When I was a kid there was a game called ‘Barrel of Monkeys’. It consisted of a plastic cup filled with a bunch of little multicolored simians with limbs that interlocked. The object was to lift and hook arms forming a chain with as many as possible. At least that’s how I remember it. This recollection corresponds to an image that was once broadcast on the Daily Show, of Jon Stewart presenting his writer’s room. The shot was inside a racquetball court, behind a glass wall, the space stuffed with people, hipsters mostly, cheek to jowl, practically climbing over each other. Let these images serve as illustration and introduction of my point.
Tune into the news and you’ll see headlines of wisecracks from late night hosts on the same plane as earthquakes and coups. Big fonts under the masthead. Not just from the Top Bananas either, anybody with a dash of fame can get placed above the fold with a saucy zinger. As the saying goes, “Everybody these days is a comedian.” That remark used to be an aside, today it’s a measure of where the best and brightest are headed. If you consider the plethora of talk shows, comedy central channel, movie franchises, social media empires, and even the snarky coverage that has infiltrated news, sports, science programming, etc., humor is a huge beachhead for those with a bit of wit, and maybe some connections.
My guess is that when Johnny Carson had his show, there were a few writers, and a similarly small production staff. Get a look at a shot of the staffs for Late Night, Late Late Night, Last Week Tonight, Tonight Show, Real Time, Daily Show, etc, you’ll see a small army of talent. In the era that preceded early television, comedy was fairly stratified. There were the offshoots of vaudeville; burlesque, slapstick. There were the Borsht Belt comedians. Then there was the highbrow humor of the Algonquin club, with venues like the New Yorker magazine, which drilled the droll with regularity. Now as a consequence of metastasized commercialization, and homogenization of culture, there are remnants of that layering, but we see a much more widespread goof-ball common denominator.
If you download the new OS for the iPhone it comes loaded with hundreds of ‘memes’. These are mostly gifs of famous people, or animals, making funny faces or otherwise yukking it up. This is not an optional component, it’s standard with the phone, with a hefty dataload. And as we observe in our current electoral landscape, it’s much less a matter of substance that sways voters, and more a case of who will delight and entertain us. I think this trend is due to several factors. We are stressed, and need comic relief. The vanishing landscape of jobs related to manufacturing and production has given way to massive media conglomerates, where the product is ‘content’. Add in the shrinking attention span, increased vanity programming, and a general decline of literacy and intellectual inquiry, it’s no wonder the ’wiseguy class’ is burgeoning.
It’s argued that humor is a distinctly human product. And a local one at that. But my prediction is in the not too distant future, as in all things these days, comedy will be infiltrated by ‘fop bots’. Those massive staffs will be downsized, and jokes will be outsourced to various algorithms along the lines of:
initialize;
d=dick joke; m= your mother is so old; e= ethnic slur
If d>m
Display d with eyeball roll
Else
Display m with smirk
Else
If m>e
Display m with double take
Else
Display e with mic drop
Cue laff trakk. Cut to commercial.
Say it with comedy
This may or may not be related to your central question (why all the comedy?) but it occurs to me that you can say a lot of pretty strong things with comedy that you probably wouldn’t get away with otherwise. Mark Twain is the standard example but there are lots of others.
When it becomes more difficult to say certain things due to social censorship of certain views, people who don’t share the socially acceptable perspective often turn to comedy for relief. Some things need to be said. Comedy (humor) gives us a way to say them.
Howls
Obama has been pretty deft with humor, his White House Correspondents Routines have now set the bar pretty high. Plus his public bromance with comic billionaires Jerry Seinfeld and Larry David, or his stints ‘Between Ferns’ shows how much he, and we, value this form.
The howling truth sayer tradition of Twain; through Lenny Bruce, Carlin, Hicks… That’s one way of knowing our National Soul. Is that voice still coming through?
ProtoBots
That last one wasn’t a rhetorical question, and it got me thinking.
Bill Hicks had a joke: “Do a commercial and you are off the Artistic honor roll–FOREVER.”
Yet,
(Variety, yesterday) “Stephen Colbert’s ‘Late Show’ Develops a Taste for Bud Light”.
Bud also paid almost World War starter Seth Rogen, and Amy Schumer each seven figures to do a series of “topical” Bud Light commericals. These comic folks are supposedly the heirs of that unchained Tazmanian devil comedy voice…Along with a big barrel of Daily Show and SNL alums, all trying to make their way in heavily populated and highly competitive shark infested waters.
So I ask again. Is that voice of outrage tempered with hilarity still coming through, or are we onto something else? A youtubed, corporate feel-good laugh riot, that simultaneously enables as it sarcastically jeers?
A robot walks into a bar
Make Me Laugh could be a new level of Turing test.
“Knock, knock.” “I will open the door and report if I sense anything there.”
Instead of giant tech companies forming AI partnerships, we’d see funding and projects from Second City and Comedy Central.
DARPA invests billions to cheer up world leaders!
Killing it!
The day AI wit matches humans is the day we become obsolete, or at least, maybe expendable in their eyes.
“Open the pod bay doors, Hal. No really, it’s a good joke, you got me… But open the f8cking pod bay doors Hal…”
“I really had you going there, huh Dave?”
what goes around
I was listening to a 1950’s radio show this weekend (Jack Benny), and Bob Hope was the guest. Here are a few of the jokes from the show that I can recall that relate to this conversation:
Benny said that they would be doing a short version of Road to Bali, which just came out. He’d play Hope. Dorothy Lamour wasn’t there. “She asked for something we couldn’t provide. Money.”
Benny and team then did a poor version of a scene from the movie, causing Hope to come out.
“Two full rehearsals and then I had to bring in my team of writers,” Hope says, commenting on saving the show this week.
He explains that the deal is that he is in the show in exchange for movie publicity. Benny has to mention Road to Bali every 60 seconds, which he dutifully does. Hope reminds him when he’s gone on for more than a minute without mentioning it.
Bob Hope says hi to Bob Crosby, Bing’s brother. “Hi Bob, Hi Bob. How’s the wife, Bob? Good, how’s the wife, Bob? Not bad, Bob, how’s the kids Bob? Good, how’s the kids, Bob? and so on.
Benny points out that it took 8 writers and $6000 for those jokes.
They go on to do more skits and jabs at one another.
So, the takeaway for me – teams of writers around each comedian, each one out to advertise and publicize their products, in the late 40’s and early 50’s. The stars were quick witted and could improvise quickly, which they seemed to love to do. But is was a machine even then.
One other note. I was visiting the Library of Congress and got a tour of the AV area. They had all of Hope’s USO shows on film, sitting on shelves. Lotsa shelves.