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The Krusty the Clown Show, also known as The Krusty the Klown Show, is a popular children's variety show in Springfield that airs on Channel 6 every afternoon at 4 PM, and is hosted by Krusty the Clown. A parody of shows filmed in front of a live child audience, the show has a circus theme remininscent of The Bozo Show and is Bart Simpson's favorite television show.

History[]

In one episode, The Krusty the Clown Show was a serious talk show in the early 1960s, with Krusty interviewing AFL-CIO chairman George Meany about collective bargaining in 1961.[1] In a different episode, the show was already childish slapstick entertainment by the 1960s, with Krusty covering Robert Frost with snow in 1963.[2] However, an announcer also billed the program on or around Presidents' Day 1993 as the Krusty the Clown 29th anniversary show.[2] In another episode, Krusty's career did not take off until after his new talent agent Annie Dubinsky suggested him to change his act to be cheap physical comedy in the mid 1960s.[3]

The show involves slapstick humor, comedy skits starring members of the show, and occasional special guest stars.

At one point, the show was handed over to Sideshow Bob due to the fact that Krusty was convicted for attempted robbery, and the show was renamed the Sideshow Bob's Cavalcade of Whimsy, turning into an educational program for children. However, the show was handed back to Krusty after it was revealed that Sideshow Bob framed Krusty because Bob had enough of being the butt of Krusty's jokes.[4]

The show faced competition with a popular ventriloquist show, The Gabbo Show, which caused the show to drop in ratings and was soon cancelled. Siblings Bart and Lisa helped Krusty to air a comeback special, starring many celebrities including Luke Perry and the Red Hot Chili Peppers. The show soon became popular again, while the Gabbo show fell from grace due to Gabbo accidentally swearing at the audience.[5]

The show was temporarily possessed by the IRS after Krusty was caught for tax fraud. As a result, the show was renamed Herschel Krustofsky's Clown-related Entertainment Show, and had literally everything stripped from the show (including costumes, and Sideshow Mel, and he wasn't able to have pies thrown at him because the budget wouldn't allow it, with the only thing being thrown at him being the IRS agent's briefcase).[6]

Later, the show was criticized by the FCC for not being educational enough. In response, a children's news segment called "Kidz News" was created, with children being the news anchors. The segment gained popularity after Bart became an anchor for the segment and created an additional human interest segment called "Bart's People". The segment was later cancelled and replaced [7].

In 2001, The Krusty the Clown Show faced competition with another show once again, this time with a quiz show called "Me Wantee!". Fed up with Network Executives attempting to get him to drastically change the content of the show, Krusty announces his retirement. The last episode of the show was a special Farewell episode. During the episode, Sideshow Bob, who was released from prison days before, planned to kill Krusty in revenge over Krusty constantly mistreating Bob during his career. To kill Krusty, Bob brainwashed and hypnotized Bart into killing Krusty, and straps bombs on Bart which will detonate when Bart comes up to hug Krusty onstage after Krusty's speech to the audience. However, Krusty unexpectedly apologized to Bob onstage for mistreating Bob, causing Bob to do everything he can to stop Bart. Mr. Teeny ultimately saved Krusty by throwing Bart's bomb strap into a room full of network executives, killing them instead. The show's ratings rose once again due to Sideshow Bob's attempted murder (which Krusty enjoys due to the ratings that are brought to the show every time Bob attempts to kill him).[8]

Some time during the show's history, Krusty and Sideshow Mel shot episodes of The Krusty the Clown Show in German for German consumption. After Kent Brockman uttered one of America's worst swears during a live broadcast of Smartline, and as a consequence landed Channel 6 with a $10,000,000 fine from the FCC, Krusty's show was negatively affected due to being on Channel 6, and had to make huge cutbacks, including being forced to have Krusty provide the voice acting for their current Itchy and Scratchy episode due to not being able to afford to pay the regular voice actors due to the fine, a decision that greatly irritated Krusty and horrified the audience when they watched the Itchy & Scratchy episode in question.[9]

The Krusty the Clown Show Retro Reboot![]

In 2011, the show was cancelled again, Krusty was fired and lost his agent, he went to his old agent Annie Dubinsky, who advised him to recreate the show for adults who watched the show as a kid. The new version of the show, titled The Krusty the Clown Show Retro Reboot!, was picked up by HBOWTIME (a premium cable network) and proved to be very popular. Later Annie began to interfere too much, prompting the network executives to request that Krusty fire her. He refused and the show was cancelled.[3] The show later moved back to Channel 6 under the old name and format.

The Itchy and Scratchy Show[]

See The Itchy and Scratchy Show

The Worker and Parasite Show[]

The Worker and Parasite Show, presented as "Eastern Europe's favorite cat and mouse team", was a replacement for Itchy and Scratchy at the time the show was losing viewers to Gabbo, which Itchy and Scratchy had moved to. It was an unsettling, incoherent mess of a cartoon that only served as the final nail in Krusty's coffin. Krusty evidently hadn't watched the cartoon beforehand to ensure its suitability, given his on-air reaction: he stared at what is assumed to be the studio's monitor in disbelief, cigarette in mouth, and then exclaimed "What the hell was that?!", before noticing that the audience had walked out in disgust.[5]

Members of the Krusty the Clown Show[]

Krustytheclownshow

The cast of the Krusty the Clown show

Krustkateers[]

Krusty children

Krusty with his Krustkateers

Guest Stars[]

Trivia[]

  • One time, in 1986, while promoting his pork products, Krusty suffered a nearly fatal heart attack on the air, but the kids laughed at him, thinking it was a part of the act. Said moment became one of television's most beloved bloopers.[4]
  • Krusty admits that the only bad show he ever did was when he co-hosted the show with Ray-Jay Johnson, citing that it "was funny for about 3 seconds".[5]
  • The show has over 4000 episodes, making the show longer than The Simpsons itself.[10]

Appearances[]

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Citations[]

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