tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19305198.post9185036208659620862..comments2024-03-27T03:19:11.216-04:00Comments on Assistant Village Idiot: Disappointing VaudevilleAssistant Village Idiothttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01978011985085795099noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19305198.post-52890248980321393792007-07-10T10:56:00.000-04:002007-07-10T10:56:00.000-04:00I didn't find the Marx Brothers funny until I was ...I didn't find the Marx Brothers funny until I was 30. When I was 40, I had an epiphany--I suddenly found Margaret DuMont physically attractive (I must be getting old!) Pogo--never found it funny. Same for Garfield. Python--loved it. Fawlty Towers--pretty good, but the high-energy anger is off-putting. Seinfeld never did anything for me (also Leno and Letterman). I just figure that we're all different.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19305198.post-46962109499961827882007-07-09T16:26:00.000-04:002007-07-09T16:26:00.000-04:00I agree with the previous post. Quality writing h...I agree with the previous post. Quality writing holds its humor. That being said, most comedies have almost no shelf life - things that were funny and hip to me merely five or six years ago already feel contrived and stale. Often we have to remind ourselves why we laughed in the first place.<BR/><BR/>Humor is by its very nature always of a moment in time: it's the funny comment you say right away at the party that draws a laugh, and when something crazy happens, it's that night's monologue from Conan or that week's SNL sketch about it that gets laughs and gets referenced the succeeding week.<BR/><BR/>Look, with all these things, we laughed then, and we laughed hard. There's no reason to argue that when these things were happening, we were probably a lot stupider and had less refined tastes, and the people before us were stupider and had less refined tastes than that, etc. Those things were just <I>funnier</I> then. They just were.<BR/><BR/>If that wasn't true, high school English teachers wouldn't have to work so hard to convince their kids that Shakespeare is <I>hilarious</I>.Ben Wymanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12491745981357751416noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19305198.post-88046512518934275472007-07-08T12:22:00.000-04:002007-07-08T12:22:00.000-04:00This is a very provocative subject. My father-in-...This is a very provocative subject. My father-in-law just gave me a bunch of vinyl records by the "cutting edge" comedians of the late 50s and early 60s, but they're painful, not funny. <BR/><BR/>Likewise, if you watch clips of the next generation of "hip" comedians, they just make you groan -- David Steinberg, Robert Klein, et al. <BR/><BR/>I remember watching Laugh In and just howling with laughter. Now it's about as funny as watching Barney with my two year old. <BR/><BR/>I remember how funny I thought Steve Martin's routine was in the late '70s, but now it just makes me wince.<BR/><BR/>I don't quite know how to gauge Monty Python, since I haven't seen it in awhile. But I've never laughed so hard as after a couple of herbal jazz cigarets with my buddies on Tuesday nights in 1975.<BR/><BR/>One thing I think will always hold up is Fawlty Towers, since the writing is so brilliant. People will disagree with me, but I think Seinfeld will hold up for the same reason. No matter how many times I see a re-run, I am impressed by the subtlety of the language. Seinfeld has an amazing ear in that regard.<BR/><BR/>I need to brood on this topic a bit more....Gagdad Bobhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14249005793605006679noreply@blogger.com