Comedy, Culture and the Media - Essay Example

As will hopefully become clear from this Comedy Portfolio good, bad, or even indifferent comedy has the capacity to influence, as well as reflect popular culture through its presentation and its subsequent transmission by the mass media. To a very large extent it could be reasonably argued that with out the mass media to communicate, spread, and promote comedy it would be more difficult for comic performances, shows and other works to have any significant level of cultural impact. Difficult but not completely impossible as there are arguably stronger indicators that there was a strong relationship between comedy and culture long before the media became as widespread and diverse as it is within contemporary societies.

1 The comedy genre itself can be traced back to Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome. The Greeks and the Romans used comedy techniques to make their theatre audiences’ laugh and enjoy themselves. The comedies of the Greeks and the Romans tended to leave any serious messages until the very last act, whilst making sure that was always a happy ending. Another feature of the early Greek and Roman comedies was that they were written in such a way to be an accurate depiction of their contemporary cultures and societies.

Greek and Roman comics thought that basing their comedies on their respective societies meant that their audiences found the humour and the messages within the plays relevant to their lives.2 Audiences that understand the settings of comedies are more likely to grasp the humour and the serious messages within those comedies, a logical conclusion reached by both the Greeks and the Romans. Contemporary comedy authors, creators, and performers predominantly stick with the concept of producing relevant comic material that its intended audiences should grasp immediately.

3 As a distinct genre comedy