racism and homophobia in shows

[Jastroch]

Erika-

I don't think you're being preachy at all. As a writer-slash-performer nothing makes me more annoyed than comedic hackery. Pandering to cheap laughs for the sake of getting a laugh. It's good to bring these things up. Although I haven't seen it so much in the AIC, honestly, if it's there it deserves to be pointed out. Hopefully, everyone has coaches that encourage them to play smart.


- J

[Wesley]

am i satirizing the POV or trying to shock people?

I think shock may be some of the cause, too. Save for certain shows, we still are not pulling in a lot of new audience members a lot of the time. A LOT of improvisers see each other's shows and a lot of freidns, family, etc come so we tend to know the audience. Maybe we sometimes use shock value to 'up the ante' or 'show 'em we still got it' or whatever. There have been times where I've felt the need to give improvisers something bigger than a normal audience (partially because I know them and partially because we see through each other's tricks. I can do a simple scene that looks like magic to an audience of non-improvisers, but is predictable 3 sentences in to those 'in the know'). Maybe sometimes we fall back on shock.


Also, I happen to find degrading women, falsely on stage of course, hysterical. I think our community could do well with a little more misogyny and a little less PC-ness. That's why Parallelogramophonograph gives Valerie and Kaci 70% of what the rest of us get per show. Because it makes the rest of us laugh. and while we tell Valerie that glass ceiling in her room is a "sky light," we actually had it installed as a constant metaphorical reminder of her place in society.

[chicocarlucci]

Hey everyone else is chiming in, I just thought, "Hey why not the guy with the ambiguously racist avatar?"
Hello.

One of the two blood-brother/ take-a-bullet-for best friends in my life is a comedian. He got me into standup. We would write some pretty edgy stuff together. Sometimes it was overtly, exaggeratively racist. Since he's black, it almost felt like it might be ok to do on stage.

But of course, I never took anything racist on stage, and any material that was racist got left behind on the corkboard. The reason?-- something that my old comedy instructor told me about Carol O' Conner. You might know him as Archie Bunker - the loveable racist, misogynistic anti-hero from All In the Family. Caroll O' Conner took the part because it was a great way to make a social statement about what NOT to do, but he wound up quitting the show because there was always some jackass on the street that would run up to him and tell him how they were so glad that he was finally "sticking it to those ghetto-monkeys" or condemning "those sick butt-pirates".

And there will ALWAYS be jackasses who don't understand. As a personal choice, if I think there is any reasonable chance that someone in the audience will walk away with the wrong idea, I'd prefer not to bolster those notions. But I loved Arthur's idea of calling the audience out, too. nice.

By the same token, not talking about it, and not addressing it I think allows racism/misogyny/hoophobia to manifest itself in newer, more politically correct, and more subdued ways. I look at some of our politicians and various insulated individuals who use all the "right" terms but the content of their message and their actions countermand all the "purty" things they were stating earlier. This - THIS is the stuff that bothers me. There's no racial epithet out there that offends me more than these little things that are done on a daily basis.

I refer you to the greatest, funniest, and most poignant writing on the subject that I know of:

http://blackpeopleloveus.com

That site says it better than I could ever say it, so I'm actually a little sorry that I wrote all the previous crap. what was I thinking?

-eric
[/b]

[eplischke]

There are so many things that i could write about on this topic. However it is very hard to do at work. I think anything can be played on stage as long as it is played intelligently. If your going to have a racist or homophobic topic in the scene it needs to be played in a smart way. Play it to the highest level of intelligence you can. Ex. I was in a scene several months back in a Tight show and we had a guest playing with us. He chose a character that had Turrets (sp?) Syndrome and amidst his random cussing he dropped the "N" word. The audience gasped a little and was real quiet. If he had been left out there after he said that he would have looked bad. I came in as a man of color and expressed my anger to him as that character. The audience LOVED it and we both looked really good. There were actually some people of color after the show who told us how much they enjoyed the show. I don't think it's funny if someone says offensive or does offensive things just for the shock value however, if there is some shock value but it is played correctly then that is ok. Think along the lines of Richard Pryor, George Carlin and more recently Dave Chapelle. I have had moments (like Erika mentioned) where I fealt icky doing a scene about one of these topics and when i thought about why that was true I realized the scene wasn't played intelligently but probably more for just the shock value. I have also had moments where the scene was played to it's highest level of intelligence and the audience went nuts because the outcome of the scene showed the audience why racism and/or homophobia are ridiculous!! (By ridiculous I mean bad.) If we censor ourselves too much than I think it hurts comedy overall. Comedy is a tool that can be used to make social and political points through satire. When done correctly people get it and aren't usually offended. If comedy didn't make fun of edgy topics it wouldn't be as exciting to watch. If I don't stop typing now I never will and I need to keep my job. Ok thats all.

[phlounderphil]

Dammit,

here I was thinking the Austin improv community (and comedy as a whole) was the perfect place to vent my racist, homophobic thoughts. I thought the stage would be a great place to reveal who I really am. (By the way, I hate minorities, ESPECIALLY Jay!) Now you all have to bring this up. Comedy is a tool used to comment on the absurd aspects of society through the use of satire?!?!

No dammit, comedy is a way for me to secretly vent my actual racist and homophobic thoughts and make the rest of you think it's just a "jokey joke".

Shit. Guess I've got to find ANOTHER community now.

Couldn't be racist in slam poetry because 2/3rds of the people who did it were black, can't be racist in the improv community because 2/3rds of the people who do that are apparently pussies.

Again. Shit.

[chicocarlucci]

Dammit,
Couldn't be racist in slam poetry because 2/3rds of the people who did it were black, can't be racist in the improv community because 2/3rds of the people who do that are apparently pussies.
Again. Shit.

HAHAHA!
i love you phil...

-eric

[valetoile]

Don't like pussies, Phil? I knew you were a fag.

[Evilpandabear]

Hey Phil, whatever happend to those black people you were hunting?

[Wesley]

Oh, the punchlines to that basically write themselves.

[arthursimone]

I was in Portland doing a show with some people I kinda knew, and the suggestion was "washing machine." After a scene in a laundromat, I edited and initiated with "George, how many times do I have to tell you, this country club is whites only?".... there was a general stunned silence on the stage, and two people came out to 'save' me, turning the scene into something lame involving an elephant and a circus.

I was kind of annoyed, because the scene suffered in a fundamental way due to other performers hesitance to deal with race. I lost, the audience lost, everyone was cheated of what could have been a fun scene poking fun at all-white country clubs.

It's that kind of self-censorship that I find unacceptable in comedy- it robs us as a society of much-needed satire and self-mockery, and its omission is glaring.

Self-censorship signals:
a) A lack of faith in the audience's ability to "handle it"
b) A fear that something "real" might come out and embarass the performer... I don't have anything to hide; do you?
c) A patronizing, protective attitude towards the Other that does no good
d) A vote of 'no confidence' for the power of live theater and comedy

you can apply that to nearly every inherently 'political' topic.


-mago magnífico simone

[mcnichol]

I strongly agree with what many people had to say in here... Arthur, Jastroch, Erin...

You cannot do this stuff without dealing with race, gender, homosexuality, or any lesser or less visible traits that categorize us as people. I don't think Erika or anyone here is suggesting to avoid playing characters who are other than ourselves or who have views on those other than ourselves.

The key is how we deal with it. What is frustrating to me (as an audience member and as an improvisor) is seeing improvisors afraid to deal with these things in a vulnerable way. What Arthur said above resonates, as those improvisors seemed afraid to even let a scene explore that, veering it elsewhere. Other times I have seen improvisors deal with these issues by playing characters that are 2-dimensional in either portraying someone other than themselves or embodying someone with views on these sensitive issues. Rather than being a 3-dimensional black woman who deals with racism but is also a short-order cook who loves kids, she's simply an embodyment of a stereotype of a black woman, whatever the hell that is. I think that laziness is a component of it, but it's mostly based in fear. Fear of playing something far removed from who you are and trying to figure out what that's like in front of an audience. It's much easier (with guaranteed cheap-ass laughs) to just play a 2-d charicature and chalk it up to "shock value" , "freakin out the squares" , and "being edgy."

If you're going to play someone who is racist or homophobic or misogynistic on stage, have a point. Why are they like that? What's the relationship between these two people?

Come on, challenge yourself and challenge the audience with something real.



and ps., just as a response to what Wes said about upping the ante when playing in front of other improvisors...

I am sometimes an improvisor and sometimes an audience member. I love watching improv and I never ever tire of just seeing a good scene/show. Nothing crazy or shocking or fukin insane, just a good scene. I have never watched a show and thought a scene was predictable -- every scene is unique if you make it such, and you definitely do not need shock value to do so. What I personally find predictable is when people make crap moves out of nervousness and expectations they put on themselves. 99% of letting ANY audience enjoy the show (improvisors present or not) is just having fun and being vulnerable. It's infectious.

And: I still see the magic.

[beardedlamb]

it may also depend on how much time you have to define your characters. if we only see a character once in a show in a scene that stands by itself, it's easier for that character to feel 2 dimensional and just about any character, whether they are your race or someone elses, are going to be subject to doing stereotypical things.
in a longform, and by that i mean longer continuous story, you'll have more opportunities to explore the character you've created. really flesh it out.

another thing that i think is crucial is the company you keep. as arthur has just noted, it can depend on who you're playing with. playing a racist, homophobic, or mysogenist character is not something we should shy away from. but, if it is the group's view that these characters are not what society needs, they need to break him down through the narrative. assholes can be great to play in improv, and with the help of other actors who share your beliefs on certain subjects, you can do a lot of good by exposing them and making them lose. this also might happen easiest when there is time for it to develop more naturally.
like with "the office." from either the british or the american versions, the boss is made to be all three of the big ones we're talking about. but because he is made to look foolish by the rest of the people around him, we understand he is there as an example of what not to do. sometimes what he says is funny depending on what your threshold for racial comedy is, but almost always he is made to look the fool because of his small-mind shortcomings.

i say don't shy away from playing controversial characters. just make them lose.

beard [chopped]

[Mike]

I'm always fascinated how Mel Brooks used to get away with half the stuff in his movies until I took a good look at the way he set them up.

Blazing Saddles can be one of the most racist films out there until you realize that Brooks empowered the people he was supposed to be mocking. He drops the N bomb like he was a B52 pilot, yet those who are being racist are morons. Almost every white character in the movie is a dope. And the African-american characters are set up as smarter, more realistic characters.

Brooks always seems to empower the people he is 'picking on'. He gives them intelligence and makes them better characters than the supposed racist or mysoginistic characters that are supposedly 'in charge'. If you look at every character he plays, Brooks usually takes the role of a complete moron, be it his Govenor from Blazing Saddles, or President Scroob from "Spaceballs". Brooks sets himself up as a "piss boy" in History of the World, and for the most part, takes the low status roles which allow him to be 'edgy' yet not cross any lines to where you don't know it's a joke. He was able to release "The Producers" in the 1960's a time when the Nazis were still a taboo topic. Yet he made the German Character a nutcase, and the play turned out to be a comedy, thanks to the Hitler, Lester St Dubois. Brooks could have offended a heck of a lot of folks with the topic of Nazis, he had a blatantly homosexual director character, and he also had one of the main characters using sex with old ladies for money. Yet the movie is considered a classic by some, and people still flock to see the stage adaptation.

So I guess we can explore certain topics such as stereotypes and such as long as we make them three dimensional, and give them a purpouse for being in the scene other than to get a cheap laugh. And like Jeremy said, let the character win. Make him/her the higher status person in the scene, and give them intelligence or some quality that makes them better than just some stereotype.

[Jastroch]

Self-censorship signals:

b) A fear that something "real" might come out and embarass the performer... I don't have anything to hide; do you?

-mago magnífico simone

On the contrary Arthur, I think you have a lot to hide... I'm thinking of your dead twin.

[York99]

I don't know if anyone will really read this, as it is a month and a half after the last reply and way down on the thread, but there is an issue that I don't think was addressed here: doing a character who happens to fit a stereotype but with the intention is not to be racist, not to have shock value, AND not to make a satirical point.

I see people all the time who fit well within the confines of a stereotype. I have been on stage thinking that I want to explore the character of this black guy I actually saw and interacted with. He happens to be a complete stereotype. The problem is that if I do an accurate impression of him I look like a racist. Quite the contrary -- I am giving this guy a voice on stage. I care what he has to say. But the audience is horrified because my black "accent" -- though spot on for this guy, perhaps even toned down -- sounds like I'm belittling black people.

A black character, a jew, a homosexual, a Middle-Easterner... these are taboo in this light. However, for less well represented (and perhaps less historically persecuted) stereotypes we do this all the time to an audience's delight -- hippies, rednecks and, most sadly of all, poor pirates.

There is no justice here. I blame the fuckin' Swedes.