gag line

A line, as in a comedy routine or speech, intended to provoke laughter.

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

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Noun

gag line - the point of a joke or humorous story

punch line, tag line, laugh line

gag, jape, jest, joke, laugh - a humorous anecdote or remark intended to provoke laughter; "he told a very funny joke"; "he knows a million gags"; "thanks for the laugh"; "he laughed unpleasantly at his own jest"; "even a schoolboy's jape is supposed to have some ascertainable point"

line - text consisting of a row of words written across a page or computer screen; "the letter consisted of three short lines"; "there are six lines in every stanza"

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NEW YORK -- Vic Hadfield joined his former GAG Line teammates as the latest to have his number retired by the New York Rangers.

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In particular, a song spoof by Hathaway was a misfire (and a shame, since she's a fine singer) that concluded with Franco appearing in blond-wigged drag and delivering this lame gag line: "The weird part is, I just got a text message from Charlie Sheen."

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Kameron, who's family live in Pakistan, had borrowed the mobile phone of a pal to try out a new 60p-a-time gag line.

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He's not keen on some current cartoonists who seem to be going for a gag line, rather than making a point about a public or moral issue.

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If it wasn't so serious, it would be pathetic, contemptible and a great stand-up gag line for Borat.

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As the gag line goes from the Federal Express television commercials, "not exactly." The relationship between unemployment rates and job growth, never a perfect one, has gotten a whole lot slipperier over the last five years.

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It's a dramatic singing role with not a gag line or impersonation in sight.

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Ewan MacGregor has a fair stab at turning leading Jedi and film hero Obi-Wan Kenobi into a more rounded person - he even gets a gag line - but much of his time is spent in flying, fighting or looking worried.

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No prizes for guessing what model car is used for a gag line; yup -- it's a Pinto, and the audience duly sniggers on cue.

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Another countercultural scrawl habitue was Fugs founder Tuli Kupferberg, who published Beatnik drawings with gag lines, like wonderfully stoned abstractions of New Yorker cartoons.