“From the people who brought you The Crown – the epic saga of the Queen – now comes the ridiculous story of this guy”
With Brexit talks continuing to trundle on, it is no surprise that German TV is covering Boris Johnson just much as the British media.
In the UK, we have Have I Got News For You, Mock The Week and The Mash Report to make fun of the news. But over in Germany, they have extra 3, a weekly political satire show that has been running for over 40 years.
And now a sketch from the show has made its way to English-speaking, British social media. ‘The Clown’ is a parody of the hit Netflix series The Crown – only instead of being about the British Royal Family, it is a biography of Boris Johnson.
(Don’t worry, it helpfully has English subtitles, so you don’t have to speak German).
The skit opens with a logo from ‘Brexnix’ instead of Netflix.
“From the people who brought you The Crown – the epic saga of the Queen – now comes the ridiculous story of this guy,” booms the German narration “A notorious buffoon at the head of a country, whose inhabitants tumble down hills to catch cheese. It’s THE CLOWN.”
The video then continues with clips of some of Boris Johnson’s most infamous moments.
“Somehow, shrewd Boris Johnson becomes prime minister with circus acts and sleight of hand,” the voiceover continues.
“But his funniest trick yet is Brexit. He cons Brits into believing fake numbers. And that’s how Mr. Johnson leads them out of the EU.”
And because this is Europeans depicting what they think they know about British culture, the Benny Hill theme also makes an appearance.
extra3 has been running since 1976. It is produced by the German public broadcaster Norddeutscher Rundfunk, and airs on NDR Fernsehen.
The show is no strangers to controversy. In 2016, they aired a spoof music video mocking Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. Erdoğan was so incensed by the video that he summoned the German ambassador and demanded that the song be taken down.
