Last spring's sold-out festival of ten documentary gems, DOC10, will be back at the Music Box in 2017! Join us on December 1 for a special preview of the upcoming festival with sneak peaks and a screening of one of our favorites films of the year, the new doc-comedy The Last Laugh.  

In this hilarious and poignant exploration of humor, a cavalcade of comedians, including Mel Brooks, Sarah Silverman, Louis CK, Joan Rivers, and Chris Rock explore the limits of what makes people laugh. Is there any topic off the table? Filmmaker Ferne Pearlstein takes on that most horrific historical moment—the Holocaust—and finds that even the most taboo subjects can spark comedy: It just has to be a very good joke. From The Producers’ hit musical number “Springtime For Hitler” and Charlie Chaplin’s balletic tour-de-force in The Great Dictator to Seinfeld’s “Soup Nazi” and Curb Your Enthusiasm’s “Survivor” episode, The Last Laugh deftly combines funny clips with serious interrogations about dealing with tragedy. Both “entertaining [and] thought-provoking” (Variety), The Last Laugh offers amusing proof that “comics are the conscience of the people,” as Mel Brooks says—“even if they’re in bad taste.” 

 Presented by Chicago Media Project, host of the DOC10 Film Festival.