French comedy falls flat on face over stolen gags

THE French comedy circuit is in crisis after a mystery online whistle-blower shamed some of the country’s bestknown stand-ups to admit they had stolen their jokes from their British and American counterparts.

Millions have tuned into anonymously posted CopyComic videos of household names apparently brazenly plagiarising the likes of Lee Evans, Robin Williams and Jerry Seinfeld.

In some cases they merely translate word for word the gags while passing them off as original material.

Among those upbraided for plagiarism is Jamel Debbouze, who is known in the UK for his serious role in the film Days of Glory. Debbouze can be seen copying Dave Chappelle, the American comedian. Another alleged repeat copycat is Gad Elmaleh, who was married to Princess Charlotte of Monaco and now has a successful career in the US.

The first to be outed was French star Tomer Sisley. He later admitted to having copied between “20-30 per cent” of his gags.

Didier Bourdon, a well-known French comic actor, described the plagiarism as “flabbergasting”. He said: “Today with internet how can you think you’re going to get away with it?”

Elmaleh has not directly answered the allegations of plagiarism except to say he does use material elsewhere as a “starting point”.

Elmaleh’s lawyers succeeded in having a French court order Facebook to hand over data regarding CopyComic in April, but the whistleblower has still not been identified and told Nouvel Obs this week that he intends to remain anonymous and continue regardless.