ETS 152  S. Sternlicht

Office 429 HL  MW 10:35-11:30 and also by appointment

Phone: 3-9480;  home: 472 5639.  Svsternl@syr.edu

 

 

ETS 152 AMERICAN COMEDY Fall 2004

 

Tragedy  is about  dying and death.  Comedy  is about living  and life. Like tragedy, comedy  is basically   a literary  form. Although  it is about  life,  it is not  a direct replication of life. The world  of comedy  is a real place (except  in the Theater of the Absurd) but  the characters  in comedy  are generally  eccentric.  That  is why  we laugh, and laughter  is as cathartic  as crying.  Inheriting  comic  traditions  from Shakespeare  and  Shaw,  American  playwrights   have  written many  fine comedies full of romance  and satire, the two basic  ingredients  of the form. This course will try to determine  what  exactly  is modern  AMERICAN comedy  through  a study of plays by American playwrights  of different decades.  As comedy  is often the weapon of minorities,  it may be significant  that most of the chosen playwrights  are or were,  members  of ethnic  groups treated unequally  by American society  in the past and even in the present.

 

Readings  for interpretation  and discussion:

Kaufman & Ferber: The Man Who Came to Dinner,  Dinner at Eight

Hughes: Simply Heavenly

Luce: The Women

Simon: The Prisoner of Second Avenue,  The Last of the Red Hot Lovers, The      Sunshine Boys

Wolfe: The Colored Museum

 

Texts:

Selected  Plays of Neil Simon  Vol 2

Black  Comedy 9 Plays

Three Comedies  by Kaufman  and Ferber

The Women  by Luce

Sternlicht: A Reader’s Guide to Modern American Drama

 

Lectures  and discussions  include:

Drama Theory  and Structure.

Comic Theory  and  the Functions  of Comedy

What  Is American Comedy?

The African American Comic Vision

Women  and Comedy

The Well-Made Play

The Theater of the Absurd

The Changing Subjects  of American Comedy

American  Comedies  of the early  20th C., mid- 20thC., late 20th C., and now.

 

For illustration segments  from documentaries   and  film videos  of some of the above  plays,  as well as selections  from Marx Brothers  comedy  and Absurdist  plays , will be shown.

 

Requirements:

Three 1500 word essays to be assigned  later.  Satisfactory  attendance   and class participation  are  required.  Students who miss more  than  4 classes will be penalized  one full letter grade;  more  than 6 unexcused  absences  will  result  in failure  regardless  of essay  grades.

 

Students with special  needs are requested to discuss them  with the instructor  as soon as possible.