We love when magic strikes unexpectedly. Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we’re counting down our picks for the most hilarious improvised moments on TV.
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00:00Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we're counting down our picks for the most hilarious improvised moments on TV.
00:16Some spoilers to come.
00:18Smells crime before it even happens. Yes, dude!
00:21What if his entire head is just one big nose?
00:25Write that down, I like that.
00:29Hot damn! Brooklyn Nine-Nine.
00:31This show is famous for its hilariously creative and creatively hilarious cold opens.
00:36This popular cold open moment was not even scripted.
00:39When Amy gets to work late for the first time, the squad speculates increasingly ridiculous theories on why she was late.
00:45Captain Holt suggests she got held up at the bank.
00:48I'd say she's in line at the bank.
00:52Sure enough, he was right.
00:54There was a problem at the bank.
00:56Hot damn!
00:57Holt's exclamation was in fact completely improvised by Andre Brouwer.
01:01It was even enough to send the entire cast into convulsions.
01:04Notice the very close and even abrupt editing.
01:08Never tell anyone about this.
01:10Holt's damn adventures don't stop there, returning in season five.
01:14What a damn good gag.
01:16Oh damn. Oh damn. Oh damn!
01:21And that is three oh dams.
01:23Number 19. Peppa Pig, The White Lotus.
01:26This black comedy anthology about a fictional resort gets one of its guests tickled pink.
01:31In one episode, Jennifer Coolidge as the rich and spoiled heiress Tanya shows up at the resort in salmon pink.
01:37Tanya claims she's dressed as Monica Vitti, but the Italian manager confuses her with another character altogether.
01:44Guess who I am.
01:46What? What?
01:51Peppa Pig.
01:52Not only was this reply improvised by Sabrina Impacciatore, but she wasn't even sure it made it into the show.
01:58Right afterward, the whole cast burst out laughing and they had to cut.
02:02Very sexy.
02:06Thank goodness it wasn't, or else we would have missed out on some comedy gold.
02:10Number 18. I kind of hate women.
02:13It's always sunny in Philadelphia.
02:15Everyone's favorite gang of narcissist sociopaths is at it again.
02:19When the gang finds out that M. Night Shyamalan is in town, Mac and Charlie decide to write a movie.
02:24Specifically, a prequel to The Sixth Sense called, you guessed it, The Fifth Sense.
02:29But they are missing, as Dennis points out, a female love interest.
02:33Mac responds accordingly.
02:35We need to get a female lead character in there that Dolph can bang throughout the whole movie.
02:39Yeah, I kind of hate women though.
02:42This casually misogynistic comment not only became a meme, but was totally improvised.
02:47This improvisation was also the moment the creators decided to develop Mac's character as a repressed gay man who hates women.
02:54A great tribute to the Greek and Roman tradition to be sure.
02:57How'd you like to be in the movie business?
03:00Number 17. Tormund's stare at Brienne.
03:03Game of Thrones.
03:04Tormund Giantsbane's infatuation with Brienne of Tarth is as cute as it is, surprisingly enough,
03:10mostly improvised by Christopher Hevue.
03:12From Tormund's first sight of Brienne arriving at Castle Black on horseback,
03:16this wildling raider cannot keep his eyes off her.
03:24When they leave Castle Black, Tormund gives Brienne a smile that has her looking away in disbelief.
03:35Is this the smile that launched a thousand fanfics?
03:38Yes, but it was an unscripted moment improvised by Hevue.
03:42It was so consequential though, that fans were taken aback when Brienne went with Jaime instead.
03:47The course of true love never does run smooth.
03:50Number 16. The tea set, Veep.
03:53This series about a frazzled vice president and her team can be really bumbling at times.
03:58In this hilarious scene from season 3,
04:00Gary and Mike are watching Selina deliver a speech when they back up and accidentally break a China tea set.
04:06Hey, Sue, sorry. Hey, listen.
04:10Scrambling to hide their crime, they brush it under a curtain.
04:14Oh, my God.
04:15Behind the curtain. Put it behind the curtain.
04:18It turned out that actor Tony Hale accidentally broke the China set,
04:22but the showrunners insisted he and Matt Walsh keep going with the film rolling.
04:28Oh, my God.
04:29Most of this scene then is improvised.
04:32Talk about spilling the tea.
04:34Number 15. The cookie, New Girl.
04:37What happens when you give your roommate a cookie?
04:39Comedy gold, it seems.
04:41In this season 2 scene, Nick gives Schmidt a cookie,
04:44insensitively shaped like the Star of David to celebrate Schmidt's Jewish heritage.
04:48When Schmidt calls him out for his insensitivity,
04:50Nick descends into an increasingly incoherent defense.
04:54You gave me a cookie, I gave you a cookie.
04:56You gave me a cookie, gave you a cookie.
04:58Cookies are indeed serious business,
05:01but Jake Johnson was only supposed to repeat the line once.
05:04Gave me a cookie, got you a cookie.
05:06You gave me a cookie, I got you a cookie, man.
05:09Instead, he repeated it five times in a perfectly frazzled delivery.
05:14Gave me a cookie, got you a cookie. We're even. We're even, Schmidt.
05:17Johnson later posted a part of the script on his Instagram page
05:20as proof of his comic improvisation.
05:22Number 14. Most of Murray's conversation with Jonathan and Nancy, Stranger Things.
05:28Great actors can make awkward moments even more awkward.
05:31And hilarious.
05:32Nancy and Jonathan have finally consummated their will-they-won't-they romance
05:36in conspiracy theorist Murray's basement.
05:38It's about time.
05:49At breakfast the following morning,
05:51Murray is wise to these kids' shenanigans,
05:53as proven by his suggestive comment.
05:55So, Jonathan, how was the pull-out?
06:00I'm sorry?
06:02The pull-out innuendo was scripted.
06:05What was not scripted was Murray dropping his scrambled egg
06:08and his answering flirtatiously,
06:10Oops.
06:11I bet.
06:14Oops.
06:17Not only does this improvisation save and improve the scene,
06:21it also fits Murray's character.
06:23The pull-out may have been good,
06:25but Brett Gelman's improv game is even better.
06:28Number 13. The Q-tip, Friends.
06:31It's a tale as old as time.
06:34Chandler needs help with something and Joey is unhelpful.
06:37But this funny exchange in particular had a lot of actor input.
06:41In this scene, Chandler needs to have his clothes tailored.
06:45Joey suggests his family tailor,
06:47claiming that the tailor did his first suit when he was 15.
06:50Or was it 16?
06:52I did my first suit when I was 15.
06:54No, wait, 16.
06:56No, excuse me, 15.
06:59Joey's leaky memory has Chandler delivering one of the best one-liners ever involving Q-tips.
07:05Okay, you have to stop the Q-tip when there's resistance.
07:11Incredibly enough, this witty line was completely improvised by Matthew Perry.
07:15The Q-tip joke has since become a meme,
07:18which goes to show the power of letting actors do their thing.
07:21Number 12. Bebe, Schitt's Creek.
07:24This running gag initially started as a pure accident on actress Catherine O'Hara's part.
07:29O'Hara plays soap actress and star Moira Rose,
07:32suitably theatrical, adopting affectations.
07:35This extends to unusual pronunciations,
07:38such as the simple word, baby.
07:42Too English for the French or Spanish word
07:44and too European for the regular English word,
07:47O'Hara's affected Bebe is a delightful verbal Frankenstein
07:50that grows worse and better upon repetition.
07:56O'Hara's first time saying the word in season 2 was pure accident,
08:00but upon seeing her team's laughter, she decided to keep it.
08:03Either way, it's great progress for Bebe.
08:08Number 11. Elaine's Dance, Seinfeld.
08:11It's the little kicks that make life worthwhile,
08:14or at least a grand old comedy.
08:16At a company party hosted by Elaine,
08:18she opens the floor with what is presumably a dance.
08:21It looks, however, more like a spasm.
08:31Elaine's bad dancing was not scripted, of course,
08:34but was carefully conceived by her actress, Julia Louis-Dreyfus,
08:38even practicing the moves in front of her mirror.
08:41To ensure Elaine's moves did not go with the rhythm of the music,
08:44the scene was shot without music.
08:48To make matters even worse and better,
08:50the whole scene was inspired by real-life SNL creator Lorne Michaels,
08:54who danced similarly at a party.
08:56The lore of this full-body dry heave set to music is deep.
09:08Number 10. Nice Ears, The Defenders.
09:12Marvel shows and movies are full of hilarious quips and banter,
09:15and The Defenders is no exception.
09:17In this scene, Matt and Jessica work together to take down a bad guy.
09:21Once he's seemingly defeated, Jessica compliments Matt's mask ears,
09:25and an annoyed Matt responds that, quote,
09:28they're horns.
09:31According to Kristen Ritter, who was responding to a fan on Twitter,
09:35this brief exchange was completely improvised by her and Charlie Cox.
09:39We think they should be allowed to improvise more,
09:41because they clearly have this quip thing down.
09:46Number 9. I Apologize About My, You Know, Thing, Sherlock.
09:52Is there anything more comfy than a drunk Sherlock Holmes and John Watson?
09:55Tell us you wouldn't want to hang out with these guys.
09:57In the third season episode, The Sign of Three,
10:00Sherlock and John go out and get hammered.
10:02When a boring client tells them some silly story about a ghost,
10:05Sherlock and John fall asleep on her.
10:08And when he wakes up, he apologizes on behalf of his sleeping thing.
10:15This little exchange showing Sherlock's sense of superiority
10:18seems too good to be improvised, but it was.
10:21According to Stephen Moffat, Benedict Cumberbatch forgot the actual line,
10:25resulting in Sherlock's stumbling of words and calling John a thing.
10:31Number 8. Pity Frack, Battlestar Galactica.
10:35Oh, so you think I should give a frack about your mood?
10:37For those unaware, frack is Battlestar Galactica's signature replacement for the F-word.
10:43And the word reared its hilarious head during a showdown between Felix Gaeta and Starbuck.
10:48Once Starbuck storms out on Gaeta, Gaeta hilariously responds with the line,
10:52So I guess a pity frack's out of the question then?
10:55The show's creator, Ronald D. Moore, revealed on a commentary podcast
10:59that this line was completely improvised by actor Alessandro Giuliani,
11:03who showed surprise when Moore decided to keep his improv in the finished product.
11:16In the third season episode, Bad Day at Black Rock,
11:19a woman by the name of Bella Talbot shoots Sam in the shoulder
11:22to get her hands on a lucky rabbit's foot.
11:24And while she doesn't walk away with the foot, she steals Dean's winning lottery tickets,
11:29forcing him to blurt out an extremely exaggerated son of a bitch.
11:35This line was improvised by Jensen Ackles.
11:37And while the line itself isn't very funny, the over-the-top delivery certainly is.
11:42Jared Padalecki apparently found it quite funny as well,
11:45as he can be seen turning his head away from the camera to avoid ruining the take with laughter.
11:51The Thanksgiving song, Bob's Burgers.
11:58We wonder how much improvisation goes on behind the scenes of animated shows
12:02that doesn't make it into the final product.
12:04The Bob's Burgers voice cast is full of talented people,
12:07including John Roberts, who voices the character Linda.
12:16Roberts apparently loves to freestyle songs in the recording booth.
12:19And one of his on-the-spot creations was the Thanksgiving song,
12:22which was later covered by the acclaimed band The National.
12:25The show's writers later called the Thanksgiving song the show's fourth best song,
12:29and we cannot blame them.
12:31It takes a lot of talent to create a song on the spot,
12:33and even more talent to make it funny.
12:49The scripts of Buffy the Vampire Slayer are undoubtedly brilliant,
12:53but as this moment proved, the cast can be just as funny and work just as compatibly without one.
12:59In this scene, Seth Green's Oz goes on a mini-rant about clothing on animal crackers
13:04and how all monkeys are French.
13:10The episode's writer, Marty Noxon, later revealed on the DVD commentary
13:14that everything following Oz's compliment to Willow was improvised by Seth Green and Alison Hannigan.
13:22It's both a tender and hilarious moment between the two characters,
13:25and it all came from the minds of the actors involved.
13:28Who needs writers anyway?
13:30Just kidding, we love our writers.
13:32The monkey's the only cookie animal that gets to wear clothes, you know that?
13:40Fitz has a great sense of humor, and that is on full display in this scene.
13:44Once Fitz disables Gordon's teleportation powers,
13:47Gordon asks Fitz what he's done,
13:49to which he brilliantly responds,
13:53As fellow actor Clark Gregg explains,
13:55the line was simply written as science,
13:57but Ian DeCastagher added the biatch as a nod to Breaking Bad.
14:01Gregg also called it,
14:06And while we wouldn't go that far,
14:08it certainly is a hilarious quip,
14:10and we will never pass up a reference to one of the greatest shows of all time.
14:22The Walking Dead isn't exactly full of humor.
14:25It concerns the end of civilization,
14:27and its characters are usually more concerned with surviving than sharing quippy banter.
14:32Daryl is perhaps the most stoic character of all,
14:35as he doesn't seem to have a single funny bone in his body,
14:38which makes this improvised line all the more hilarious.
14:41Once the group assimilates into Alexandria,
14:43the usually hardened and dirty Carol begins dressing like a grandma,
14:47prompting the equally tough Daryl to call her appearance ridiculous.
14:52The line is funny,
14:54but it also adds a further dimension to the relationship between Carol and Daryl.
14:58It is simply an all-around great ad-lib.
15:11You just can't write jokes like this.
15:13In the season 3 episode Flu Season,
15:16Leslie gets sick,
15:17prompting Andy to Google her symptoms
15:19and find that she has network connectivity problems.
15:22It's one of the funniest lines of the entire show,
15:24and it was all completely improvised by the master, Chris Pratt.
15:34The show's creator, Michael Schur,
15:36later showed respect for Pratt's ad-lib,
15:38calling it, quote,
15:42The cast of Parks and Rec wasn't given much room to improvise,
15:45aside from Patton Oswalt's rambling Star Wars speech,
15:48but Pratt clearly saw his opportunity and took it,
15:51resulting in a joke that was completely unexpected
15:54and gut-bustingly hilarious.
15:59Before we continue,
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16:16Number 1. Michael kisses Oscar, The Office
16:19You ready?
16:20What are you doing?
16:21I'm going to embrace Oscar.
16:22When Steve Carell sees a joke, he takes it.
16:25In the season 3 premiere, Gay Witch Hunt,
16:27Michael accidentally outs Oscar,
16:29and to show his support, he kisses him on the lips.
16:32It's an incredibly inappropriate thing to do,
16:35and it proves that Steve Carell knew his character perfectly,
16:38because the entire sequence was improvised by Carell and Oscar Nunez.
16:46Ah!
16:48Oh!
16:49I did it!
16:50Nunez simply rolled with Carell's improv,
16:52but the other cast members were laughing behind the camera.
16:55Luckily, the camera was planted firmly on Carell and Nunez,
16:58which allowed this now classic footage to make it into the episode.
17:02Because this is an image
17:05that I want you people to remember
17:07for a long time to come.
17:09What other unscripted TV moment had you full-body dry-heaving to music?
17:13Let us know in the comments down below.
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