History Main / ScriptSwap

->"Okay. The game is Cue Card Rummy. I deal."

* ''AnchormanTheLegendOfRonBurgundy'': When Veronica switches the teleprompter to read "go fuck yourself, San Diego", Ron reads it without missing a beat.
* In ''TheSeduction'', Morgan Fairchild plays a news anchorwoman named Jamie who is being [[StalkerWithACrush stalked]]. At one point the stalker gets into the newsroom and replaces her teleprompter feed. She starts to read it in her bland newswoman's voice until she realizes what she's saying.

* In ''ScaryMovie'' 3, there's a scene in which two characters type conflicting information into a teleprompter, followed by a technician typing in rude words just for laughs. The newscaster reads it all (including gibberish such as the output from just sitting on the keyboard) with a completely straight face.

* On ''TheWestWing'', President Bartlett is forced to nominate complete non-entity "Bingo Bob" as a replacement V.P. to avoid a long confirmation battle, and his scriptwriters complain bitterly, going so far as to pen a resounding denunciation of this ridiculous lobbyist lapdog. [[HilarityEnsues Inevitably]], it ends up on the president's teleprompter by mistake. In a partial aversion, Bartlett merely gives a surprised blink and then improvises a glowing eulogy, because he is just that awesome. (And the V.P. actually requests a copy, saying he needs to be aware of what people are thinking of him.)

* ''AnchormanTheLegendOfRonBurgundy'': When Veronica switches the [=TelePrompTer=] to read "go fuck yourself San Diego", Ron reads it without missing a beat.
* In ''TheSeduction'', Morgan Fairchild plays a news anchorwoman named Jamie who is being [[StalkerWithACrush stalked]]. At one point the stalker gets into the newsroom and replaces her [=TelePrompTer=] feed. She starts to read it in her bland newswoman's voice until she realizes what she's saying.
-->"Jamie, I'm watching you..."''breaks down on live TV'' He's gonna kill me... Please help me... Please!

* On ''TheWestWing'', President Bartlett is forced to nominate complete non-entity "Bingo Bob" as a replacement V.P. to avoid a long confirmation battle, and his scriptwriters complain bitterly, going so far as to pen a resounding denunciation of this ridiculous lobbyist lapdog. [[HilarityEnsues Inevitably]], it ends up on the president's [=TelePrompTer=] by mistake. In a partial aversion, Bartlett merely gives a surprised blink and then improvises a glowing eulogy, because he is just that awesome. (And the V.P. actually requests a copy, saying he needs to be aware of what people are thinking of him.)

* This is a favorite trick of {{ComicStrip/Garfield}} in [[GarfieldAndFriends his animated TV series]]. He's done it with the cue cards for an exercise show (page quote), a disc jockey's advertisement, and a list of pet tricks for a cat show.

* In ''ANightAtTheOpera'', Chico and Harpo swap the sheet music of an entire orchestra so that they all start playing "Take Me Out to the Ball Game" in the middle of the opera.

->-- '''ComicStrip/{{Garfield}}''', preparing to invoke this trope in ''WesternAnimation/GarfieldAndFriends'' (episode: ''Health Feud'')

** Another episode has Nina and Maya nominated for fashion magazine awards. Maya's nomination was for an article that was changed without her permision, so she planned a speech rejecting the award and badmouthing the article. Unfortunately, Nina took Maya's acceptance speech by mistake, thus making Maya look bad when she won her award immediately afterwards.

*** Episode 104 of the same series does the same thing with a series of cue cards for AbrahamLincoln's statements on the issues. Abe must ''really'' not be paying attention, since the poster and the sign used for the swaps look nothing like the normal cue cards in terms of font and layout... maybe this one relies on RuleOfFunny.

A common trick to pull on the CartoonConductor. Whether or not this is TruthInTelevision is a question someone more psychologically educated than myself will have to answer.

See also OhWaitThisIsMyGroceryList. The cases in which it happens by accident rather than deliberate trickery also fall under UnfortunateItemSwap. Compare the BavarianFireDrill.

See also OhWaitThisIsMyGroceryList. The cases in which it happens by accident rather than deliberate trickery also fall under UnfortunateItemSwap.

* In an episode of ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'', Bart replaces the hymn sheets and music at the local church with those of "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida" (a {{mondegreen}} of "In the Garden of Eden") by Music/IronButterfly.

* A slightly inventive version is performed with two typewriters in a ''Magazine/SpyVsSpy'' comic.

->-- '''ComicStrip/{{Garfield}}''', preparing to invoke this trope in ''WesternAnimation/GarfieldAndFriends'',

[[quoteright:330:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/spyfoxmusicswap_3648.png]]
[[caption-width-right:330:Swapping sheet music is a common variant.]]

->-- '''Garfield''', preparing to invoke this trope, ''GarfieldAndFriends'', "Health Feud"

* In one episode of ''StarTrekTheNextGeneration'', a computer glitch replaces the text of a play with some of [[spoiler:Data]]'s poetry. Fortunately, they notice this during rehearsal.

A Script Swap occurs when either by accident or by external mischief, someone winds up reading or following a different document than what they're supposed to, and does so without at any point noticing the mixup.

See also OhWaitThisIsMyGroceryList.

* In ''The Seduction'', Morgan Fairchild plays a news anchorwoman named Jamie who is being [[StalkerWithACrush stalked]]. At one point the stalker gets into the newsroom and replaces her [=TelePrompTer=] feed. She starts to read it in her bland newswoman's voice until she realizes what she's saying.

* In the ''WebOriginal/HomestarRunner'' toon [[http://www.homestarrunner.com/sbemail195.html "love poems"]], Homestar produces an acrostic poem that spells out the name of his girlfriend Marzipan. The poem consists entirely of food items.

* A slightly inventive version is performed with two typewriters in a ''SpyVsSpy'' comic.

* In one of the ''{{Scary Movie}}'' films, there's a scene in which two characters type conflicting information into a teleprompter, followed by a technician typing in rude words just for laughs. The newscaster reads it all (including gibberish such as the output from just sitting on the keyboard) with a completely straight face.

* In ''{{Seinfeld}}'', when Jerry and George got their mentoring notes mixed up, Bania ends up doing a brilliant stand-up routine about corporate risk management, and George gives a lecture to his colleagues about Ovaltine.
* A classic accidental example from ''{{Friends}}'': Rachel is making English trifle for dessert, but two pages on the recipe book stick together, so she ends up making a mincemeat trifle that {{tastes like feet}}.

** The third game of ''StrongBadsCoolGameForAttractivePeople'' has this done with a series of records for the Two-O Duo's dance routines, including introducing two new ones, combining this trope with ProgrammingGame. Coach Z is smart enough not to dance off the stage if that's what the music suggests, but he's not smart enough not to [[spoiler:air-punch his partner square in the face]].
** This is done on two levels in the second ''BackToTheFuture'' game, where Marty has to swap the sheet music at the piano so Cue Ball plays just the right music to change the mood so a drunken officer will get in the mood to talk to him. Then when he needs a more inspirational song than the club has to offer, Marty gets the lyrics to such a song, swaps them for Trixie's lyrics to her own song, then changes the piano music so Trixie's song is played. Possibly justified in the latter case in that the two songs have ''really'' similar lyrics, and Trixie explicitly hasn't memorized hers.
* The image is from the first ''SpyFox'' game, where the player has to do this to get tango music playing so Russian Blue will dance.

* Imps do this to Garland early in ''EightBitTheater''. Garland does notice that the speech written for him by Princess Sara has been replaced by an insult letter, but that still means he has to think up something quickly, resulting in his {{meme}}tic line.

* In the ''HomestarRunner'' toon [[http://www.homestarrunner.com/sbemail195.html "love poems"]], Homestar produces an acrostic poem that spells out the name of his girlfriend Marzipan. The poem consists entirely of food items.

* This is a favorite trick of {{Garfield}} in [[GarfieldAndFriends his animated TV series]]. He's done it with the cue cards for an exercise show (page quote), a disc jockey's advertisement, and a list of pet tricks for a cat show.

* In ''TinyToonAdventures'', Buster switches the lyrics on a bossy kid's performer so that his song about a monkey who looks both ways to cross the street ends with the monkey being run over.
* In the ''TomAndJerry'' short "Carmen Get It!", Jerry pulls a variation of this trick on Tom by having a sizable number of ants rearrange themselves on the conductor's lectern.

* ''AnchormanTheLegendOfRonBurgundy'': When Veronica switches the [=TelePrompTer=] to read "go f*** yourself San Diego", Ron reads it without missing a beat.

* In an episode of ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'', Bart replaces the hymn sheets and music at the local church with those of "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida" (using the common joke that it's a {{mondegreen}} of "In the Garden of Eden") by Iron Butterfly.

* Variant: In the manga ''Cat Street'', Keito's script is wrongly transcribed for her by rival auditionees in order to improve their own chances of being selected. Keito cannot read kanji and asked them for help, resulting in a completely nonsensical monologue.

* In one of the {{Scary Movie}} films, there's a scene in which two characters type conflicting information into a teleprompter, followed by a technician typing in rude words just for laughs. The newscaster reads it all (including gibberish such as the output from just sitting on the keyboard) with a completely straight face.

* In an episode of ''TheSimpsons'', Bart replaces the hymn sheets and music at the local church with those of "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida" (using the common joke that it's a {{mondegreen}} of "In the Garden of Eden") by Iron Butterfly.

** Episode 102 of ''Game/SamAndMaxFreelancePolice'' does this when swapping a set of game show question cards with an easier set of questions. Possibly justified in that since Hugh Bliss isn't the normal host, he probably has no idea what the questions are supposed to be.