Before there was Jonnie Marbles and Rupert Murdoch, there were clowns, and they've been throwing pies since the first rubber chicken was but a comedic egg.
But these days, the custard and crust attacks aren't confined to circuses and slapstick comedies.
Celebrities, actors, sports stars, politicians and public figures have been targeted with baked goods, a practice known as "pieing."
There was an surge in prominent pieings in 2000, when attacks on politicians around the world made headlines. That year, Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien, Illinois governor George Ryan, and the managing director of the IMF, Michel Camdessus, were all victims of pies to the face, according to The New York Times.
In 2004, two members of the group Al-Pieda attempted an attack on Ann Coulter while she was speaking at the University of Arizona, The Smoking Gun reported. Coulter, however, seems to have a natural aversion to pies, and, for the most part, escaped this attack unscathed:
(Her attackers weren't so lucky -- they were arrested and charged with a felony and three misdemeanors.)
Tom Friedman, best-selling author and New York Times columnist, got a pie to the face while speaking at Brown University in 2008:
While it remains to be seen whether Jonnie Marbles will be punished for his attempted pieing of Rupert Murdoch, clowns from generations before are surely looking down, knowing that their legacy lives on.
Check out some memorable pies to the face in the slideshow below. Let us know what pies to the face you remember in the comments.
