COMEDY
What is the aesthetic role of comedy?
Comedy is often mistaken for humour, because humour usually plays a part in comedy, but the two are not really identical (Meeker, 1997). Comedy is a symbolic way of puncturing pomposity. So much of what is presented in the public and official realm is serious and ponderous. A lot of the public and official agendas are driven by ideologically motivated advertising and propaganda (Ellul, 1973). Comedy seeks to expose the pompous premises motivating this posturing. Instead of “towing the party line,” comedy shows, through various media and allusions, the contradictions, the hypocrisy and the absurdity behind prevailing assumptions, expectations, and pronouncements. Comic heroes have at least something of the ridiculous about their demeanour. Woody Allen is a far more renowned comic than Arnold Schwarzenegger, precisely because his characterizations are much more plausible send-ups of so many of the archetype personalities in the modern world.
This “poking fun at” or “belittling” may be very gentle, but it can also be quite savage. In many of the comedies that Woody Allen stars in as well as directs, he plays an inept klutz whose good luck isn’t too good and whose bad luck isn’t too bad. But in two of his comedic dramas, which he directed but did not star in, the protagonists actually got away with murder. In both of these latter stories, the “rules of the game” of crime and punishment had loop-holes through which the protagonists were able to elude apprehension. Currently on American television, the best comedy, and the best news program, and the best on-going puncture of pomposity, are one and the same, namely John Stewart’s The Daily Show – none of the network news can hold a candle to it!
How is comedy used?
One task of comedy is to expose lies without naming names. Stories are often told in which the names and various other minor details are changed (to protect the innocent and/or the guilty). In political comedies the politicians may be assigned names of no one currently elected or generic names of which there are multiple examples in real life. When corporate connivance is being portrayed the industry or location may be altered, with tobacco executives becoming oil executives, and oil executives becoming tobacco executives, etc. Something else which comedy does particularly well, is to show the unanticipated and unintended consequences of either benevolently or malevolently motivated actions – “no good deed goes unpunished,” so “be careful what you wish for.” Thirdly, comedy is often an opportunity to “see ourselves as others see us” but without the embarrassment of having the audience’s own shortcomings publicly exposed. Or when a hero or a villain descends into the absurd, it can be a cautionary tale showing that if you want to keep your dignity and/or self-respect, don’t go there!
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