What we gain from taking humor seriously

From Katherine Levac to Guillaume Pineault, from Louis Morissette to Adib Alkhalidey, there will be many of them in the coming months who will pick up topics that they will sublimate into laughter. The ideal opportunity to speak with the American journalist from Vulture Jesse David Fox who, in his fascinating book Comedy Bookpublished last November, defends the main conviction animating his work: the stand-up is an art form in its own right and to be taken seriously. Conversation around a humor which, more than ever, finds the comic in the not-comic.

The comedy industry in Quebec has long presented to us, as a selling point, the fact that we would have a stomach ache when we left the theater, that we would die of laughter, and more and more Comedians tell me in interviews that they are comfortable with the idea of ​​not provoking laughter every 10 seconds.

This is the thing that people get the most angry about among the ideas I hold, when I say that the best comedians aren’t necessarily the ones who make us laugh all the time.

In my book, I talk about the end of art: the invention of photography freed painters, who no longer had to represent people or objects, which is not unrelated to the advent of modern art. And that’s what happens with humor: in a world where our phones bombard us with potentially funny content, when you find yourself in a room, certainly the act of laughing with other people is rare and precious, but what you hope for is a form of link, of relationship with the comedian. This is what we’re talking about when we say that a comedian doesn’t have to make you laugh every 30 seconds.

Either way, even if a comedian only cares about the number or strength of laughs, audiences will laugh more if they are invested in what he is saying.

You write that “laughter is a limited criterion for considering an art form”. This is probably the most astonishing, almost shocking, idea in your book.

What defines the stand-upit’s funny [funniness], which is more of a state, a climate created by the comedian. The number of laughs is a fairly superficial criterion: we have all seen a comedian have success on stage by doing predictable or lazy material.

I almost put a warning at the beginning of the book: I’m not saying that humor should no longer be funny, I’m just saying that it’s a measuring stick that doesn’t reveal everything. I propose a broader definition of what humor can be, without excluding the previous definition.

Judging the quality of a comedy show by the number of laughs would be the equivalent of judging the success of a basketball team by its average points per game, rather than by its number of victories. And victory, in any art form, is to communicate, to enter into relationships. Laughter is a channel that allows this, but not the only one.

How do you explain this excitement around humor that draws on the intimate and on serious subjects, or at least not immediately comical?

I must first say that I am not asking stand-up to be theater. I like stand-up exactly as it is. Taking this art form seriously does not mean depriving oneself of everything that is not serious about it.

Already, in the 1950s, comedians like Shelley Berman and Lenny Bruce were saying to themselves: while we’re here, why not do something other than jokes about our mother-in-law? But it’s always been rare, because it’s scary and it’s difficult to get out of that patch of sand.

Then in the 1970s, we have Richard Pryor talking on stage about his heart attack and the time he set himself on fire and this is the beginning of what we could call modern humor, in the sense of form of personal expression.

Then in the 1990s, what we called alternative humor took this idea further, but also created a split between its representatives and club comedians, who are there to tear everything away and say nothing really. respondent.

What has happened in recent years is that this so-called alternative approach, in the broad sense, has taken up more space, thanks to the accessibility to all content that the Internet allows, and also because young comedians have role models in the genre, like Marc Maron, Tig Notaro, Maria Bamford. It’s quite mainstream now to do this type of humor, even in a context of comedy club.

Still, to really dive in, to show yourself vulnerable, it has always been and will remain difficult.

You explain in the book that vulnerability is inseparable from good stand-up. For what ?

What I like most about humor, what’s remarkable about it, is that it’s created with the audience. And giving the audience a form of control over their own story is a form of vulnerability. But comedians don’t all have to talk about illness or death to be vulnerable. Presenting something different, something innovative can make you vulnerable. Just going on stage to try new jokes is being vulnerable.

The worst kind of stand-up is born from a fear of being afraid. This is what makes some people put on armor before going on stage, taking the easy way out.

If we’re afraid of a subject, I think it’s a sign that we’re touching on something.

The remarks have been abbreviated and condensed for brevity.

Comedy Book

Jesse David Fox

Farrar, Straus and Giroux

368 pages

To see in the coming months

• Vulnerableby Guillaume Pineault (premiere March 19 at the Olympia)
• The man of my lifeby Katherine Levac (premiere March 27 at Théâtre Maisonneuve)
• Under pressureby Louis Morissette (March 28 to 30 at the Cinquième Salle at Place des Arts)
• Whores and thievesby Adib Alkhalidey (from May 23 to 1^er June at the Théâtre Maisonneuve)