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Clip description
In this stunt from The Chaser’s War on Everything, Chas Licciardello poses as a security officer working for APEC and asks members of the public to undergo random checks.
Curator’s notes
The comic prank moves beyond basic Candid Camera-style trickery and into satire when it makes a point or raises a question about some aspect of contemporary reality. This stunt does so quite cleanly, the question raised being ‘Just how much interference will people tolerate in the name of APEC security?’ The answer is funny and also a little disturbing.
According to executive producer Julian Morrow, sometimes legal restrictions end up making a stunt stronger and he believes this is an example. It is illegal to impersonate a police officer: hence Licciardello is simply dressed in a fashion ‘vaguely reminiscent of authority’. That people go along with him anyway serves to strengthen the point.
