Tag: Politics
In an earlier post I made the argument that physical comedy, far from being dead, is all around us. We just don’t recognize it. Today in part two we look at physical comedy in politics, where it can prove especially embarrassing to those so desperate to control their self-image. The first hilarious example is hot off the wireless, last night’s Republican debate where, with help from ABC, the presidential candidates proved Chaplin’s adage that “good exits and good entrances, that’s all theatre is.”
We’ve had an action hero as governor of California, a professional wrestler as governor of Minnesota, and now a reality tv star as a presidential contender. But Canada has us beat, a prime minister who’s a physical comedian! Yes, the newly elected Justin Trudeau (another JT). And I don’t apply that label the way many a politician is characterized as being a bozo, or the way President Ford was so clumsy that spoofing him helped jumpstart Chevy Chase’s career. Trudeau really can do stuff. For example, “accidentally” falling down stairs is (or at least was) his favorite party trick.
This really happened, but it could have come right out of the Marx Brothers or Borat, a variation on the old false translation bit. In this case it would be funnier if it weren’t quite so despicable.
A funny Jon Stewart clip from The Daily Show. Even some discussion of “slapstick” in it!
I think you’ll find this TED Talk by Chris Bliss not exactly revelatory, but interesting enough. Bliss focuses on effective comedy, especially political comedy. There’s no mention of physical comedy, though the same ideas can certainly apply. You can watch the 16-minute talk below or, better yet, temporarily leave this blogopedia and go to the TED Talk site, where you can see it full screen or read a transcript of it.
In case you haven’t noticed, I think clowns and physical comedy are like totally RELEVANT and SIGNIFICANT in our modern world because we’re all still pretty dumb at least part of the time, though we’re less likely to admit it, and human error is still titanically inevitable. Which is what clowns have been telling us for several millennia, and the only good news is that we’re still able to laugh about it. So if you need to justify your clown existence to an annoying “friend” or to that condescending uncle, read and steal these quasi-intellectual arguments I wrote about here and here.
A short follow-up to post 168, the pieing of Rupert Murdoch at a Parliamentary hearing. Jonathan May-Bowles, aka Jonnie Marbles, has pleaded guilty and been sentenced to three to six weeks and fined £250 costs — plus a £15 victim surcharge.
“It is a far better thing that I do now than I have ever done before #splat” — Tweet earlier today by pie-thrower Jonnie Marbles
So yesterday my sweetie came home from the hospital on crutches after she and her bike had an encounter with a truck in a Manhattan bike lane. No broken bones, but thanks for asking. Then later in the day Daniel Wallace, game designer and former student, sent me this video.
I thought some of you might get a chuckle over this piece from the Salon.com web site. Opponents of Mc Donald’s lay some of the blame for childhood obesity directly on the company’s trademark clown, but Mickey D’s PR people claim he’s a symbol of physical fitness. You decide….
We live in an age of heat-seeking missiles and biometric surveillance, so when Thai rebel leader Arisman Pongruangrong pulled a Douglas Fairbanks and escaped from a hotel surrounded by Bangkok police by climbing a rope down the side of the building, we had one of our more retro physical comedy moments in recent years. Better yet, the deputy prime minister had just gone on national television to announce that they had their man! Pongruangrong, who’s also a pop singer, was hugged by his adoring supporters before being spirited out of there in a get-away car. Zorro, anyone?
“Excuse me, sir,” Barbara Ross said to the driver of a black town car parked on Avenue of the Americas near 37th Street. “You are obstructing a bike lane.”
Considering that Ms. Ross, 46, was wearing a white hazmat suit and an orange traffic cone on her head and riding a large red tricycle, the driver, Ross Ravita, took her relatively seriously. He protested that he was making only a quick stop, and though he did at one point tell her, “Hold your horses, lady, this isn’t your street,” he yielded his ground and drove away.
I don’t know much about this, but it might be right up your clown alley. The Manege Center for Circus, Music Hall and Street Performance, in collaboration with the Swedish branch of Clowns Without Borders and the Stockholm Academy of Dramatic Arts, is offering a one-year master’s degree program in Physical Comedy. Classes are in English and start January 2011. “Upon completion of the programme students will be qualified to work with Clowns without Borders internationally.” You might want to ask if “qualified” means “offered a job,” but certainly worth looking into.
In writing about San Francisco on my last post, I mentioned the influence the San Francisco Mime Troupe had on the popular-arts performance scene there. If you’ve seen their work, you’ve probably wondered why they label themselves a mime troupe. The answer lies in their early years under the direction of their founder, R.G. Davis (photo, right). This manifesto on mime and pantomime, written by Davis in 1962, shows the troupe’s roots and still raises some interesting questions today.
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Workshops & Other Events
My first book (1976)
My book Clowns has long been out of print, but you can borrow it for two weeks at a time from the Internet Archive. More information is available here.
My second book (2015)
Visual and verbal humor for the cognitively and artistically curious! Available here.
“A book to treasure!”
—Bill Irwin