Comedy

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Comedy Comedy Genres Drama · Tragedy · Comedy · Tragicomedy · Romance · Satire · Epic · Lyric This article is about the theatrical genre of comedy. For the popular meaning of the term "comedy", see Humour. Comedy (from the Greek κωμωδία, komodia) as a popular meaning, is any humorous discourse generally intended to amuse, especially in television, film, and stand-up comedy. This must be carefully distinguished from its academic definition, namely the comic theatre, whose Western origins are found in Ancient Greece. In the Athenian democracy, the public opinion of voters was remarkably influenced by the political satire performed by the comic poets at the theaters.[1] The theatrical genre can be simply described as a dramatic performance which pits two societies against each other in an amusing agon or conflict. Northrop Frye famously depicted these two opposing sides as a "Society of Youth" and a "Society of the Old,"[2] but this dichotomy is seldom described as an entirely satisfactory explanation. A later view characterizes the essential agon of comedy as a struggle between a relatively powerless youth and the societal conventions that pose obstacles to his hopes; in this sense, the youth is understood to be constrained by his lack of social authority, and is left with little choice but to take recourse to ruses which engender very dramatic irony which provokes laughter.[3] Much comedy contains variations on the elements of surprise, incongruity, conflict, repetitiveness, and the effect of opposite expectations, but there are many recognized genres of comedy. Satire and political satire use ironic comedy to portray persons or social institutions as ridiculous or corrupt, thus alienating their audience from the object of humor. Satire is a type of comedy. Parody borrows the form of some popular genre, artwork, or text but uses certain ironic The Greco-Roman mask of Thalia in a Three Stooges slapstick short title card. Literature Major forms Novel · Poem · Drama Short story · Novella Genres Epic · Lyric · Drama Romance · Satire Tragedy · Comedy Tragicomedy Media Performance (play) · Book Techniques Prose · Verse History and lists Basic topics · Literary terms History · Modern history Books · Writers Literary awards · Poetry awards Discussion Criticism · Theory · Magazines Performing arts Major forms Dance · Music · Opera · Theatre Minor forms Circus Arts · Magic · Puppetry 1 From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia changes to critique that form from within (though not necessarily in a condemning way). Screwball comedy derives its humor largely from bizarre, surprising (and improbable) situations or characters. Black comedy is defined by dark humor that makes light of so called dark or evil elements in human nature. Similarly scatological humor, sexual humor, and race humor create comedy by violating social conventions or taboos in comedic ways. A comedy of manners typically takes as its subject a particular part of society (usually upper class society) and uses humor to parody or satirize the behavior and mannerisms of its members. Romantic comedy is a popular genre that depicts burgeoning romance in humorous terms, and focuses on the foibles of those who are falling in love. Comedy identified it with Arabic poetic themes and forms, such as hija (satirical poetry). They viewed comedy as simply the "art of reprehension", and made no reference to light and cheerful events, or troublous beginnings and happy endings, associated with classical Greek comedy. After the Latin translations of the 12th century, the term "comedy" thus gained a more general semantic meaning in Medieval literature.[6] History Aristophanes, a dramatist of the Ancient Greek Theater wrote 40 comedies, 11 of which survive and are still being performed. In ancient Greece, comedy seems to have originated in bawdy and ribald songs or recitations apropos of fertility festivals or gatherings, or also in making fun at other people or stereotypes.[4] Aristotle, in his Poetics, states that comedy originated in Phallic songs and the light treatment of the otherwise base and ugly. He also adds that the origins of comedy are obscure because it was not treated seriously from its inception.[7] The phenomena connected with laughter and that which provokes it have been carefully investigated by psychologists. They agreed the predominating characteristics are incongruity or contrast in the object, and shock or emotional seizure on the part of the subject. It has also been held that the feeling of superiority is an essential, if not the essential, factor: thus Thomas Hobbes speaks of laughter as a "sudden glory." Modern investigators have paid much attention to the origin both of laughter and of smiling, as well as the development of the "play instinct" and its emotional expression. George Meredith, in his 1897 classic Essay on Comedy, said that "One excellent test of the civilization of a country ... I take to be the flourishing of the Comic idea and Comedy; and the test of true Comedy is that it shall awaken thoughtful laughter." Laughter is said to be the cure to being sick, Studies show, that people who laugh more often, get sick less.[8][9] Etymology The word "comedy" is derived from the Classical Greek κωμῳδία kōmōidía, which is a compound either of κῶμος kômos (revel) or κώμη kṓmē (village) and ᾠδή ōidḗ (singing); it is possible that κῶμος itself is derived from κώμη, and originally meant a village revel. The adjective "comic" (Greek κωμικός kōmikós), which strictly means that which relates to comedy is, in modern usage, generally confined to the sense of "laughter-provoking".[4] Of this, the word came into modern usage through the Latin comoedia and Italian commedia and has, over time, passed through various shades of meaning.[5] Greeks and Romans confined the word "comedy" to descriptions of stage-plays with happy endings. In the Middle Ages, the term expanded to include narrative poems with happy endings and a lighter tone. In this sense Dante used the term in the title of his poem, La Divina Commedia. As time progressed, the word came more and more to be associated with any sort of performance intended to cause laughter.[5] During the Middle Ages, the term "comedy" became synonymous with satire, and later humour in general, after Aristotle’s Poetics was translated into Arabic in the medieval Islamic world, where it was elaborated upon by Arabic writers and Islamic philosophers, such as Abu Bischr, his pupil Al-Farabi, Avicenna, and Averroes. Due to cultural differences, they disassociated comedy from Greek dramatic representation and instead Forms of comedy • • • • Pun Fantasy Observational Irony 2 From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia • Satire • Parody • Political satire • Black comedy • Slapstick • Deadpan • Tragicomedy • Sketch comedy Comedy Plays (theater) Musical comedy plays • Musical comedy and palace Performing arts History • Ancient Greek comedy, as practiced by Aristophanes and Menander • Ancient Roman comedy, as practiced by Plautus and Terence • Burlesque, from Music hall and Vaudeville to Performance art • Citizen comedy, as practiced by Thomas Dekker, Thomas Middleton and Ben Jonson • Clowns such as Richard Tarlton, William Kempe, and Robert Armin • Comedy of humours, as practiced by Ben Jonson and George Chapman • Comedy of intrigue, as practiced by Niccolò Machiavelli and Lope de Vega • Comedy of manners, as practiced by Molière, William Wycherley and William Congreve • Comedy of menace, as practiced by David Campton and Harold Pinter • comédie larmoyante or ’tearful comedy’, as practiced by Pierre-Claude Nivelle de La Chaussée and Louis-Sébastien Mercier • Commedia dell’arte, as practiced in the twentieth-century by Dario Fo, Vsevolod Meyerhold and Jacques Copeau • Farce, from Georges Feydeau to Joe Orton and Alan Ayckbourn • Jester • Laughing comedy, as practiced by Oliver Goldsmith and Richard Brinsley Sheridan • Restoration comedy, as practiced by George Etherege, Aphra Behn and John Vanbrugh • Sentimental comedy, as practiced by Colley Cibber and Richard Steele • Shakespearean comedy, as practiced by William Shakespeare • Stand-up comedy • Dadaist and Surrealist performance, usually in cabaret form • Theatre of the Absurd, used by some critics to describe Samuel Beckett, Harold Pinter, Jean Genet and Eugène Ionesco[10] Opera • Comic opera Improvisational comedy • Improvisational comedy Clowns • Bouffon comedy • Clowns Stand-up comedy Stand-up comedy is a mode of comic performance in which the performer addresses the audience directly, with the absence of the theatrical "fourth wall", and usually speaks in his own person (rather than as a dramatic character). • Comedian • Musical comedy • Comedy albums • Comedy club • Stand-up comedy • Impressionist (entertainment) • Alternative comedy Stand-up comedy events and awards • British Comedy Awards • Canadian Comedy Awards • Cat Laughs Comedy Festival • The Comedy Festival, in Aspen, formerly the HBO Comedy Arts Festival • Comedy Walk, monthly comedy festival in Los Angeles • Edinburgh Festival Fringe • Edinburgh Comedy Festival • Halifax Comedy Festival • Just for laughs festival • Leicester Comedy Festival • Melbourne International Comedy Festival • New Zealand International Comedy Festival • New York Underground Comedy Festival • HK International Comedy Festival • Vancouver Comedy Festival Lists of stand-up comedy performers • List of comedians 3 From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia By nationality Comedy • List of British TV shows remade for the American market • Paramount Comedy (Spain). • Paramount Comedy 1 and 2. • TBS (TV network) • The Comedy Channel (Australia) • The Comedy Channel (UK) • The Comedy Channel (USA) not to be confused with HA! - channels that have merged into Comedy Central. • The Comedy Network, a Canadian TV channel. • • • • • • • • • List List List List List List List List List of of of of of of of of of Australian comedians British comedians Canadian comedians Finnish comedians German language comedians Indian comedians Italian comedians Mexican comedians Puerto Rican comedians Jokes • • • • One-liner joke Blonde jokes Shaggy-dog story Paddy Irishman joke Lists • List of comedies * List of New York Improv comedians Literature • Comic novel See also • • • • • • • • • Original Comedy British humour Comedy club Humour Jewish Humour Joke Laughter Rule of three (writing) * History of theater Clown Film • Comedy film • Anarchic comedy film • Gross-out film • Parody film • Romantic comedy film • Screwball comedy film • Slapstick film Television and radio • Television comedy • Situation comedy • Dramedy • Radio comedy Notes [1] Henderson, J. (1993) Comic Hero versus Political Elite pp.307-19 in Sommerstein, A.H.; S. Halliwell, J. Henderson, B. Zimmerman, ed (1993). Tragedy, Comedy and the Polis. Bari: Levante Editori. [2] (Anatomy of Criticism, 1957) [3] (Marteinson, 2006) [4] ^ Francis MacDonald Cornford, The Origin of Attic Comedy, 1934. [5] ^ Oxford English Dictionary [6] Webber, Edwin J. (January 1958), "Comedy as Satire in Hispano-Arabic Spain", Hispanic Review (University of Pennsylvania Press) 26 (1): 1–11 [7] Aristotle, Poetics, lines beginning at 1449a. [1] [8] [2] [9] [3] [10] This list was compiled with reference to The Cambridge Guide to Theatre (1998). [11] DESILU: The story of Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz, 1998 The First Couple of Comedy This is a common nickname for comedienne Lucille Ball and her one-time husband Desi Arnaz. This nickname is based on the eight year success of their show I Love Lucy. Their co-stars Vivian Vance and William Frawley are known as the most famous second bananas in comedy and television.[11] Lists of comedy television programs • British sitcom • British comedy • Comedy Central - A television channel devoted strictly to comedy. • German television comedy 4 From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Comedy • Riu, Xavier, Dionysism and Comedy, 1999. [4] • Sourvinou-Inwood, Christiane, Tragedy and Athenian Religion, Oxford University Press, 2003. • Trypanis, C.A. (1981). Greek Poetry from Homer to Seferis. University of Chicago Press. • Wiles, David, The Masked Menander: Sign and Meaning in Greek and Roman Performance, 1991. References • Aristotle, Poetics. • Buckham, Philip Wentworth, Theatre of the Greeks, 1827. • Marteinson, Peter (2006). On the Problem of the Comic: A Philosophical Study on the Origins of Laughter, Legas Press, Ottawa, 2006. • Pickard-Cambridge, Sir Arthur Wallace • Dithyramb, Tragedy, and Comedy , 1927. • The Theatre of Dionysus in Athens, 1946. • The Dramatic Festivals of Athens, 1953. • Raskin, Victor, The Semantic Mechanisms of Humor, 1985. External links • Comedy at the Open Directory Project • A Vocabulary for Comedy • The History of Comedy Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comedy" Categories: Comedy, Humor, Performing arts, Theatre, Film, Literature, Humanities This page was last modified on 20 May 2009, at 20:46 (UTC). All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License. (See Copyrights for details.) Wikipedia® is a registered trademark of the Wikimedia Foundation, Inc., a U.S. registered 501(c)(3) taxdeductible nonprofit charity. Privacy policy About Wikipedia Disclaimers 5