When comedy becomes tragic
“Comedy equals tragedy plus time,” argues a character in Woody Allen’s “Crimes and Misdemeanors.” In other words, it’s acceptable to joke about nearly any terrible event after enough years have passed – or enough decades, in the most horrific cases. So while delivering the one-liner “Other than that, how did you like the play, Mrs. Lincoln?” would have been a bad idea in the late 1860s, the joke elicits chuckles today.
Here’s a new corollary to that famous humor equation: Comedy plus tragedy equals (a bad) time. The formulation occurred to me last Tuesday after I tuned in to the 10:30 p.m. “Seinfeld” episode on KSKN-TV Ch. 22. It was “The Contest,” in which Jerry, Elaine, George and Kramer compete to see who can keep from pleasuring themselves – and thus remain “master of their domain” – the longest. The Emmy-winning episode features a Kramer bit TV Guide heralded as the third-funniest moment in television history. But it offered more yuck than yucks last week.
The show opens with the gang joking about whether terrorists ever let hostages do their laundry. Watching the scene a few hours after the beheaded, booby-trapped body of a South Korean hostage was discovered in Iraq, I wondered how many other viewers could only wince at the unintentional juxtaposition. Making matters worse, one of the main subplots concerns Elaine developing an erotic fixation on John F. Kennedy Jr. after ogling his butt at a health club. It was a hoot – before JFK Jr. and his wife died in a plane crash.
As the classic “Seinfeld” ended, I flashed back to another Emmy-winning effort overtaken by tragedy – the 1997 season-opening episode of “The Simpsons,” in which Homer retrieves his illegally parked car from the World Trade Center plaza. “The City of New York vs. Homer Simpson” won’t tickle my funny bone again, either. The memory of too many real bones will get in the way.
Hitting his Mark
Last week, a Modesto, Calif., police investigator admitted his interview transcripts intentionally omitted witness statements likely to bolster Scott Peterson’s contention he didn’t kill his wife, Laci. If his foul-up helps set Peterson free, the cop should move to Sandpoint and launch a radio talk show in Spokane. There’s always room for one more.
Sentient signs?
The “test test test” messages rolling across the new traffic sign looming over eastbound I-90 near the Sprague Avenue exit bring to mind the roadside reader board that gives Steve Martin’s character personal advice in “L.A. Story.” What targeted messages might local drivers see if our freeway sign developed a mind of its own? A few likely possibilities:
“Hey buddy, don’t they have passing lanes in Idaho?”
“It’s too bad they don’t sell cars with turn signals in Spokane.”
“With a skull that thick, I can see why you refuse to wear a helmet.”
“Unless your truck bed has a rust-powered force field, you might consider tying down the tools and trash bouncing around back there.”
“Why don’t you lay off the open-road speeders for a day and focus on the psychotic macho men who make driving the Valley corridor such a harrowing ordeal?”
Nuts to me
Talk about creative fast-food service. At the SpoVegas Krispy Kreme drive-up window the other morning, a young woman handed over my box of pastries, flashed a big smile and proclaimed, “Here’s your ‘nuts!”
At least they didn’t come in a sack.