When Was the Last Time You Laughed at a Comedy?

 When Was the Last Time You Laughed at a Comedy?

 

There’s a serious problem affecting comedy today.  It just isn’t funny.

 

It’s not just a matter of bad writing.  Sometimes the dialogue, plotting, and characterization are fair to fine.  It’s just that there’s no actual humor.  Instead of jokes, there are wry comments. Or people the writers don’t like are targeted for attacks.  Indeed, a lot of today’s supposed comedy is about making points rather than creating laughs.  On so many late-night talk shows today, the host makes a quip about a political topic.  In response, the audience doesn’t laugh or even chuckle.  They applaud.  They’re not responding as if the line was humorous.  They’re appreciating that their political opinions have been supported.  

 

In contrast, Joyce Porter’s books make me laugh just by reading them.  It’s rare for simply reading to create laughter.  Normally visual media, such as movies, television shows, or plays provoke actual laughs.  People don’t often laugh at a medium without an audio component.

 

Yet Porter succeeds.  Why is this?  Part of this is sheer outrageousness.  It’s fun to see people behaving badly and foibles getting targeted for skewering.  There’s something else about Porter’s style of humor.  At least four or five times a book, there’s a situation where the reader will gasp, laugh, and think, “You couldn’t get away with a joke like that today.”  Why is that, I wonder?

 

–Chris Chan

 

 

Chris Chan’s first book, Sherlock & Irene: The Secret Truth Behind “A Scandal in Bohemia” was released on August 27^thfrom MX Publishing, and is available for sale at Amazon.com and the MX Publishing website, as well as at Book Depository (with free worldwide shipping there).  It is also available in a Kindle edition.