Thursday, November 08, 2007

Humorology: A Study in Comedy

My acting class is doing a unit on comedy. One of our homework assignments was to observe situations in everyday life and try to find the comedy in it. Here are some of what I came up with:

1.) Eating my bowl of Puffins cereal: What if I were a hippy tripped out on a halucenogen and I looked down to my bowl, and each square of cereal looked like a live, baby puffin squalking up at me?

2.) You're on a first date and accidentally spit on him while telling a story: What if it were a funny story and it made the date laugh? And what if as he opened his mouth to laugh, a little bit of your saliva/spit flew into his mouth? What if that turned him on because he saw it as a prelude to a kiss?

3.) A person is eating a plate of spaghetti in a restaurant: What if that person had been rude to the waiter, and everyone but that person knows that the waiter sneezed on it just before delivering it to your table?

4.) It's sprinkling outside in Southern California: What if you hear on the news that a five-minute sprinkle-storm caused a 50 car pile-up on the freeway, because SoCalifornians don't know how to drive in the rain?

5.) Your husband volunteers to change the baby's diaper: What if it is the most magnificent poop your baby has ever done, and instead of being grossed out by the smell, your husband has never been more proud of the baby?
The above photo was taken at my wedding reception. It is my sister Jilly being cracked up by her best friend, Catchy, the funniest story-teller on earth! Jilly and Catchy will tell any man, woman, child or house pet they meet that they are BEST friends. They're territorial that way. SHE'S MY FRIEND, TOO, JILLY! ;)

6 comments:

Autumn's Mom said...

haha #2 made a little spit fly out of my mouth when I loughed out loud.

Anonymous said...

#4 is a bit true around here.

Anonymous said...

I think that you missed the point of your assignment. Finding humour in something doesn't mean imagining terrible things happening- the 50-car pile-up- or something quite rude and/or disgusting- the sneeze and the spit and the poop. The point was to look at simple things: ex., a man walking a dog and see that it could be, instead, that the dog is walking the man. Americans are so scatological! ICK!

Love Bears All Things said...

You're doing well at this NaBloPoMo thing.
Mama Bear

Tracy said...

Anonymous - Maybe those things don't seem funny to you because you aren't American, so the humor doesn't cross the cultural line. Don't get me wrong, a 50-car pile-up is definitely terrible, and sneezing in someone's food is certainly rude, but that doesn't mean that it can't be funny under certain circumstances. Dark comedy is born of tragedy. And situational comedy is only funny in given circumstances. That being said, everyone is entitled to their own opinion, and I can understand your point-of-view, even if I don't agree. I used to date a German guy who constantly reminded me that Americans have such "plain vanilla" humor and that sarcasm is a far superior form of humor (which incidentally is thought of as very funny in his culture). What can I say? Sarcasm seems hurtful to me, and I think bathroom humor is funny! People are just different, and not everything is funny to everybody. That's just the way it is!

J said...

1. Don't eat the baby puffins! (yet another good reason to stay off of the drugs!)

2. Ewww!

3. See, your mother was right when she said to be polite. ;)

4. I thought that really happened sometimes...seems to around here...

5. Very likely.

Love the pic!