Pranks are definitively the most unfortunate kind of humor. Sure, there can be good pranks, but those are best handled by professionals. Most of the time it’s just amateurs launching something obnoxious upon a perfectly nice, unsuspecting innocent. Don’t do it! And especially don’t do it if you’re a celebrity. Time was, the only celebrity we had to worry about running around sets pranking people with fart sounds was George Clooney. But now there’s a new candidate for Prankmaster General, Department Of Farts, and her name is Amy Adams.
According to Vulture, the extremely talented and Oscar-winning star of Arrival, Nocturnal Animals, and many other very good movies, is also the kind of person who enjoys fart machines, those awful little things where you press the button and it emits a loud fart sound. (Surprisingly, really, that she hasn’t also been nominated for the Mark Twain Prize For American Humor, now that we know this.) Anyway, Adams’ co-star on the upcoming Sharp Objects miniseries on HBO, Taylor John Smith was explaining how the extremely bleak and somber material could lead to a deeply serious set. That sounds fair; a story about the murder of two young girls probably should make for a serious set. But that was before Lady Pranks-A-Lot got going. We’ll let Smith explain:
There was a scene that’s very gritty and heavy, probably one of the heaviest of the show. To break the ice, she brought on a fart machine. She hid it inside the set unbeknownst to Jean-Marc [Vallée, the director]…First couple takes, she’d press the button and Jean-Marc freaked out. He was like, “Who was that? Who was that?” It was great.
Calling it great was very kind of Smith, because it almost assuredly was not great. Farts, like pranks and other catastrophes, can occasionally be funny—Ted Cruz farting in the middle of an idiotic rant on the Senate floor is a good example. But fart machines are just the worst—think of any time someone has pulled one out. It’s exhausting within seconds. Our thoughts and prayers are with Amy Adams during this difficult time of her fart-machine fandom. Much like the gas it emulates, hopefully it will soon pass.