Comedy often comes at the expense of others, and to do that smartly, you don't want to make fun of vulnerable people. You want to make fun of people in power, and so you need to really understand the dynamics of power.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
Comedy is a way to make sense of chaos. It's a way of dealing with things that are overwhelming, that threaten you; it's a way to survive and get closer to the truth.
What's great about comedy, obviously, is that you set up a situation that people assume one thing and then you break the assumption. That's basically the backbone to comedy. You set up a situation, let people make an assumption, and then you break the assumption.
You can not have comedy unless people are behaving badly. You can't have it.
Comedy is all about having a point of view, and it's also about power.
Most comedy is based on getting a laugh at somebody else's expense. And I find that that's just a form of bullying in a major way. So I want to be an example that you can be funny and be kind, and make people laugh without hurting somebody else's feelings.
Your funny gets developed pretty early on. Comedy requires that you understand as much as possible about the viewpoints of all people and everything that's going on around you. It genuinely requires a true point of view, a real sense of your own view of things in the world.
Comedy is to force us to observe ourselves in ways that are humorous and yet, at the end of the day, that cause us enough discomfort with the status quo to make a change.
People complain that joking about serious subjects is 'making light' of them. Isn't that a good idea? Comedy lets the air out of the bully's tires.
I have such a respect for comedy. It's a lot harder than doing drama, in my opinion; you have to have sort of an innate sense of humor. There are rules to comedy you can learn. But ultimately, it really does require a certain point of view on the world, and that really does appeal to me.
Comedy is a reflection. We create nothing. We set no styles, no standards. We're reflections. It's a distorted mirror in the fun house. We watch society. As society behaves, then we have the ability to make fun of it.