Crank Yankers aired from June 2002 until 2005 and from February 2007-? on Comedy Central and MTV2.
Most people consider prank phone calls an annoyance , but on this series they were the joke. A wide range of comedians made crank calls to unsuspecting ordinary people and the results were then used on the show with the callers( and victims) portrayed by foam puppets living in the strange town of Yankerville. Among its inhabitants were gross disc jockey The Nudge ( voiced by Jimmy Kimmel) who called a 7-11 employee and convinced him to scream " I peed in the surplee machine!"; Birchum ( Adam Carolla), an angry war veteran looking for a job; Elmer ( Jimmy Kimmel), an old coot who called for a hearing aid but couldn't hear the salesperson; Bobby( Jim Florentine), who called about a job but kept belching throughout the conversation; Tony ( Bob Einstein), a canadate for district selectman who offended everyone, and Spoonie Luv( Tracy Morgan), a cool black dude who called a very proper flower shop to dictate an obscene greeting card to his ex. Among the guest stars making calls were Jack Black, David Alan Grier and Kevin Nealon.
Interspersed with the calls were short visual jokes such as a Chinaman with a large gong announcing " Confucious say : girl who sits on judges's lap get honorable discharge." Gong!
Crank Yankers was created by those princes of puerile humor, Adam Carolla and Jimmy Kimmel, who were also responsible for the Man Show. Reportedly all calls used were made in Nevada, the only state where harassment prosecution is not possible.
A Review from The New York Daily News
SORRY, WRONG NUMBER
BY DAVID BIANCULLI DAILY NEWS TV CRITIC
Saturday, June 01, 2002
CRANK YANKERS. Sunday night at 10:30, Comedy Central. 1 1/2 Stars
The newest Comedy Central series, "Crank Yankers," takes two juvenile obsessions - prank phone calls and rude puppets - and combines them in a very bizarre show with a pseudo-celebrity twist.
Comics who may or not be familiar - such as Dave Chappelle, Sarah Silverman and Stephen Colbert - assume outrageous alter egos and phone unsuspecting store employees, prospective employers and everyday people.
"Crank Yankers" then takes these recordings and reenacts them, with puppets on both ends of the line.
Some of the characters recur in subsequent episodes (I've seen three programs in the series, which launches tomorrow night at 10:30), and begin to grow on you.
But "Crank Yankers" is not the sort of instantly new, gotta-watch piece of TV insanity that, say, "The Osbournes" or "South Park" were at the start.
It's more a slowly acquired taste, and I'm fairly certain that viewers most likely to swallow it eagerly are ones who already watch "Jackass," "The Andy Dick Show" or "The Man Show."
In fact, this new series comes from the "Man Show" folks: The executive producers are that program's Daniel Kellison, Jimmy Kimmel and Adam Carolla. Kimmel provides several crank-call voices during the first three shows, including one duet with Sarah Silverman that is more comic improv than a simple rude phone call.
ABC executives, who just hired Kimmel to be their new late-night comedy voice after "Nightline," ought to watch "Crank Yankers" very closely, and shudder a bit.
Kimmel is a funny fellow and established his quick wit as far back as "Win Ben Stein's Money" - but "Crank Yankers" is one more indication, along with "The Man Show," that if Kimmel really has his pulse on the viewers of tomorrow, ABC has to ask how deeply it wants to sink to attract them.
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