Comedy is not pretty.
Or at least current comedy is not pretty.
I am a person who laughs at a lot of things, but I don’t laugh at anything today.
And I am talking about comedy today, including what you find on television.
Just the other day, Steve Martin said that he was deciding whether it was time to retire, and when I heard about this, I said ot myself, “Yes, it is time to him to retire, because he hasn’t been funny in at least 30 years.”
And then last night, I was speaking to my mother, and the subject of comedy came up … and with her 91 years of wisdom, and seeing and hearing it all, she agreed that there is nothing funny to laugh at today, nothing at all.
I think the main problem with all of this is that people have simply forgotten how to laugh at themselves anymore, laugh at the human foibles that make us human beings and members of one race, the human race.
Everybody gets upset at just the littlest things, and certainly the engine that powers comedy is that one can laugh at oneself, or others, because nothing vile is really being spoken about, it is all just in fun.
Don Rickles could not survive today as a younger comedian in this environment. He made fun of everyone, including himself, and people actually wanted to sit front row when he was on stage, because it was an honor to be ragged by him, for your color, your ethnic background … heck, any feature that stood out he would grab onto and not let go.
Can you imagine a current comedian making fun of someone’s ethnic background today? People would knock him unmercifully.
Rickles used to say before each of his performances that no malice was intended with his barbs, it was just all in fun, and people took it that way.
Today? Fuggedaboudit.
I have tried to watch today’s TV sitcoms, and they are as un-funny as can be. So much politics are thrown into the shows that they cannot possibly be funny, so much PC nonsense are part of these shows, so they can’t possibly be funny, and you see the regression of humor since probably the 1980s or early 1990s—“Everyone Loves Raymond” and “King of Queens” were funny--with these shows.
They simply are not funny, since they kind of pussyfoot around things that should be funny, but aren’t, because these shows are afraid of insulting people.
Or at least current comedy is not pretty.
I am a person who laughs at a lot of things, but I don’t laugh at anything today.
And I am talking about comedy today, including what you find on television.
Just the other day, Steve Martin said that he was deciding whether it was time to retire, and when I heard about this, I said ot myself, “Yes, it is time to him to retire, because he hasn’t been funny in at least 30 years.”
And then last night, I was speaking to my mother, and the subject of comedy came up … and with her 91 years of wisdom, and seeing and hearing it all, she agreed that there is nothing funny to laugh at today, nothing at all.
I think the main problem with all of this is that people have simply forgotten how to laugh at themselves anymore, laugh at the human foibles that make us human beings and members of one race, the human race.
Everybody gets upset at just the littlest things, and certainly the engine that powers comedy is that one can laugh at oneself, or others, because nothing vile is really being spoken about, it is all just in fun.
Don Rickles could not survive today as a younger comedian in this environment. He made fun of everyone, including himself, and people actually wanted to sit front row when he was on stage, because it was an honor to be ragged by him, for your color, your ethnic background … heck, any feature that stood out he would grab onto and not let go.
Can you imagine a current comedian making fun of someone’s ethnic background today? People would knock him unmercifully.
Rickles used to say before each of his performances that no malice was intended with his barbs, it was just all in fun, and people took it that way.
Today? Fuggedaboudit.
I have tried to watch today’s TV sitcoms, and they are as un-funny as can be. So much politics are thrown into the shows that they cannot possibly be funny, so much PC nonsense are part of these shows, so they can’t possibly be funny, and you see the regression of humor since probably the 1980s or early 1990s—“Everyone Loves Raymond” and “King of Queens” were funny--with these shows.
They simply are not funny, since they kind of pussyfoot around things that should be funny, but aren’t, because these shows are afraid of insulting people.
Clever is not funny, shows about people with diseases are not funny, so TV sitcoms have regressed to the point that they are not watchable.
If you lose that edge, these shows cannot be funny.
Can you imagine a “Sanford and Son” today? With all the rants against every ethnic group and even the use of the “N” word, no way Jose.
How about an “F Troop” today? Having white and Jewish Indians rather than using indigenous people to fill these roles, the satire would be lost on the current TV generation.
And what about “All In the Family?” There are so many layers to that show that would not fly today that I don’t have room in a single Rant to go over each of them with you.
Although people today look at certain comedians as funny, most of their supposed “funniness” is vile and vicious, which is not what comedy is supposed to be about.
Comedians can make fun of people, but really they are not making fun of people, specifically, just their foibles.
We all have them, and they are funny, not vile and vicious and filled with four-letter words and other vulgarity that many comedians use today to get a laugh.
And then we have the altercation between Chris Rock and Will Smith, which may have set comedy back 100 years because one side really misunderstood the actions of the other side,
The comments made by Rock were not vicious but in today’s world, every word is dissected in a ridiculous way, and Smith took it upon himself to uphold his wife’s honor, rather than rolling with the flow of the supposed comedy that Rock was dishing, again which really isn’t funny to begin with.
Other comics have since been attacked when performing their supposed hilarious acts on stage, and if you can’t laugh at these people, you have no right to attack them physically.
My mom and I were recalling the great comics, who were really funny because they fell into two camps: they were either storytellers or were people who made fun of themselves as much as, or even more than, they made fun of others.
My wife and I watch the half hour reruns of “The Ed Sullivan Show” each weeknight, and there you see some of the funniest comedians that have ever been on a stage entertaining audiences.
You see people who went onto further heights later in their careers, like Joan Rivers and Richard Pryor, both of whom were funny early on but became pathetically unfunny later on when they went off their axis of self-deprecating comedy into lashing out at others in a vile way.
You see people like Alan King and Myron Cohen, each of whom never told a joke during their acts, but told stories that were rich with humor all about the ups and downs of people like you and me.
You saw Flip Wilson and George Carlin and so many others, who knew how to get a laugh by being funny without being condescending.
How could “The Ed Sullivan Show” exist today with the current crop of supposed comedians?
The answer is that it couldn’t exist, simply because with all the restrictions put on comedy today, nothing is funny anymore.
There are no breakout comedians like Freddie Prize to make us laugh anymore, and this is not helped by the fact that the late-night talk shows—themselves hosted by supposed comedians—are simply too politically edged to be really funny.
Johnny Carson was political too, but he and his writers knew that when you knocked one side of the podium, you had to knock the other side in kind.
He was funny. Today’s hosts are not.
When will we be able to laugh again?
Even today’s current comics have acknowledged that comedy isn’t what it once was, with all the straightjackets applied to comedy today.
So until se stop getting so uptight about everything that comes out of peoples’ mouths, comedy will continue to suffer, and the phrase “Comedy Is Not Pretty” will continue to morph into “Comedy Is Really Ugly” in a blink of an eye ...
And that certainly isn’t funny at all.
If you lose that edge, these shows cannot be funny.
Can you imagine a “Sanford and Son” today? With all the rants against every ethnic group and even the use of the “N” word, no way Jose.
How about an “F Troop” today? Having white and Jewish Indians rather than using indigenous people to fill these roles, the satire would be lost on the current TV generation.
And what about “All In the Family?” There are so many layers to that show that would not fly today that I don’t have room in a single Rant to go over each of them with you.
Although people today look at certain comedians as funny, most of their supposed “funniness” is vile and vicious, which is not what comedy is supposed to be about.
Comedians can make fun of people, but really they are not making fun of people, specifically, just their foibles.
We all have them, and they are funny, not vile and vicious and filled with four-letter words and other vulgarity that many comedians use today to get a laugh.
And then we have the altercation between Chris Rock and Will Smith, which may have set comedy back 100 years because one side really misunderstood the actions of the other side,
The comments made by Rock were not vicious but in today’s world, every word is dissected in a ridiculous way, and Smith took it upon himself to uphold his wife’s honor, rather than rolling with the flow of the supposed comedy that Rock was dishing, again which really isn’t funny to begin with.
Other comics have since been attacked when performing their supposed hilarious acts on stage, and if you can’t laugh at these people, you have no right to attack them physically.
My mom and I were recalling the great comics, who were really funny because they fell into two camps: they were either storytellers or were people who made fun of themselves as much as, or even more than, they made fun of others.
My wife and I watch the half hour reruns of “The Ed Sullivan Show” each weeknight, and there you see some of the funniest comedians that have ever been on a stage entertaining audiences.
You see people who went onto further heights later in their careers, like Joan Rivers and Richard Pryor, both of whom were funny early on but became pathetically unfunny later on when they went off their axis of self-deprecating comedy into lashing out at others in a vile way.
You see people like Alan King and Myron Cohen, each of whom never told a joke during their acts, but told stories that were rich with humor all about the ups and downs of people like you and me.
You saw Flip Wilson and George Carlin and so many others, who knew how to get a laugh by being funny without being condescending.
How could “The Ed Sullivan Show” exist today with the current crop of supposed comedians?
The answer is that it couldn’t exist, simply because with all the restrictions put on comedy today, nothing is funny anymore.
There are no breakout comedians like Freddie Prize to make us laugh anymore, and this is not helped by the fact that the late-night talk shows—themselves hosted by supposed comedians—are simply too politically edged to be really funny.
Johnny Carson was political too, but he and his writers knew that when you knocked one side of the podium, you had to knock the other side in kind.
He was funny. Today’s hosts are not.
When will we be able to laugh again?
Even today’s current comics have acknowledged that comedy isn’t what it once was, with all the straightjackets applied to comedy today.
So until se stop getting so uptight about everything that comes out of peoples’ mouths, comedy will continue to suffer, and the phrase “Comedy Is Not Pretty” will continue to morph into “Comedy Is Really Ugly” in a blink of an eye ...
And that certainly isn’t funny at all.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.