The death of comedy

A political tragedy

By Zach Hagadone
Reader Staff

It seems to be a trend that as political regimes — even whole civilizations — begin to collapse, people not only keep laughing but laugh louder. 

The uproarious games and entertainments of the late-Roman Empire were seen even in their time as a sign of decline. The English dared to start satirizing King Charles I right before their civil war (and his eventual execution) in the 1640s. The colonial American press and popular culture was full of parodies and insults against King George III right up to the outbreak of revolution, and the average American over the age of 15 was drinking about seven gallons of pure alcohol a year in the runup to our own civil war while whooping it up at wild vaudeville shows. Again, the press and pop culture was full of bawdy satire and profane parodies of various leaders and contemporary issues.

Then there’s Weimar Germany, which notoriously experienced an explosion of politically provocative (and risque) expression on the eve of the Nazi takeover in the 1930s.

In all those times and places, there seemed to be a burst of hilarity on the precipice of profound upheaval, but it wasn’t of the “har-har,” “take-my-wife” variety. Satire got sharper and darker, one-liners got more and more bitter, and the responses to those punchlines were as manic as they were mirthful. Until they stopped laughing, which was the real crack of doom. 

I thought about that after the most recent Follies, when my wife said the event gave her the feeling of a Weimar burlesque. I thought about it again after watching the 98th Oscars on March 15, when host Conan O’Brien welcomed attendees and viewers to the “Has a Small Penis Theater,” adding, “Let’s see him put his name on that one.”

Of course, the central cause and target of both the present collapse and comedic response is President Donald Trump — a ludicrous figure throughout his long life on the public stage, but a joke that’s been on us for the better part of 15 years. 

He’s always been easy to make fun of. Trump’s a walking caricature of himself. Following that, humorists of all types across the world have mined every aspect of his absurd persona and the even more absurd people who have supported him and somehow still do. It’s too easy, really, and I fear that we have reached a dangerous tipping point when it’s just not funny anymore — not even in the way of gallows humor.

Despite revulsion at the thought of adding one more viewer stat to Melania — a “documentary” of the first lady if it was directed by Leni Riefendull — I watched it thinking it might provide a few dark-hearted laughs. I can report with full conviction that it’s an obscenity that strips grotesquery and cynicism of their meanings and deserves a Razzie given by The Hague. It’s not funny, it’s an insult that should by rights cause a spike in sales of guillotines on Amazon Prime. Even Oscars presenter Jimmy Kimmel’s oblique cracks about the film only elicited a polite chuckle.

Among the countless outrages and debasements committed against the American people by Trump and the people who’ve acted in ways big and small to maintain the disease of his “movement” is the death of comedy, insofar as “you can’t make this shit up,” as they say.

If it’s not Jabba the Trump feeding troughs of double cheeseburgers to the Olympic gold-winning U.S. men’s hockey team at the White House, it’s his “war secretary” spending more than $90 billion on what looked like supplies for the World Manosphere Convention or it’s Secretary of State Marco Rubio clumping around D.C. in presidential Florsheims at least three sizes too big — literal clown shoes. 

I’m not sure what the punchline to all this is, but it’s becoming clear that the joke’s over.