There's a lot I find funny and humorous. But whatever it seems to be in British sketch comedy that Americans seem to love doesn't work for me. Actually I'm not a big fan of sketch comedy in general. It is a format that rarely works for me (SNL, Mad TV, Almost Live, Second City, etc., are all shows I can pass on with no regrets).
Another element to what is funny is that for me it would seem that I have never found something that is funny on re-experience. A joke is only funny the first time, and each retelling just makes it less and less so. So while there may have been things in Monty Python I found funny initially (and now I've forgotten), that has been wiped clean by endless repetition, particularly by people who aren't nearly so talented - such as the geeks in high school you were kind of ashamed to find yourself among. The Knights Who Say Ni may originally have been funny in context (though I would say it wasn't; the movie has other funny parts) but it has been deprived of any oxygen by the people who think simply saying "ni" at an odd moment is reason to have adult diapers on hand.
I'm a big fan of stand-up since I think that it is an environment that removes the need for continuity and context that ruins sketch comedy. I prefer restrained exaggeration and biting sarcasm over pratfalls and poop jokes. P.J. O'Rourke over David Sedaris. Douglas Adams was only funny when he was writing non-fiction.
On television I seem to tend more towards the smart low-brow to the sophisticated highbrow.
Everybody Loves Raymond was really very funny.
Sports Night wasn't
. Arrested Devleopment and
Scrubs are both brilliant in different ways. The jokes in
Playboy are better than the jokes in
The New Yorker but they're all mostly lame. "On the internet, nobody knows you're a dog" was never funny. It may have been telling of a deeper truth but not funny.
However, other than
High Anxiety and the "Puttin' on the Ritz" bit in
Young Frankenstein, Mel Brooks (low brow) has never been funny but Albert Brooks (high brow) always is, even when the movie itself is crap.
On the AFI list of the
top 100 comedies, the funniest, in descending order are, are #93, #55, #44, #82, and #34. Half of the movies on that list are not, to me, funny at all.
His Girl Friday is a great movie but I don't find it funny, just fun. Same with
Harvey, one of my all time favorites.
To wrap it up, I wonder if I pushed the solidarity too far with Not Afraid with my semi-diss of David Sedaris.