Monsieur et Madame jokes

A Monsieur et Madame joke is originally a French type of joke, which takes the form of a riddle. It involves providing the surname of a husband and wife and asking for their child's given name, with the answer forming a pun. For example, Monsier and Madame Mauve are said to have a son called Guy, where his name is a homophone for guimauve ("marshmallow").

History[edit]

The inventor of this type of joke has never been clearly determined. Several historic examples have been recorded.

Origins[edit]

Wordplay that links an actual surname (or a title) to an imaginary family name has been around since the 18th century:

In 1770, Marquis de Bièvre invented comtesse Tation and l'abbé Quille.^[1]
- comtesse Tation – same pronunciation in French as contestation ("dispute")
- l'abbé Quille – same pronunciation as la béquille ("the crutch")
In 1882, Alphonse Allais invented Jean Rougy de Ontt, Tony Truand, Tom Hatt, Sarah Vigott, Azutat Laure.
- Jean Rougy de Ontt – j'en rougis de honte ("I blush from shame")
- Tom Hatt – tomate ("tomato")
In 1893, Christophe from the comic strip La Famille Fenouillard invented Guy Mauve and Max Hillaire.^[2]
- Guy Mauve – guimauve ("marshmallow")
- Max Hillaire – maxillaire ("upper jaw")

The game of in-memoriam[edit]

In late 1964, Juliette Gréco and Françoise Sagan popularized a basic version of the game under the name of "Game of in-memoriam", which was widely exchanged among Parisians.
In early 1965, Paris Match made it widely-known across France in its first issue of the year, number 823, by publishing over several weeks the best "in-memoriam" from its readers.^[3]
In 1978, Georges Perec created an example in Life: A User's Manual:

"M. et Mme Hocquard de Tours (I. & V.) have the joy of announcing the birth of their son Adhémar.".^[4]

— (a [= elle] démarre au quart de tour), referring to a car that "starts within a quarter turn" (from the time cars were cranked manually).

The first Monsieur et Madame jokes[edit]

In 1969, during the shooting of Claude Chabrol's film This Man Must Die, Michel Duchaussoy and Jean Yanne played this game.

They found:

- Judas ... Nana (jus d'ananas → pineapple juice)
- Elvira ... Sacuti (elle vira sa cuti → she dramatically changed her mind)
- Ferdinand ... Saint-Malo à la nage c'est pas d'la tarte (faire Dinan - Saint-Malo à la nage, c'est pas d'la tarte → swimming from Dinan to Saint-Malo is not a piece of cake)^[5]^[6]

Mr. and Mrs. Gre have a daughter, what's her name?
- Nadine! (Gre, Nadine → grenadine)

In French culture[edit]

Music[edit]

The song Le Papa du papa (1966) by Boby Lapointe^[7] is based partially on this idea, mixing births, marriages, genealogy, first names and extended surnames in a complicated manner, in order to end up in the last line with a son with the contrived name of:

Yvan-Sévère-Aimé Bossac de Noyau Dépêche
- same pronunciation as: il vend ses verres et mes beaux sacs de noyaux de pêche, meaning "he sells his glasses and my beautiful bags of peach stones"

Comic strip[edit]

Example of a dialogue :

Monsieur et Madame Naiempalépourmoinsqueça ont un fils...

- Jean?

Goscinny / Tabary, La Tête de turc d'Iznogoud

Theatre[edit]

In the 1972 play Le noir te va si bien, Maria Pacôme and Jean le Poulain play a « surname game » (with « Mr. and Mrs. have... »), with the loser having to throw him or herself off a cliff. Following the example (the daughter of Micoton (Mylène)), they successively came up with: the son of Danleta (Alphonse), the son of Teuzemani (Gédéon), the daughter of Enfaillite (Mélusine) and the son of Dalor (Homère).^[8]

Other media[edit]

In Les deux minutes du peuple, François Pérusse regularly makes such jokes.
Michel Leeb based a skit on the joke, Monsieur et Madame ont un fils, where he tries to explain the nature of the joke to a madame Menvussa.

Television series[edit]

This type of word play was also used by Bart and Lisa in their telephone gags, in the series The Simpsons.

In English[edit]

"Mr & Mrs jokes" have been commonly featured in the "late arrivals" round of the radio panel show "I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue", broadcast on BBC Radio 4 since 1972, where the contestants announce the arrival of fictional guests.^[9] For example, "And will you welcome Mr and Mrs O'Reef, and their wonderful son Great Barry O'Reef!"^[10]

Use in speech therapy[edit]

The joke has been employed by some speech therapists as an activity while interacting with adolescents. It may be done in the usual form, or in reverse: the therapist gives the first name, and the adolescent needs to find the surname.^[11]

References[edit]

^ "Marquis de Bièvre : Lettre écrite à Madame la comtesse Tation, par le sieur de Bois-Flotté, Etudiant en droit-Fil (1770)". www.miscellanees.com.
^ "Info" (PDF). ebooks-bnr.com.
^ Bernard Gourbin, L'esprit des années 60.
^ Georges Perec, La Vie mode d'emploi, Hachette, 1978, édition Le Livre de Poche, January 2000, p. 291.
^ Mina Guillois et André Guillois, Le dictionnaire malicieux des histoires drôles: Témoins de notre temps, 2015.
^ Claude-Jean Philippe, Un rire par jour, Hachette, 1971, 254 pages
^ on the album Anthologie - Comprend qui peut, 1966, Philips.
^ Le noir te va si bien – via YouTube. Advance to 11 min 15 s).{{cite AV media}}: CS1 maint: postscript (link)
^ en.wikiquote.
^ Roberts, Jem (2010). The Fully Authorised History of I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue: The Clue Bible from Footlights to Mornington Crescent. Penguin Random House. p. 438. ISBN 978-1-84809-132-0.
^ "Data" (PDF). docnum.univ-lorraine.fr. 2003.