Gossip

The theme of gossip transcends time. In class we have found a comedic angle to view gossip. The Silence Dogood Letters were merely gossip in print. In this class, I can now recall three instances of female authors using the theme of gossip. The first was from the Frances Whitcher selections at the beginning of the year. The women in this sewing society gather every so often to “sew,” when they actually just gossip. The sewing is so insignificant, but the women don’t think twice about just having a tea party instead, they insist on sewing. On top of all the absurdity, they ever have a president. My first instinct is that Ms. Whitcher is attacking the ideals of women in order to draw a laugh. I found the humor in this sewing society wasting yarn and gossiping for the time being. This episode concerning gossip was more appealing to me than the passage we read today from Edith Wharton. While Whitcher’s piece was more of a loose slapstick between fair ladies, “Xingu” associates with rich New York women who indirectly gossip about each other behind their backs. Mrs. Ballinger leads the herd to make fun of Mrs. Roby while she is the only one with opinions of her own. The rest of the crew say the least they can in order to satisfy their own personal intelligence. The women merely try to keep the conversation going by doing the minimal amount of work. Similar to the sewing society this is a lunch club. In conjecture with these settings, Eudora Welty writes in a hair salon. All three of these situations are perfect places for women to dabble in their gossip. In the Welty reading, the gossip spreads through the characters. It all starts when the hairdresser, Mrs. Fletcher tell Leota that your hair falls out when you become “p-r-e-g.” Leota, startled, gives her pregnant position away and Mrs. Fletcher instantly becomes interested. This piece reminds me about old high school drama. Scandals spread like wildfire through the halls, and the same goes for this situation.
Gossip is an interesting theme used by female comedians. We have yet to read a male piece regarding gossip (unless you count Ms. Dogood) and for that reason I think women use this humor to poke fun at their own social lives.

The Best of the Women - Wanda and Janeane

I would like to start this blog off with an under appreciated comedian that we have discussed in class. Out of all six or seven females we looked at this week, Wanda Sykes deserves a round of applause. She ousted her counterparts during Monday’s class. To that point in the class all the females we looked at were bad, to say the least. The crickets in the room quickly vanished when Wanda was turned on. The week’s focus was on style, timing, and appearance and Wanda had it all. She is a well-dressed black female, and she acted the part to a T. Her jokes were appropriate for her appearance and her language was synonymous with her act. I really enjoyed her feminist form contrasted with her aggressive male style. Her timing was almost too good. Joke and joke, she probably had twice as many punch lines as Margaret Cho earlier in class. She didn’t pause on stage and she knew her stuff. I congratulate Miss Sykes on her raw jokes in conjunction with well executed punch lines.
For me, the best comedian we saw on Wednesday was the young and beautiful Janene Garofalo. For the most part, her appearance matched her comedic style. Her tom-boy attire made her jokes seem more masculine to me. I hope I speak for the guys when I saw she was a man’s woman. Not in the attractive sexual way, more the association between the sexes. Her offensive aggressive jokes were much more appropriate coming from her than coming from Nora Lynch. Janene's overarching theme was a sort of resistance to society. We discussed this briefly in class, but I think that it the best way to say it. Most of her jokes marketed to men, but they also dealt with society at her time (mid 80’s?). The funniest joke I can remember was her sarcastic criticism of the all-versatile Steven Segal.
As for the best of the rest, Caroline Ray had some pretty smart jokes. Her skit started rough and once she got into her groove the punch lines kept on coming. I enjoyed her short satire of contraceptive devices (more specifically, the use of sponges).

Expecting the Unexpected

In class we focused on timing, style, and presentation. I wanted to take this blog to focus on presentation along with expectations. There is a general consensus of our class that the woman we watched defied their expectations. Margaret Cho was dressed in more casual female clothing during the skit we watched in “Funny Ladies.” She looked good sporting a dress, lipstick, and made-up hair. I have watched her stand-up in the past where she wears jeans, a plaid button-up shirt, and looks sort of trashy. So in turn, it is obvious she has changed her style for the better because the skit we watched in class was funnier than the comedy she performed previous. The delivery is affected by what people expect. The audience expectations are formed from two things. The first being their reputation. A comedian mostly gets their reputation from word of mouth, reviews, or legacy. Secondly, an audience gets a final expectation by their appearance that performance; if a female dresses like a male, I would general expect male-esque jokes. Besides Cho, I have never seen or heard the comedians we watched in class. With Cho, I expected her to have more elegant jokes by her elegant outlook, but on the contrary she crossed several gender boundaries. Similar to Cho, the second female act we watched in class also defied her expectations. This woman was a much more elegantly extreme case than the expectations of Cho. She was a very attractive female, dolled up hair, and a prom dress to boot. My expectations of her and her performance were very wrong. She acted almost immature on stage. Her only comedy was formed off of physical stunts that made her the butt of the joke. It was far from what I expected from a woman dressed as so.
There are people who dress and act the suit. For example, Larry “the cable guy” acts just like the audience might expect. With a southern draw, he talks about guns, women and rednecks. He appears trashy, and talks with a trashy tone. Personally, he is hilarious. He might not appeal to some women because his appearance makes him a “man’s man.” On the other hand, there are comedians who can appropriately cross that boundary. Eddie Izzard is one of those people. He is a transvestite. Without explanation, this gives most of the audience a common gender that we can relate to. If the joke appeals to men as a man, so be it. If the joke appeals to women as a female, everyone is happy.

Gender Rules

The Full Monty was a surprisingly funny British comedy set in the city Sheffield. Gaz is the main character who is on the verge of losing his only son. This is because Gaz cannot pay custody for his wife. One day he sees the women queuing up to see a performance by the Chippendales. These male strippers persuade him to try it out. He comes up with the idea of raising money by stripping. He riles up some of his buddies and they undertake the training they think a stripper must adhere to. The plot of this story is absolutely hilarious. I could easily write a few blogs concerning the comedy in this story, but I have chosen to pay tribute to the gender roles that this movie batters.
The Full Monty attacks the changing gender roles in today’s society. In the movie and in every day life, male stripping is a rarity. That doesn’t stop these unfit, out-of-shape men to pursue their dreams. It is interesting to see that the economy in which the movie is set is so deprived of work that men have to resort to an occupation such as stripping. It can be generally concluded that young boys and girls don’t usually have high aspirations of becoming a stripper when they are young. It is an occupation typically attracted to the under-educated and unemployed. But women still do it. In my mind, stripping is a degrading vocation for women. On the contrary, stripping in the movie empowers these men. It makes them seem superior and the fact that a woman will pay to see a man nude sanctions the degradation. In the end of the movie, all six men managed to take all of their clothes and become “Full Monty”. They regain masculinity and self-esteem that has been taken from them through the loss of their jobs.
Another gender misconception is that only women care about their appearance. It is evident by the magazine reflections scene that men worry about their body as well as women do. Dave has a strong complex about being chubby and worries that women, including his wife, do not want to see him. In hopes of enhancing his appearance, Horse buys some crooked tool to make his manhood bigger. All of the men in the film are very self-conscious of taking all their clothes off and scared of being a laughing stock. Thus male insecurity and vulnerability are well depicted throughout the film.

Would this be funny yesterday?

Humor entertains different types of people. Older people probably prefer intelligent comedy over beavis and butthead. Teenagers prefer Office Space over The Usual Suspects. Whenever I ask my dad what he thinks of those slapstick comedies, he scoffs at me. By the same token he could have a two hour conversation about a comedy he prefers. Generally, he prefers the intelligent comedy, because toilet humor is not funny to him. I asked him if he ever liked slapstick humor, perhaps, The Three Stooges? He laughed when he said, “That shit is hilarious.” Today, I wonder to myself what changed him. Obviously, he matured. What a loser I thought. I know in 30 years I am still going to laugh my head off at Billy Madison. This type of maturation made me think about whether comedy would be funny yesterday.
It was not until writing my mid-term papers did I really take this thought into consideration. Back to the previous claim. I want to preface myself by explaining the proposition. By yesterday, I mean decades ago. And by comedy, I meant things that make me laugh today. The Jim Gaffigans’, the Lewis Blacks’, and The Office are sure to tickle my fancy today. The question is, would my ancestors think Dane Cook’s piece on Church-goers be funny? So, I did some research, I called my grandma, round 78 years old this year, she has laughed more times than I could imagine. Influenced by my stats class, I know how to ask the right questions. I asked her what she thinks is funny. Obviously in her time she loved Charlie Chaplin, and recently she likes I Love Lucy. And yes, she said I Love Lucy is recent. So I then asked her what she thought of the show Seinfeld because it has been around for a decade or so. I knew she had seen the show because I sometimes watch it at her house. She said it is okay, the witty characters control the plot, if I could paraphrase. She still preferred I Love Lucy, over Seinfeld. I was appalled because I Love Lucy episodes really don’t have me rolling on the floor laughing, I personally think their characters are thin and the situational humor is corny. So it was decided, Grandparents and their future generations have different tastes in comedy. The question to why must be hidden in the depths of time.
This conclusion brings me to my next claim. Would modern humor be funny to generations of long ago? Would the colonists think Eddie Izzard is funny? Granted Izzard would have to be talking about pilgrims and the Mayflower and such, but the essence is the same. I can generally speak on behalf of my generation when I say Ann Stephen’s finest is not funny. The generic teenager would not be enthralled to go to a book club discussion on Ann Stephens. I am fairly confident the sheer shock of Izzard’s performance would have blown those Englishmen’s minds. The puritans would laugh their heads off if Izzard was doing a stand-up skit on the Separatists or the “City on a hill.” On the contrary, the comedic interests of the 1700’s would be different than ours today. So to say that they would laugh at todays stand-up would be a bold claim. I am interested to know what they would have said about Chris Rock or Eddie Murphy?