Three Stooges
Growing up, I remember a lot of ‘violent’ shows and movies. The ones where you have characters getting hurt, but in a comedic way. This would be slapstick or physical comedy, which, obviously, involves a lot of physicality. Examples are Three Stooges, Marx Brothers (to some degree), Looney Tunes, Tom & Jerry, and the list keeps going. A big part of comedy back then seemed to be someone getting hurt. I mean, stuff like this video were hilarious:
Nowadays, I don’t see a lot of slapstick comedy on TV or even in movies. To be fair, I haven’t been drawn to any comedies in years. Probably because I’m older, but I do see less slapstick these days. Even the Looney Tunes are more normal in more recent incarnations, so you don’t see them getting blown up and being fine the next seen. For real people, I haven’t seen anythin like the Stooges did. That’s why I wonder if it’s become an archaic and abandoned genre. Modern audiences might not like seeing people get hurt even for comedy and in extreme measures.
Then again, my son nearly falls off the bed whenever there is slapstick. We occasionally watch an old show called ‘Most Extreme Elimination Challenge’, which has people running through obstacle courses and some get totaled. They get up and walk away, but the sound effects and dramatic narration makes it funny. This was the first episode scene that had him laughing for 5 minutes:
Now, I’m guessing the art of slapstick revolves around the incident being so outlandish that it shocks the audience. You also don’t see any blood, bruising, broken bones, or anything that would signify injury when it’s a real person. For cartoons, they say somethign funny and are back either in the next scene or next episode. It’s made clear that the person being hurt isn’t going to end up in the hospital or dead. Once it hits that point, you have an action or drama scene on your hands.
You might notice that I have to use videoes for examples. That’s because I think slapstick is easier to do with a visual medium. That doesn’t mean I don’t try to have some of it in my stories. Having grown up on the stuff, I can’t stop myself from taking an opportunity to have a character get knocked off something by a branch or hit in the groin then try to waddle it off. It’s funny for me since I clearly see it in my head, but I’m never sure if it translates to the audience. Fairly hit or miss with it since comedy is subjective and even verbal jokes will get missed. Still, I think it’s worth trying to put it into my stories since it fits the tone.
Slapstick comedy also has a weird way of working better for present tense, which I’ll admit is a personal opinion. With past tense, it talks about it already having happened, so I feel like I’m being told about something that I had to be there for. Present tense is right there and I’m seeing it unfold along with all consequences. As an author, the present tense also makes me carry the residual pain and embarrasment throughout the entire chapter since it’s happening ‘live’. Of course, this depends entirely on my imagination, which differs from person to person.
I know I’m a fan of slapstick/physical comedy, but not everybody is. Like everything, it’s got fans and haters. So, what do other people think of the genre? Do you feel like it isn’t used very often these days?
Legends of Windemere 
Growing up, I remember watching The Three Stooges and also Bugs Bunny and other Looney Tunes cartoons, the Carol Burnett show, and Monty Python where slapstick was a staple. I’ve only seen slapstick used more recently in the later Thor movies (and I’m basing this on a trailer for Thor: Love and Thunder, since I didn’t see the movie) and a few other Marvel movies where someone might fall over or get hit by something. And there were silly moments in Thor Ragnarok. I think Taika Waititi’s Jo-Jo Rabbit movie had slapstick. With so many taking offense to so much these days, slapstick seems to have gone the way of the dodo. Some of it might be viewed as triggering.
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I remember Thor 4 getting a lot of hate for going for slapstick. It felt like a big shift from earlier ones. I agree with the triggering issue.
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Monte Python was the best for this! Also the Honeymooners and Red Skelton. I think Slapstick comedy has gone the way of most comedy at this time – too many critics out there ready and willing to tear it down. I hope we swing the other way in my lifetime!
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Yes, great additions! 😄😄 I guess they probably were used to vaudeville where slapstick happened constantly. Sketch comedy was a natural segue.
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I liked Monty Python. My favorite slapstick group was Three Stooges. They were all physical humor. Marx Brothers was another good one, but they also had puns and verbal humor.
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My brothers used to love the Marx Brothers movies. 😄
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I never liked the Three stooges – don’t know why!
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I love it and don’t get why it has disappeared, but comedy in general has faded. People are so serious and angry these days. Maybe they need to watch the Pink Panther movies.
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True. Comedy seems to be a rare genre. It’s either raunchy or internet puns.
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You are right. A lot (most?) comedy these days is reruns of old shows. I don’t find many of the newer ones funny at all.
As for slapstick, well it’s funny in films and cartoons, but not so in real life. The clip of the man in the Japanese show I didn’t find funny. I cringed. I think it’s something to do with in films and cartoons, you know no one is actually getting hurt, while in real life, there is the possibility.
I do feel sorry for comedians these days. They have to be so careful not to offend some group or other that it must be difficult to write any jokes as so many have someone as the butt.
And, as with Monty Python, the idea was to offend.
There’s nothing wrong with offending people, nor with being offended. It is often a way of throwing light onto a difficult subject.
In the 1960s I saw a play called A Day in the Death of Jo Egg. It was a very funny comedy about a family dealing with a severely handicapped daughter. It was written by a man whose own daughter was handicapped. Maybe that helped to make it all right, but it did enlighten people about the problems faced by the family, but in a light-hearted way.
I don’t suppose that would be acceptable today. If it’s serious, don’t make fun of it.
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The thing with the messed up backflip is that the guy was up and running right afterwards. So, he didn’t actually get hurt. There’s a real chance of actors getting hurt in films too. The Stooges actually got hurt a bunch when stunts went wrong. You just don’t see it or think it.
People are quicker to be offended and run to announce it these days. I think it’s more that people aren’t walking away and leaving it be. They try to get others to join a crusade.
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Haven’t we all had moments when we would like to drop an anvil on somebody? I wonder if the violence of slapstick was an outlet for that impulse, in a time when people were pressured to conform. There was not a lot of room for quirky people in that era. But everyone could laugh along with Bugs Bunny (quirky) getting Elmer Fudd (conformist) to shoot himself in the face.
Of course, conformity may also have included laughing at things like a cross-dressing Bugs, rather than allow anyone even a hint of suspicion that you, yourself, might secretly be cross-dressing.
Now, there is a lot more freedom to non-conform. Drag performance is talked about openly, even if sometimes in insulting terms. The quirky are not forced to appear only in comedy. Yes, there is more empathy in society for the downtrodden, minorities, homeless, gay/bi, autistic. We don’t like to make fun of people. It makes us feel bad.
That said, if you think about some of the most successful recent comedies, they still come back to the quirky vs. conforming frame. In Elf, the quirky Buddy goes up against his conforming father. In Shrek, the quirky ogre and donkey go up against the conforming Farquaad. In Big Bang Theory, a bunch of quirky scientists are finding their way in the very conforming halls of Academia.
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I think the outlandishness of slapstick kept it funny without going too far. Maybe there is a part of human nature that finds pain funny. It is close to pleasure.
With drag, I think the humor was in the breaking of a taboo. It was done for humor. A lot of taboo stuff gets presented that way, especially with men as the targets. Dark stuff too.
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Slapstick is important comedy because it gives the viewer a laugh and a ‘release’. I’m a fan.
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I agree.
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I’ve never grown out of slapstick humour, and use it a lot in my stories, though it tends to be more the custard-pie type than people getting hurt. Most comedy has got boring now in its attempts not to offend. Pretty soon the offended brigade won’t have anything to rant about, and what will they do then?
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They’ll always find something. People tend to stumble into offending others when doing art.
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Isn’t that what art is about, Charles?
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Not really. Art can also be to make people happy. The idea that it’s only to offend, which I’ve heard many times, ignores a lot of creations.
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Slapstick, like all comedy, is necessary. I’m glad your comment section agrees. I think we have grown too careful and nervous with humor in general. As a member of the crowd, comedy really felt the sting of, dare I say it, the PC epidemic that struck at the same time of the global pandemic. I am hoping that people just take it easier and enjoy funny things. It’s not always that deep. It can be, of course, but we are all adults with brains. I would like to be hopeful about it.
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It felt like it was starting before the pandemic, but it definitely got more pronounced during the event. Maybe people were so bored that they were just looking for drama.
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I agree with you. And to be honest, as a twenty-five year old, I am over the fear and hyperawareness to mind my manners. I’m not looking to act like a maniac and literally say whatever I want, but there is a line. The comedians Bobby Lee and Andrew Santino talk about this at times on their podcast Bad Friends. Interesting stuff. Great post!
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Thanks. I don’t venture into online forums or social media chat stuff these days. Too often, I’d ask a question about sensitive topics and people would take it as an insult. Then it would be a flurry of angry replies. That wasn’t even with comedy. Just feels like people are seeing ‘offended’ as a core personality trait these days and thinking if the other person is really trying to piss others off.
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You’re right. It suddenly became the trend to take everything very personally, and to even twist it to fit that bill. I had a very influential teacher in high school who gave my class a, “You need to realize that in the scheme of things, you don’t matter. It’s not all about you,” and that is something that I think about often! We can debate topics while simultaneously having the freedom to enjoy things. Not everything is always quite that serious.
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I think it’s about happy hormones. People found that they got spurts of serotonin from being offended and getting others to join in the defense. So many on the internet are looking for a fight, so it’s easier to lead a virtual lynch mob.
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Oh the irony. It’s tragic. Hoping we can pull ourselves up by the bootstraps!
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