Paper #1: Funny Business, due Friday, Feb. 5

 

NOTE: Blog Response #1 is in the post BELOW this one...

“Comedy is frequently born from the disparity between what a person is and what he affects to be” (Bevis 39).

THE SET-UP: For your first paper assignment, I want you to discuss a SINGLE SCENE from one of your favorite comedies. This could be a movie, a show, a stand-up comedy routine, a song, etc., but it must focus on only one short scene, no more than 5-6 minutes or so. If you’re doing a TV show, it should focus on a short scene in a single episode (not several scenes from several episodes); if a movie, it should be a short “bit” from the movie, and if a comedy routine, it should be one of the stories or longer jokes. You can do an entire song, however, since they’re relatively short.

THE PUNCH LINE: Once you’ve selected your scene, and watched it a few times (the more you watch it, the more you’ll catch), I want you to write a short paper that examines the scene by considering some or all of the questions below. But be sure to set it up: explain what’s going on in the scene so we can get the joke, and give us any back story from the show/movie necessary to understand it (don’t assume we’ve watched every episode of Schitt’s Creek, in other words).

THE QUESTIONS (answer as many as possible in your paper—but don’t number your paper 1., 2., 3. etc. Write an essay that incorporates these questions/ideas):

• Why is this scene funny? What makes it comedy?
• How is it subversive? Why might someone find it threatening or inappropriate?
• How is the character(s) ‘stretched’ for comic effect? What makes them real but not quite real (caricatures)?
• Which chapter in Bevis’ book (Chs.1-4) does it most connect to? Find a specific passage or idea from one of these chapters that made you go “ah ha!” when you watched it. QUOTE from this chapter in your paper and help us see it, too.

EXAMPLE: Remember how we watched and discussed the song, “Business Time” from The Flight of the Conchords. This is a song that makes fun of something very taboo—a couple’s sex life—but also explores the real-life problems that come with routine. It’s not that having a “sex date” is bad, or that marriage is bad, but that sometimes we need to laugh at the absurdity of love to have a healthy relationship with our significant others. If you felt awkward watching this scene with your spouse or significant other, that might suggest there’s a problem; if you can both laugh at it, that might suggest the health of your relationship! That’s the point of comedy, to make you laugh at other people’s predicament…and then take a long, hard look at yourself.

REQUIREMENTS: (1) at least 3 pages double-spaced; (2) analysis of the scene with specific details (dialogue helps!); (3) a specific quote or two from Comedy: A Very Short Introduction; (4) Cite quotations according to MLA format: see the Purdue OWL website for citation questions.

DUE Friday, February 5^th @ 5pm either via e-mail or in the box on my door (HM 348)