke” concept had a name: “The Carnac Saver.”

The riff-within-the bit was co-created by then-contributing writer Woody Allen, along with collaborator Marshall Brickman.

In a 2009 interview, Allen said, “I’ll go to my grave having to apologize for having invented the Carnac Saver.”

The “Sis Boom Bah” Legacy

The “Sis Boom Bah” joke aired on August 5, 1981. Carson himself ranked it as the second-best moment in his 30-year run as host.

Ed McMahon later recalled that Carson had warned him before the show: one of the jokes in the Carnac bit “is going to put you away.”

McMahon had no idea what the joke was, or when it would be told.

The setup:
A: “Sis boom bah.”

When the “question” part of the joke was revealed, it triggered what is widely considered the longest sustained laugh in the show’s history.

McMahon’s usual supporting and somewhat “canned” chuckle was replaced by a genuine, uncontrollable belly laugh, complete with tears, which only added to the moment’s authenticity and charm.

For you statistical purists, it was 53 seconds. In perhaps the only time during the estimable Carnac’s tenure, Johnny and Ed both broke character. As the audience roared, they were barely able to continue the bit.

Who Wrote the Joke?

I’ve been searching for about a year for definitive attribution. The authorship of the joke is debated.

Some sources credit Pat McCormick, a veteran comedy writer known for his zany, offbeat humor and long-time collaborations with Carson.

However, the evidence strongly suggests that it was written by Kevin Mulholland, another staff writer on The Tonight Show.

Both writers were known for their sharp timing and love of absurdist wordplay.

So: What’s So Funny About It?

I have no idea.

Maybe it’s my mind’s empathy for, and personification of the poor little sheep. Maybe it’s the timing. Or the rhythm and combination of the three syllables.

Maybe it’s my delight in hearing the audience’s parsing of each word in the “answer” as they apply it to the “question.” You can feel the eventual, “I get it” – in three distinct waves of realization. Or:

Perhaps it epitomizes a masterful confluence of mid-century American vaudevillian vernacular and meta-linguistic humor, deftly subverting conventional comedic tropes through its playful invocation of cheerleading onomatopoeia as a symbol of performative enthusiasm within a hyper-mediated televisual context.

Um, no. Not quite, laughing boy.

Remember the first rule of comedy: if you have to over-explain it, it wasn’t actually funny.

I will say: In an age where comedy is often layered with irony, commentary, and existential dread, there’s something refreshing about a joke that’s just… dumb.