modern life is better than life in the past, humorist P.J. O'Rourke writes, "Even the bad things are better than they used to be. Bad music, for instance, has gotten much briefer. Wagner's Ring Cycle takes four days to perform while 'Mmm Mmm Mmm Mmm' by the Crash Test Dummies lasts little more than three minutes." In 1994, "Weird Al" Yankovic parodied the song as the lead-off single for his compilation box set Permanent Record: Al in the Box after his record label insisted he record a new song to promote it. The parody, titled "Headline News", combined the music of the original song with new lyrics about three popular news stories from the preceding months. He also produced and starred in a nearly frame-for-frame parody of the original song's music video, featuring several celebrities playing the parts of those referred to in the lyrics. In The Venture Bros., the Pirate Captain plays a rendition of the song, calling it "an old pirate dirge", at Jonas Venture Jr.'s funeral, to Rusty's annoyance. Chart performance Outside their home country of Canada, the single became the band's most successful song, reaching number four in the United States and number two in the United Kingdom—the group's biggest hit in both countries. It also reached number one on the Modern Rock Chart in the United States and in Australia, Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Iceland, Norway, and Sweden. While the Crash Test Dummies had six singles reach the Canadian top ten, "Mmm Mmm Mmm Mmm" was not one of them, instead stalling at number 14. Music video The accompanying music video for "Mmm Mmm Mmm Mmm" was directed by Dale Heslip and premiered in October 1993. It sets the song's lyrics as the script for a series of one-act plays performed by schoolchildren. Throughout, the scenes of the performance are intercut with scenes of the Crash Test Dummies performing the song at stage side. All three one-act plays included nicknames for their lead characters, to provide Heslip with easy references: The first featured a kid nicknamed "Whitey" The second pitted "Blotchy" against "Bratty Kids", who Heslip thought lived up to their nickname; Blotchy's marks are covered with a long cape she wears throughout, whereas the "Bratty Kids" wear deerstalker hats and carry magnifying glasses The third had, as its focus, a "Reluctant Boy" These nicknames were all revealed in an installment of Pop-Up Video. The same