laughing academy

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laughing academy (plural laughing academies)

1. (slang) A mental hospital.

   Synonyms: see Thesaurus:mental hospital

   • 1971 Oct. 11, Stefan Kanfer, "Cinema: Senescent Saint" (film review of Kotch), Time (retrieved 7 June 2014):

     "Tell me, do you think your old man has slipped his trolley—that he belongs in a laughing academy?"

   • 1981 Nov. 23, John Leonard, "Books Of The Times" (review of The Letters of Nunnally Johnson), New York Times (retrieved 7 June 2014):

     One day the men in white will walk in, throw a net over him, and take him off to the laughing academy.

   • 2009, Jamie Ford, Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet‎, →ISBN:

     Meanwhile William struggled to shake the thought of his mother spending her final years locked away in a nuthouse—a laughing academy, a funny farm.