Analyzing Comedy - C/D

Inspired by the Gervais talk in the Louie thread as well as the arguments on threads about loved shows that for some reason get much worse:

Is it worth breaking down comedy to study how it works?
Is it possible to do this too much to one bit?
Can looking at it scientifically actually hurt your understanding of why it works?
Do you believe that over-thinking comedy always hurts your chances of it still being funny, or does it depend on who is handling it?

if it bends, it's funny

When you fall and break your neck, it's comedy. When I cut my finger, it's tragedy.

I guess the analysis of analyzing comedy is kind of worse, but I'm actually curious about this.

Analyzing Comedy is worthwhile I guess but I wonder if it ever makes anybody do anything besides smile at the well-executed elucidation of a feeling or opinion they already had or roll their eyes at what seems like a totally off-base analysis that they wrote off as total spergy mirror universe bullshit the second they read its thesis statement in twitter form or whatever. This is with regards to normal people, not weirdasses who are so far gone that they do improv and like to talk about it IRL.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Glpcn2PBDu0

Well worth watching that clip -- in contrast to the better-known Hollywood Bowl version of that sketch, Graham Chapman is absolutely fucking plastered here.

I'm just interested in the varied opinions, and why someone always shows up in the Office thread or something to make me or someone else feel bad for having a college course type discussion about the reasons why either a whole show or a scene doesn't stack up with its former self.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W_L5mYlxlXE&feature=related

Seinfeld vs. Gervais here is kind of a more specific argument within what I'm going for here.

some people think hard k's are funny, but w's are probably funnier. hence walla walla being a funnier placename than klamath falls.

if it were named "klamath falls klamath falls" it might be funny, though.

Timbuk3 = terrible band name

Timbuk170 would be good though, and could sidle up an averagely calibrated laugh meter

"When it comes to jokes I have always concurred with Schopenhauer in his belief that there's nothing funnier than the sudden apprehension of an incongruity between a general concept and a heterogenous object which is subsumed thereunder, and hence between what is abstract and what is perceptive. When that happens I piss myself."

hence walla walla being a funnier placename than klamath falls.

Mike Birbiglia has a bit where he pronounces "Walla Walla, Washington" as though it were Spanish ("Why-a Why-a Washing-tone"). Strangely funny.

some people think hard k's are funny, but w's are probably funnier. hence walla walla being a funnier placename than klamath falls.

― dell (del), Wednesday, July 6, 2011 2:09 AM (6 hours ago) Bookmark

Ah, but don't ignore the Cucamonga Factor.

Oh well, at least people are talking to (at? with? ...near?) me.

bergson's analysis of comedy, written in 1900, is one of the most enjoyable pieces of writing about anything i've ever seen

Laughter: An Essay on the Meaning of the Comic

http://www.gutenberg.org/files/4352/4352-h/4352-h.htm

^ that link plays well with instapaper, btw ( @gbx )

why does every child think the word 'pickle' is funny?

Mike Birbiglia has a bit where he pronounces "Walla Walla, Washington" as though it were Spanish ("Why-a Why-a Washing-tone"). Strangely funny.

reminds me of an snl sketch from sometime in the nineties in which the characters pronounce all these words with spanish origins (umbrella, tornado, etc.) the way you would say them in the original language...plus with exaggerated accents of course

yeah, that's one of my favorites. fits perfectly with bergson's contention that the comic is "something mechanical encrusted upon the living"

reminds me of an snl sketch from sometime in the nineties in which the characters pronounce all these words with spanish origins (umbrella, tornado, etc.) the way you would say them in the original language...plus with exaggerated accents of course

Bob COST-ASS

broncoasssss

Himmy Smittsss