'It’s about expecting the unexpected’: Live stand-up comedy from the audiences’ perspective

Copyright @ 2011 The Authors.A dearth of research exists that examines live stand-up comedy from the audiences’ perspective. This empirical article redresses this neglect by examining the appeal of live stand-up comedy to audiences and revealing their motivations for going to see live stand-up comedy. These interests are explored through an online survey and a series of semi-structured interviews with live stand-up comedy goers. The online survey uncovers the frequency of attending live stand-up comedy, the types of venues that stand-up comedy is seen in, the types of venues that audiences prefer to experience live stand-up comedy in, and the extent to which individuals attend live stand-up comedy alone or accompanied by others, and if so, who they attend with. The one-to-one semi-structured interviews extend the investigation by analysing the specific reasons why audiences attend live stand-up comedy. Five main themes emerge from the semi-structured interview data: respecting the stand-up comedian; expecting the unexpected; proximity and intimacy; opportunities for interaction; and sharing the comic experience. The article illustrates the differing ways in which audiences engage with live stand-up comedy at both the public and private level.Brunel University School of Social Science

An Extra Slice of Jo Brand

In this candid interview Jo Brand, one of Britain’s most popular and successful comedians, discusses her comedy career. Brand shares experiences and critical reflections on a wide range of comedy, from her first stand-up gig in the 1980s through to presenting the Great British Bake Off: An Extra Slice [2014-present]. She discusses the inspiration and motivation for her comic material, explains the highs and lows of working in television comedy and offers pragmatic advice for comedians wishing to pursue a career in comedy today

Aristotelian Comedy

This paper examines the evidence for Aristotle's theory of comedy in the Poetics and other works. Since he defines comedy in terms of its 'inferior' characters, he cannot have objected in principle to ethical impropriety, obscenity and personal abuse in comedy; comedy cannot be judged by the ethical standards appropriate in everyday life. His account of the historical development of comedy is discussed, together with the application of the concept of poetic universality to comedy. It is argued that Aristotelian theory is consistent with Aristophanic practice. My aim in this paper is to reconsider a number of aspects of Aristotle’s thinking on comedy in the light of the acknowledged Aristotelian corpus. I shall have nothing to say about the Tractatus Coislinianus, an obscure and contentious little document which must (despite Janko’s energetic attempt to restore its credit) remain an inappropriate starting-point for discussion. There is still, I believe, something to be learnt from the extant works

Illocutionary Acts in Stand-up Comedy

This research was conducted to discover the types of illocutionary acts, the most dominant type of illocutionary acts, the implication of the dominant type of illocutionary acts, and which utterances show the function of stand-up comedy in stand-up comedy performances in Indonesia. It was based on descriptive design by applying both quantitative and qualitative method. This study took ten performances of stand-up comedy which is taken randomly from the internet and there were 1378 illocutionary acts in ten stand-up comedy selected. The findings show that all types of illocutionary acts were used in stand-up comedy and the percentages were: 55.9% of representatives, 22.9% of directives, 16.2% of expressives, 3% of declaratives and 2% of commissives. There was another function of stand-up comedy in addition to entertaining, informing, and criticizing, which is insinuating. The most dominant illocutionary acts type found was representatives. It means, in delivering their material, the comics dominantly convey their belief that some proposition is true and they also indirectly provoke the audience to believe their words

Beryl Reid Says... Good Evening: Performing Queer Identity on British Television

Beryl Reid Says… Good Evening was a comedy revue series broadcast on BBC television in the late 1960s which showcased the talents of a renowned British character comedy performer. Beryl Reid’s career spanned music hall, variety theatre, dramatic acting, radio comedy, film and television. She was a celebrity figure from the 1950s to her death in the 1990s but never became a ‘star’ as such. Reid’s work is addressed as a form of queer performance, both in roles which reference lesbian sexuality and roles which depict eccentric femininities. This television series was one of the few attempts to showcase her talents, and it is discussed here as an example of how character comedy queers heteronormativity through its camp attention to the everyday

'I Like the Metamorphosis of the Characters': Dynamics of Transnational Television Comedy Engagement

This article contributes to debates on transnational television comedy audiences through analysis of Eastern European audiences’ engagement with British television comedy. Using questionnaire and focus group data it examines the extent and nature of British television comedy engagement by Romanian audiences and the limits of broadcasting British television comedy to Romanian audiences. The research reveals Romanian audiences’ high involvement with television comedy. Over half of questionnaire respondents watch British television comedy. Three themes regarding Romanian audiences’ engagement with British television comedy are identified in the focus group data: 1) transnational television comedy aesthetics; 2) transnational television comedy as intellectual comedy; and 3) ethical limits of transnational television comedy. These themes highlight the complex contours of transnational television comedy engagement.https://ijoc.org/index.php/ijoc/article/view/2941/152

Effect Of Mirthful Laughter On Vascular Function

In contrast to the well-established scientific evidence linking negative emotional states (e.g., depression, anxiety, or anger) to increased risk for cardiovascular disease, much less is known about the association between positive emotional states (e.g., laughter, happiness) and cardiovascular health. We determined the effects of mirthful laughter, elicited by watching comic movies, on endothelial function and central artery compliance. Seventeen apparently healthy adults (23 to 42 years of age) watched 30 minutes of a comedy or a documentary (control) on separate days (crossover design). Heart rate and blood pressure increased significantly while watching the comedy, whereas no such changes were seen while watching the documentary. Ischemia-induced brachial artery flow-mediated vasodilation (by B-mode ultrasound imaging) increased significantly after watching the comedy (17%) and decreased with watching the documentary (-15%). Carotid arterial compliance (by simultaneous application of ultrasound imaging and applanation tonometry) increased (10%) significantly immediately after watching the comedy and returned to baseline 24 hours after the watching, whereas it did not change significantly throughout the documentary condition. Comedy-induced changes in arterial compliance were significantly associated with baseline flow-mediated dilation (r = 0.63). These results suggest that mirthful laughter elicited by comic movies induces beneficial impact on vascular function. (C) 2010 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. (Am J Cardiol 2010;106:856-859)Kinesiology and Health Educatio

The Divisive Power of Humour: Comedy, Taste and Symbolic Boundaries

Using British and Dutch interview data, this article demonstrates how people from different social classes draw strong symbolic boundaries on the basis of comedy taste. Eschewing the omnivorousness described in recent studies of cultural consumption, comedy audiences make negative aesthetic and moral judgements on the basis of comedy taste, and often make harsh judgements without the disclaimers, apologies and ambivalence so typical of ‘taste talk’ in contemporary culture. The article demonstrates how, in particular, Dutch and British middle class audiences use their comedy taste to communicate distinction and cultural superiority. We discuss several reasons why such processes of social distancing exist in comedy taste and not other cultural areas: the traditionally low status of comedy; the strong relation between humour and personhood; the continuity between comedy tastes and humour styles in everyday life; as well as the specific position of comedy in the British and Dutch cultural fields

Violation Maxims in Awas Ada Sule Situation Comedy

The objectives of this research were to discover the types of violation maxims, the most dominant violation maxim, and to explain the causes of the most dominant violation maxim in Awas Ada Sule situation comedy. The source of data was situation comedy and taken from internet. The data were the scripts in Awas Ada Sule situation comedy. There were 50 violation maxims in this research. The descriptive qualitative design was used to analyze the data. The results of the analysis showed that all types of maxim were violated; 33 utterances violation maxim of quantity (66%), 7 utterances violation maxim of quality (14%), 7 utterances violation maxim of relation (14%), and 3 utterances violation maxim of manner (6%). The most dominant type of violation maxims was the violation maxim of quantity because the main characters said something without giving enough information or even providing it too much by adding something unimportant to say which was aimed at creating humor, entertaining

Comic Impossibilities

Argues for the controversial and initially counterintuitive thesis that theatrical magic (that is, the performance of conjuring tricks) is a form of standup comedy