As far as sketch comedy goes, there is nothing funnier than watching someone break character.  That happens when an actor stops performing like the character and behaves like his or her actual self.  This happens occasionally  on shows like Saturday Night Live.

When I was little I remember watching Horatio Sans break during a seemingly dry sketch.  It was like watching him realize the absurdness of the character he was playing.  As the idea of the sketch set in and he began delivering his ridiculous lines, his mouth began to widen and he started squinting.  His words became very staccato as if he was struggling to breathe.  And then, within an instant, Horatio Sans  (as himself) was now cheesing and chuckling towards the light from the camera.  I laughed so hard that I cried.  

This sketch, that was probably intended to be about 2 minutes long, had now become a 7 minute struggle to keep from laughing, Horatio struggling over every line and when another character was delivering their lines, Horatio still couldn’t recover.

Watching a great actor go through that emotional and yet light-hearted struggle is slightly endearing.  It reminds us that the actor understands how they appear and it allows us to laugh with them.

In the sketch above, Fred Armison broke during a pretty regular sketch.  Fred Armison’s break causes Kristen Wig to break along side of him and they struggle to maintain for the remainder of the sketch.