–Freddy Purcell
Philosophy Society’s President of two years ago (Benjamin Roth) returned on Thursday for a characteristically passionate speech. I have personally never been on the receiving end of such a diversity of adjectives, so if you wanted your vocabulary expanded, this was the talk to come to. Benjamin’s argument broadly follows that modern comedy has lost some key elements that made older comedy an enriching art form. He believes that older comedy was an effective tool for illustrating issues present in a society by mocking those in power, public figures or those participating in broader social dynamics. As an example, we were given a copy and a touching rendition of Katherine’s monologue from Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew (here). As Benjamin argues, while this passage seems to be about women submitting to their husbands, the context of the play has Katherine and her suitor Petruchio working together to achieve their goals. Therefore, it is argued that this passage mocks the men of Shakespeare’s audience for their likely belief in their own superiority, while appearing to say something quite different at first. This passage is therefore classified as “high” comedy by Benjamin because of this level of complexity. Benjamin made clear that he believes “high” comedy is accessible to everyone as the audiences of older theatres were made up of all sorts of people, and that he believes we need “low” comedy for an easy laugh. To make comedy great again, it is therefore suggested that we need something that develops our understanding of the world, while also being accessible to all people and (presumably) amusing us. From this conclusion, Benjamin therefore calls for comedians to tune back into their craft as one that is more aware of its societal context and has a greater societal function. He also suggests that comedians ought to read more so that they can better make references to other things and have more layers to their humour.
We had a series of strong questions from the audience that really helped flesh out the talk. One major contingent of questions asked why Benjamin believes comedy has degraded in the modern day. Benjamin argued that mass media has allowed the production of lots of poor content and has taken away from a sense of care and pride in the production of art. Short form content on social media also received some of the blame as he argued that it has shortened our attentions spans to mean that we don’t desire longer form content that has greater potential to be meaningful. Although for reasons mentioned above, Benjamin laid the vast majority of the blame for the state of comedy with comedians, not audiences.
Other questions expressed concerns that Benjamin was missing good content produced in the last 10-20 years. He argued that except for Peep Show, he wasn’t. Approaching the issue from a different angle, others questioned the possibility that some unappreciated things from the modern day will find greater appreciation in the future (something experienced by many classic works). Benjamin repeated that he did not think this will happen.
In summary, in Benjamin’s view, all modern comedy (except maybe for Peep Show) is bad and will remain bad. This is because it lacks any depth that makes us think on the society we live in and any of the complexity seen in the writing of older comedy. The reason for comedy’s condition in the modern day is mass media’s role in the devaluing of art.
This concludes the summary of the second Phil on Tap this year. I hope those that went enjoyed themselves and that if you’re reading this without having experienced Phil on Tap, you will be encouraged to attend the next one. That next one will be in two weeks’ time and will start our first Phil on Tap month, where we will have Phil on Tap for at least three of the four weeks of November.
If you have any questions about the talk or about Phil on Tap generally, please ask away in the comment section below. I should be able to answer any questions about the society and I can forward questions for Benjamin onto him. Thank you for reading and goodbye…