To understand the subtleties there's a quick summary of the story before you listen. Then you’ll know the main events, leaving you to focus on the funny details (you also have the script).
To deal with the humour, there's an explanation about what it's funny about the sketch. Learners tend not to find the same things funny as native speakers – perhaps because they don’t get the cultural reference points, or because they can’t understand it well enough to get all the jokes immediately. Instant comprehension of all the subtle shifts in tone and meaning is very important for finding something funny. Most of the funny aspects of these routines are not obvious jokes. It’s far more subtle than that.
Louis CK – When I Thought I Was Going to Die (From the album “Word – Live at Carnegie Hall”)
Summary
- Louis talks about a time when he was scared for his life. He thought he was going to die. It’s a true story.
- He was flying from Indianapolis to New York and there was a delay because of a technical problem with the plane. The fuel guage was broken.
- The pilot decided to fly even though he didn’t know how much fuel was in the plane.
- Louis just assumed that the pilot knew what he was doing. He unquestionably put his trust in the pilot. Why do we do this?
- Louis expresses some concern about the rather relaxed approach to safety which the pilot is taking.
- The plane is still delayed because of bad weather at their destination.
- The pilot informs the passengers that he is going to lie to the tower, telling them they’re going to Philadelphia, even though they’re going to go to new York.The plan is to say they’re going to Philadelphia, and then at the last minute, ask for permission to land in New York. He thinks the weather is not so bad there.
- Again, Louis expresses concern about the attitude of the pilot and he wonders why the pilot is sharing this information with him.
- Louis and the other passengers basically accept the situation because, perhaps stupidly, they have faith in the pilot and the whole situation.
- The weather during the flight is terrible. There was a big storm.
- He managed to listen to the conversation between the plane and the tower in new York.
- The tower didn’t allow the plane to land in New York because of bad weather.
- They could have run out of fuel and fallen out of the sky at any moment.
- suddenly the tower in NY announced that the airport was closed due to bad weather.
- The pilot panicked and requested urgent permission to land.
- The tower guy allowed him to land, but he was quite annoyed.
- The pilot immediately went in for landing.
- It was an extremely stressful and dangerous landing in low visibility.
- The pilot and all the passengers were extremely emotional at the end.
- Even the taxi drivers at the airport were surprised by the dramatic landing of the plane.
Script
I’ll tell you this story about one time that I thought I was going to die. I think it’s the only time where I thought “why wouldn’t this be when I die?”
I was on a plane. I’ve been on a lot of planes in a lot of shitty weather and stuff, but this shit was fucked up.
I was in Indianapolis on a plane, waiting to take off, and we’re sitting there and the pilot comes on, and he says “Hi folks, erm, the fuel gauge is broken so we’re waiting for maintenance.”
So, we wait, about 20 minutes. Then he comes back on,
“Folks the fuel gauge is still broken, but we’re going to go anyway. We don’t know how much fuel we have, but we feel confident that it will be okay so we’re going to go.”
And I’m thinking, okay, well, he’s a pilot, I’m sure he’s going by some manual that says, you know, ”(if) the fuel gauge breaks, call maintenance. If they’re not there in 20 minutes, fuck it. Fuel gauges are overrated, just go, you’re fine. Just top it off and remember what happened.”
So then we still don’t take off and the guy comes back on, “err folks we have another problem, LaGuardia Airport in New York won’t give us clearance to take off because the weather’s been bad there intermittently, so we’re going to wait for that.”
So we wait 20 minutes. Then he comes back on, “Folks, LaGuardia still hasn’t given us clearance, but we’re going to go anyway. We’re looking at the radar, we think the weather will be fine. So what we’re going to do is say that our destination is Philadelphia, we’ll get clearance to go there. Halfway to Philadelphia we’ll switch courses to LaGuardia airport and we’ll be probably there in a few minutes.”
I swear to god he said this.
First of all, I’m pretty sure you’re supposed to be honest with the dude in the tower. Does the tower have to go “Really? You’re going to… come on! Tell me where you’re going!”
And why is he telling us this shit? Am I going to have to corroborate this lie if we get pulled over by the sky police at some point in the flight? “Oh no we’re totally going to Philly, I’ve got a brother there and err, we’ve got a thing in Philly”
But I’m still fine with it because we’re travellers on the plane, like “yeah, I’ve got a thing, fuck it, I’m immortal, just go please. Yes, go into marginal weather, with shoddy equipment, secretly. I totally support this plan.”
So, we take off. We get above where we are right now, and it’s just a black motherfucker of a cloud. It’s just like The Wizard of Oz. It’s just there are trees throwing apples at us, it’s crazy. It’s just horrible, and we’re “GUGGGGGUGUGUGU” the whole flight, and we’re making these circles, and me and the guy next to me are both listening to the tower. You know how you can plug into your seat sometimes and you can listen to the tower talk to the airplanes, and we keep hearing our guy trying to get clearance to land, from LaGuardia.
PILOT: “Ah; this is Delta 288 requesting clearance to land.”
TOWER: “Ah, that’s a negative 288. Low visibility.”
A few minutes go by.
PILOT: “Ah, this is 288. We would really like clearance to land.”
TOWER: “Yeah, that’s a negative 288.”
Like he was getting annoyed. And meanwhile, we’re just circling, and burning this vague amount of fuel. We could just stop being an airplane at any second.
And then we hear this. This is all true. The LeGuardia guy comes on and says,
“This is LaGuardia airport to all area airplanes, we are closed for the night, zero visibility, not safe for landing, please divert to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania or Boston.”
And then we hear our guy.
“This is Delta 288, we need to land now! We have no fuel! We have no fuel we have to land right now!”
Interesting.
Then there’s a pause, and then we hear this.
“Well, then, clear to land then 288”
That’s how he said it, like “Dude… (sighs) No-one can see okay? But, just, I … (sighs) I guess all the dumb decisions you made today have made this a good one. Just take a shot, I’m going home. Just fuckin’, turn the lights off after you crash, I don’t give a shit frankly. By the way you’re not supposed to be here you fucking liar you said you were going to Philly.”
So as soon as we get clearance, we just “nyaaaaaaa”, like we start bulleting, “nyaaaaaaa…” We’re either flying desperately towards the ground or falling. I don’t know that there’s a difference.
We come out of the clouds and there’s the fucking earth, right fucking there! It’s right there! That’s what low visibility means. We come out of the clouds and “Oh fuck it’s right there oh jesus!”
And the plane just “nyaaaaaa…” And you can feel the plane go “Oh fuck, I can’t do that, what are you nuts?” We go “brrrrrrr” and veer over the highway, and I swear to god I saw people in their cars go “what the fuuuck?”
And we hit the runway like sideways, like “kapoof!” And the pilot comes back on, all true I swear to god, he’s totally out of breath, he’s like (heavy breathing & shaky voice) “welcome to LaGuardia airport, New York City, (crying) you may turn on your cellphones now and you may call your loved ones.”
He said that. He said “You may call your loved ones” and everybody on the plane was crying and rocking back and forth just sobbing, calling their husbands and their wives. I’m divorced, what am I (going to say) “Hi remember you hate me? Well I almost died.”
And I got in a cab, and the cab driver goes “that was a very bad landing.” I was like, “How did you know that was me?”
“That’s the only plane that landed in 4 hours. We all watched, the drivers, we said ‘they are going to die’”
Dealing with the humour:
Firstly, there aren’t really any jokes in this bit. It’s just the way Louis tells the story, adding some descriptions, some sarcasm, some attitude and drama. That’s it really. The first big laugh comes from the line “fuck it”. As if a manual for a pilot would say “If the fuel guage doesn’t work, fuck it. Just go.” Of course a manual wouldn’t write that. Instead, this indicates the negligent attitude of the pilot who is flauting the safety regulations. This is what is going through the pilot’s head, and is clearly a huge act of negligence.
There’s something funny about copying the voice of a pilot, especially when he’s acting rather irresponsibly. We all hear those pilot’s announcements. This is the guy who we are all trusting our lives to. He usually sounds quite relaxed. Pilots have a certain kind of voice, thankfully. If they sounded different it could be worrying. Anyway, copying his voice is quite amusing.
“I think you’re supposed to be honest with the dude in the tower”. This is a really funny line. It’s understating the formal protocol the pilots must follow. Being honest with the ‘dude’ in the tower is a fundamental responsibility of the pilot. The choice of the word ‘dude’ is also funny because we’re talking in informal terms about normally formal things. This highlights the careless attitude of the pilot.
“Why is he telling us this shit? Do we have to corroborate his story?” True – why was he telling them? The character of the pilot is like a shitty friend who expects you to lie for him.
Everyone on the flight just accepts everything that’s happening. This is a really good observation. We put our trust in people in authority positions very easily. We consider ourselves immortal when we’re not responsible for our own safety. It’s the same in taxis. We never put on our seatbelts in the backs of taxis. Why not?
Louis is just a great storyteller. He brings the story alive with certain detailed descriptions to elicit fear, surprise and so on. He knows just how much detail should be given in the correct places. The humourous bits are delivered with excellent timing. They’re not obvious jokes. He’s a master. He makes it look easy. This is not easy.
Then we have the irritated conversation between the pilot and the tower. The pilot is a total dick and the tower is getting annoyed with him. You don’t expect a pilot to behave like that.
Then the dramatic moment when Louis hears the pilot panicking, which he describes as “interesting”, clearly understating how alarming it must have felt to hear that.
The tower is so pissed off, and this is expressed with the line “Well, clear to land then” which is delivered with so much frustrated despondency by Louis, as if the guy in the tower is a tired parent who has run out of patience with his child. This kind of frustration in a conversation is usually over something like homework or another petty disagreement. In this case people’s lives are involved. Louis’ performance is great. He adds loads of attitude into the conversation between the pilot and the tower. Again, the pilot is a dick, who has everyone’s lives in his hands.
Louis even gives a voice to the plane which has a personality of its own, complaining that the pilot is pushing it too hard – “Dude, I can’t do that!” Expressing how low to the ground they were he mentions people in their cars who he could actually see mouthing the words “What the fuck?” which must have been very scary!
This is just a dramatic and engaging story, which seems to be true, told in a way which highlights the general irony of being at the mercy of a pilot making bad decisions.
By demonstrating that the pilot is emotional and out of breath after the landing, Louis allows us to imagine what we couldn’t see in the cockpit of the plane: the pilot had a really hard time landing the plane and is seriously traumatised. For some reason, letting the audience imagine something for themselves is quite funny. Also, Louis’ impression of the emotional pilot is just quite amusing.
The choice of phrase “You may call your loved ones” also emphasises the emotional nature of the landing. Louis considers calling his ex-wife, who hates him, which clearly would be a pointless move. This highlights Louis’ sense of alienation, and the fact that nobody really cares about him. Louis is like a classical comedy character – lonely, sad, alienated. We also get another character – that of the taxi driver who we learn just watched the plane land, fully expecting everyone on board to die.
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