What happened to comedy? There are more funny people with huge platforms than ever before thanks to Twitter, podcasts and now Twitch. And there has never been more TV shows and specials than right now. But something seems way off. On the big screen, the genre basically doesn't exist anymore. And on TV, there are too many to wade through. What was once by far my favorite genre - the thing that shaped my personality probably more than anything except music - is now an embarrassment. The only good new comedy so far this year, in my opinion, is I Think You Should Leave with Tim Robinson on Netflix. Veep, which just ended, was genius until the end but not new. The lack of good comedy movies is glaring and easier to explain. The current lull started with bombs. Last decade we had Best In Show, Superbad, Step Brothers, Burn After Reading and 40-Year-Old Virgin/Knocked Up. Just at the beginning of this decade we had Bridesmaids. Then things went south at the box office for comedies while sequels and adaptations and superhero flicks consolidated all the box office revenue, leading studios to be much more hesitant to invest in original comedies.
Director Alexadner Payne said it well to the LA Times last year: “Every summer we used to look forward to the big blockbuster comedy...We used to look forward to ‘Trading Places’ and ‘Ghostbusters.’ ‘What’s the big comedy that’s going to make a ton of money and be delightful?’ I lament the passing of those days.”Judd Appatow explains that the death of the big comedy movie is due to:
The way studios buy scripts: "They used to buy a lot of scripts, and they had big teams of people giving notes, and they worked for years with people in collaboration on those scripts. Now it seems like they’d rather things come in packaged: a script, a cast, a director. As a result, a lot of great comedy writers are going to television."Big comedies bombing: "When you do a big, broad comedy and it fails, it’s an easy target for criticism."Critics: “I also don’t think critics have a great respect for the effort it takes to make people piss their pants laughing. They think it’s more honorable to show someone in torment, but being able to do that doesn’t make you more of an artist than being able to make ‘The Naked Gun.’"
Then there's comedy on TV. A lot is being made of the standup comedy boom, but how many of the hundreds of comedy specials on Netflix does anyone remember? Same goes for original series. How many people really talk about PEN15 or Russian Doll or Shrill? Bojack Horseman and Rick and Morty were both buzzed-about hits, but also widely mocked and come with serious cultural baggage that tends to obscure the content itself. On the other hand, I've heard lots of people talking about I Think You Should Leave. It feels like the first time in a few years that people with good taste are not only aligned around a new comedy show or movie but also really influenced by it/quoting it. ITYSL reminds me of Mr. Show, Kids in the Hall and Tim and Eric Awesome Show Great Job - the best sketch comedy shows are disturbing, a little angry maybe, and take earthbound premises into psychedelically weird conclusions. They stretch what is or was happening around them in culture so far that we can finally see how ridiculous things are for the first time. My favorite sketch from the show is called "Instagram" but the focus group sketch and "TC Tuggers" are the ones I see referenced the most on Twitter.
Bonus: RIP to the great Twitter account SNL Snippets, which was recently removed by NBC.
A lot of people are talking about Carly Rae Jepsen's album. (Spotify)
Lil Nas X's next song sounds like a cross between The Killers and late period Weezer. (Twitter)
If you ever wondered what Blanket (aka Bigi) Jackson and Prince Michael Jackson look like now, they have a movie review show on YouTube. (YouTube)
I had never heard of Tati Westbrook or James Charles until a week ago. (TNY)
Eurovision gets 200 million viewers? (Variety)
Bio-musical movies are the next superhero movies
Did you know how much is riding on the new Elton John biopic? I didn't until I read Brooks Barnes' analysis of the stakes involved with paramount's $120 million summer flick Rocketman, the second in a long line of upcoming rock star musicals. After the $900 million-plus box office success of Bohemian Rhapsody, studios are betting on bio-musicals as the only viable alternative to Marvel besides sequels and Netflix."Movies built around song catalogs have become white hot in Hollywood," Barnes writes. A quick list of all the bio-musicals on the horizon, taken from the piece:
An Elvis Presley movie from Baz Luhrmann for Warner Bros. Once Upon a One More Time, described as a fairy tale fueled by Britney Spears songs, from SonyA Madonna biopic called Blond Ambition from UniversalA Celine Dion movieA David Bowie movieA Judy Garland movie
If the parallel wasn't obvious enough, Paramount chairman Jim Gianopulos beat it into the ground at Comic-Con: “If musicians were superheroes, Elton John would be Rocketman — capable of escaping the gravity of the ordinary, fear and prejudice.” The smart move would be to make a XXXtentacion bio-musical. Get those Zoomers into the theater for something other than Avengers.
Tfue is suing FaZe clan. This is like the 2019 version of Paul suing the Beatles. (THR)
Investors in a new round of funding for Impossible Foods include JAY-Z, Trevor Noah, Alexis Ohanian, Kal Penn, Katy Perry, Questlove, Ruby Rose, Jay Brown, Kirk Cousins, Paul George, Jaden Smith, Serena Williams, will.i.am and Zedd. (Twitter)
Magazine articles are where TV shows come from now. (Bloomberg)
Facebook is pushing groups hard. (Twitter)
Missouri School of Journalism set up the first ever Instagram Local News summer fellowship. (Poynter)
Really? "There were three genuine hits in broadcast television during the 2018-19 season: the NBC weepie This Is Us, the Fox reality show The Masked Singer and the CBS perennial The Big Bang Theory." (NYT)
Further reading: — The Weirdo’s Guide to Bruce Hornsby, Reigning King of Soft Rock Strangeness
If you think of Bruce Hornsby only as a mulleted late-‘80s smooth-rock lifer, making music somewhere off the coast of Sting’s solo career, then you haven’t been paying enough attention.
How Veep Did What Game of Thrones Couldn’t
Selina Meyer’s downfall was beautifully earned. Daenerys Targaryen’s was a frustrating mess.
The Burnout Generation Gets the Reality Show It Deserves
Bravo's "Summer House" revels in the ways millennials use “working hard” to sublimate negative aspects of “playing hard"
‘Playing Catch-Up in the Game of Life.’ Millennials Approach Middle Age in Crisis
New data show they’re in worse financial shape than every preceding living generation and may never recover
For Teens, Romances Where the Couple Never Meets Are Now Normal
A generation that lives online is redefining dating; ‘We only met for 20 minutes and that was the first and last time we ever saw each other’
YouTube’s Newest Far-Right, Foul-Mouthed, Red-Pilling Star Is A 14-Year-Old Girl
"Soph" has nearly a million followers on the giant video platform. The site's executives only have themselves to blame.
Why Play a Music CD? ‘No Ads, No Privacy Terrors, No Algorithms’
Streaming services have revolutionized the discovery of songs, but here’s why Ben Sisario, who covers the music industry, still likes to listen to compact discs.