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What’s So Funny? A Glimpse at the Origins of Comedy It All Started With The Greeks… Dionysus, Greek god of the common man, wine, nature, and human/wild impulses Drama originated from ancient festivals honoring Dionysus (masks, torches, dancing, singing)
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What’s So Funny? A Glimpse at the Origins of Comedy
It All Started With The Greeks… • Dionysus, Greek god of the common man, wine, nature, and human/wild impulses • Drama originated from ancient festivals honoring Dionysus (masks, torches, dancing, singing) • Komoidia means “the song of the komos” (communal ritual carouse) • Normal social rules and inhibitions set aside
Three Ages of Greek Comedy • Old Comedy (fifth century BC) • Political and social satire; enforce social norms • Middle Comedy (400-323 BC) • Mock reenactment of famous myths • New Comedy (320 BC to mid-third century BC) • Focus on family, love, relationships
Characteristics • Original (not based on myths) • Outrageous ideas presented as plausible solutions (Lysistrata) • Role of the chorus prominent • Use of obscenity in language and gesture • Purpose: to ridicule recognizable figures without naming names • Political and social satire; vigorous concern with social events
Old Comedy: A Serious Edge • Scatalogical and obscene humor, but for a purpose: • to influence civic ideology, • to provide political and social critique
Aristophanes • Most well-known figure of old comedy • Wrote over 40 plays; eleven survive • Frogs, Clouds, Lysistrata are three of the most well known
Characteristics • Turned from confrontation, topical humor to mythological burlesque (mock reenactments of famous myths) • Less direct social/political comment • More interest in daily life • Attempts to develop characters more fully
Characteristics • Less obscene • Focused on family matters with complications in love relationships. • Love is an important theme New Comedy introduces into literature. • New Comedy concentrated on everyday life • Genial, mildly philosophical reflections of human situation
Focus of New Comedy • domestic situations, • troubles with husband/wives or particularly fathers and sons. • Interest in human characters revealed in an individual’s moral choice • Characters are placed in difficult situations through their own failings; must make difficult decisions. • Characters’ dilemmas reflect issues of Athenian society or Athenian attitude
Where do we see Old Comedy? • Satire • Parody • Political cartoons
Where Do We See Middle Comedy? • Comedy of manners • Satirizes the manners and affectations of a social class • Much Ado About Nothing
And New Comedy? • Deals with relationships • Most easily translated to our society • Romantic comedies (“chick flicks”) • Pretty Woman, Sleepless in Seattle, When Harry Met Sally, It’s a Wonderful Life
Subgenres of Comic Film Or, Where the Greeks Led Us
Comedy of Manners • Satirizes the manners and affectations of a social class • Often represented by stock characters • Plot often concerns illicit love affair or other scandal • Witty dialogue • Examples: Importance of Being Earnest, Seinfeld, anything by Noel Coward, • “Brit-coms”
Fish Out of Water • Main character(s) in a strange environment…for example: • Swapping gender roles (Tootsie) • Swapping age roles (Big) • Free spirit fitting into structured environment (Police Academy)
Parody or Spoof • Satirizes other film genres or classic films • Uses sarcasm, stereotyping, mockery of scenes from the films, etc. • Examples: Blazing Saddles, Airplane!, Young Frankenstein
Anarchic Comedy • Nonsensical, stream-of-consciousness humor • Jokes and visual gags—usually non-sequiturs (i.e., random stuff happens) • Wildly exaggerated characters and situations, sometimes unrelated to the narrative • Monty Python and the Holy Grail, Marx Brothers, Animal House, Wayne’s World
Black Comedy • Based around normally taboo subjects: death, murder, suicide, war • Treats these subjects in a humorous way • Includes an element of irony (belt example from Waiting for Godot)
Romantic Comedy • Focuses on development of relationship between two people • Typical plot: boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy gets girl back • Sexual tension and confusion along the way • Generally happy ending
Put Another Way… • Old Comedy focused on political and social commentary and change. • We see it today in satires (Daily Show, SNL, Simpsons, etc.)
Middle Comedy focused on increasing interest in daily life and character development, less interest in social/political commentary • We see it today in comedy of manners films
New Comedy focused on love, and developing human relationships. We see it today in one of the most prevalent subgenres of comedy: romantic comedy (chick flicks).