“HITOSHI MATSUMOTO Presents Documental,” the comedy competition series created and produced by Downtown’s Hitoshi Matsumoto, is getting its first-ever American production. The US version will be made by Fulwell Entertainment, the company behind recent Grammy Awards telecasts and “Keeping Up with the Kardashians.”
Eric Pankowski, an executive producer of “Carpool Karaoke,” will serve as showrunner. He will work alongside Ben Winston and Emma Conway, both showrunners of the Grammy Awards telecast, who join as executive producers on the project.
“Documental” first began streaming on Prime Video in 2016. The format pits ten comedians against each other in a battle to keep straight faces while their rivals try everything to make them laugh; the last person who hasn’t cracked up wins. The show went international in 2019 with a Mexican edition released under the title “LOL: Last One Laughing.” Since then, more than 80 seasons have rolled out across 25 countries and regions on Prime Video. The German edition has been a particular standout, ranking fifth worldwide in the TV series category and first among non-English-language TV series on Prime Video’s weekly “Top10 Prime Original Films and Series” chart for the week of May 25 to 31, 2026.
Who is Hitoshi Matsumoto?
Hitoshi Matsumoto (松本人志) is one half of the legendary comedy duo Downtown, a cornerstone act in Japanese television since the 1980s. Beyond performing, he has built a career as a producer and creator of original comedy formats, with “Documental” standing as his best-known international export. The show’s global spread under the “LOL” banner has made Matsumoto one of the few Japanese entertainment figures with a directly attributable hit format on Western streaming platforms.
Author’s Comment
Look, I love that Japan finally gets to export something other than anime and karaoke machines — a room full of comedians trying not to laugh is about as universal as entertainment gets. But let’s not pretend this is charity work; Fulwell doesn’t sign on to Grammy-adjacent talent for the warm feelings, they sign on because the German version is quietly out-streaming half of English-language TV. Japanese Twitter’s reaction so far is basically "wait, there wasn’t already an American one?" — which, fair, when you’ve had 80-plus seasons rolling out from Mexico to Germany, America showing up late to its own IP feels almost poetic. I’ll be very curious to see if American comedians can survive a straight face as long as the Japanese cast, because frankly, our guys have had a decade of practice not laughing at things that definitely aren’t funny.
