Standup Comedy As Humorous Detachment: Enlightenment Roots from Diderot and Sade

Home , Denis Diderot, Jim Jefferies (comedian)

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DOI number 10.2478/tco-2020-0023

Standup Comedy as Humorous Detachment: Enlightenment Roots from Diderot and Sade

Patricia NEDELEA

Abstract: This comparative and multidisciplinary article reveals an original perspective on Standup Comedy, proposing the Enlightenment philosophy as a possible roots for Standup Comedy. Subsequently, the Standup Comedian is presented as the most Rational and Detached type of actor. The comparative approach uses writings coming from the Enlightenment, from two very different, but equally iconic philosophers: Diderot, whose discourse focuses on acting (The Actor’s Paradox) and Sade, whose text is directed at gender issues from what we call today a very “politically incorrect” angle (the novel Justine). My theoretical attempt is multidisciplinary, being situated at the intersection between performance studies, literary studies and rhetoric.

Key words: Standup Comedy, Denis Diderot, Sade, multidisciplinary attempt, Enlightenment philosophy

Foreword - Introductory Stand(up)point

Seen as “the purest public comic communication”1, Standup Comedy was and still is, without a doubt, an extremely notable form of comedic expression (maybe even the most notable one), and today humour, in general, and the quality of being therapeutic of Standup comedy, in particular, is more relevant and needed than ever:

 CEU Budapest, Gender Studies Department, Visiting Staff; UBB, Theatre Faculty, Teaching Assistant. She has obtained 2 PhD-s, one from CEU (in Shakespeare and Queer Theory), the other from EUI (in Renaissance History). 1 Lawrence E. Mintz, “Standup Comedy as Social and Cultural Mediation”, in American Quarterly, Vol.37, No.1, Special Issue: American Humour, The John Hopkins University Press, Spring 1985, p.71.

THEATRICAL COLLOQUIA we are at the end of 2020, the year when the expression “public communication” has globally received new meanings, which are, at this moment, very different meanings from the past. I am writing this article from a triple perspective: the one of scholar, the one of a former (and perhaps future) Standup comedian,2 as well as the one of a passionate Standup spectator since forever.

1. Standup Comedy as Humorous Detachment First let us look at Standup histories and its possible roots and influences. The historiography of Standup starts with historiographical attempts (today, they seem old and outdated) on Standup Comedy as a theatrical genre, some of those pioneering historical books on the topic being written by Steve Allen (in 19563 and then later, in 19814 and 19825), Joe Franklin (in 19726) and Phil Berger (in 19757) and, after numerous documentary films about comedy and comedians in between,8 this historiographical tradition continues nowadays with numerous Standupper biographies and self-biographies, but also exceptional visual materials such as Wayne Federman’s podcast The History of Standup (Season 1 - 2018, Season 2 - 2019)9. A constant feature of Standup comedy always reflected in the historical and academic works about it is the humorous detachment: comedy paradoxically attracts and repels at the same time,10 the audience detaches

2 I have been a Standupper between 2004 and 2010, performing for HBO Romania Standup Caffee Show, as well as on the stage of National Theatre from Cluj-Napoca. 3 Steve Allen, Funny Men, New York, Simon and Schuster, 1956. 4 Steve Allen, Funny People, New York, Stein and Day, 1981. 5 Steve Allen, More Funny People, New York, Stein and Day, 1982. 6 Joe Franklin, Encyclopaedia of Comedians, Secaucus, New Jersey, Citadel Press, 1972. 7 Phil Berger, The Last Laugh, New York, Morrow, 1975. 8 I will give just a few very relevant examples: All jokes aside (2000), Comedian (2002), History of the Joke (2008), The Last Laugh (2016). 9 Wayne Federman, The History of Standup, https://www.thehistoryofstandup.com, most recently consulted on October 30th 2020. 10 Paul Woodroff, “The Paradox of Comedy,” in Philosophical Topics, vol. 25, no. 1, 1997, 319– 335.

THEATRICAL COLLOQUIA through laughter from the comedian,11 and from the context of the joke.12 But is the Standup comedian detached, or is he / she involved? Should he / she be detached? I anticipate that the answer is affirmative: the story of a very detached comedian still can catch the audience, while the comedian can’t really “lose himself” and his rationality in the moment. The roots of Standup Comedy are multiple, among its possible ancestors being enumerated (and here I quote Oliver Double with the longest and most comprehensive list I found, list that includes all the other enumerations from elsewhere) “the shaman, jesters, Commedia dell’ Arte, Shakespearean clowns like Richard Tarleton, English pantomime clowns like Joseph Grimaldi, circus clowns, British music hall comedians, American vaudeville entertainers, the stump speeches of American minstrelsy, nineteenth century humorous lecturers like Mark Twain and medicine shows.”13 Still, this very inclusive and generous enumeration does not include the Enlightenment philosophy. In order to answer the question “Is the Standup comedian detached of is she / he involved, passionate?” I will briefly refer to the two main (and opposite) acting methods, the Method acting and the Brechtian acting. The Standup comedian is also sine qua non involved: there is no fourth wall convention in Standup, meaning that the comedian directly addresses the audience and reacts to it. The audience reactions are spontaneous, unpredictable - so he / she has to be involved, but in a very special and rational way. While the theatre actor moves in between one and the other, the Standup comedian is the most rational and detached kind of actor. This Standup comedy rationality is, in my view, very similar to the Enlightenment reason and rationality, and I see the Enlightenment philosophy as a possible cradle for the Standup idea. This similarity might be reflected in and exemplified by two philosophical (but also humorous, or at least ironic) works, both coming from the

11 Jason Rutter, Stand-Up as Interaction: Performance and Audience in Comedy Venues, Doctoral Thesis, University of Salford, Institute for Social Research, September 1997. 12 Janine Schwartz, Linguistic Aspects of Verbal Humour in stand-up comedy, Doctoral Thesis, 2010.

13 Oliver Double, Getting the Joke, the Inner Workings of Standup Comedy, London, Bloomsbury Methuen Drama, 2014, pp. 23-24.

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Enlightenment: Diderot’s14 dialogue “Paradox sur le comedien”15 and Marquis de Sade’s16 short novel “Justine”17. These two literary paradigms differ as much as their equally rebellious authors do, but they still have strong common points situated at different structural levels. The commonalities between the two Enlightenment literary works are numerous: firstly, the fact that the rational / detached model of acting and behavior is preferred and recommended by both authors, secondly, the life philosophies expressed in both and, thirdly, the similar types of persuasion which organizes the author’s rhetorical discourse in both cases. The subject is the professional actor, in Diderot’s case, and the woman and her condition, in Sade’s Justine.

2. Two Enlightenment Models of Detachment

Le paradox sur le comedien, usually translated in English as The Actor’s Paradox18 is a classic writing about the beginning of a modern era in the art of acting. The paradox, according to Diderot, is that while playing a part the actor does not have to feel and lose artistic control. The best actor makes the audience feel, but feels absolutely nothing. The Actor’s Paradox is, in my view, a premonitic vision of the XXth century Brechtian theory of acting, arguing for Brecht’s acting technique proposal and his major requirement for the actor to take

14 Denis Diderot (1713-1784) was a famous French Encyclopaedist and philosopher who wrote novels, essays, plays, art and literary criticism. the most celebrated writers of the day, sceptical, rationalist Diderot powerful propaganda weapon against ecclesiastical authority, conservatism and superstitions. He published Pensées philosophiques (1746), volume which includes Le paradox sur le comedien. 15 Denis Diderot, The Paradox of the actor (annotated): Le paradoxe sur le comédien (Humanities Collections Book 21), London, Kim Doyle, 2014. 16 Marquis de Sade was a familiar designation for Donatien Alphonse François, Comte de Sade (1740-1814), his writings include Justine (1797), its continuation Juliette (1797) and Le Philosophie dans le boudoir (1795). His works were therefore labelled obscene, and their publication was banned until the 20th century. 17 Marquis de Sade, Justine, or the Misfortunes of Virtue, Oxford World's Classics Collection, 1st Edition, translated by John Phillips, Create Space Publishing Platform, 2015. 18 A more proper/accurate translation would be “The Paradox about the actor”, but such translation (especially the preposition about) would perhaps symbolically situate the theory too far away from the subject.

THEATRICAL COLLOQUIA distance from the character in order to represent that character properly. As a reaction to the strong movement initiated in the first decade of the XXth century by Stanislavski and his Method Acting Theory (which imposed the actor do totally identify with his character and feel all the character’s feelings in order to convince the audience), Brecht showed up two decades later with a reactionary anti-Stanislavskian theory, insisting on the model of the actor that just “represents”/”shows” the character without imposing himself to feel any of the character’s feelings - this is what we call today Character Acting. The Actor’s Paradox is structured as a Dialogue19 on the art of acting. The two opposite types of acting are presented, each exemplified by numerous actors and actresses of the time. Each of the two male participants in the discussion situates himself on the side of one or another type of actors (the orator will end by convincing the other one that the rational actor is preferable and reliable than the irrational one). The first type of actor (the correspondent of what Stanislavski will much later call “the actor of re-living”) will “live” the life of his character in an organic, un-mediated, irrational, visceral way, without care for self-control, reason or objectivity. This actor is considered unreliable because he can be genius one evening and absolutely unexpressive in the next performance. The second type is the “valuable” type of actor characterized by self-control, auto-observation, objectivity and objectivation20, rationality, judgement, detachment, thinking - all the main values of the Enlightenment. This actor is “showing” instead of “feeling”. This one will be, two centuries later, the Brechtian. The Standupper does tell pretended self- biographical stories, but those stories are always told from a detached perspective: they are funny stories from the past, and the storyteller always shows, but never feels. The story told by the short novel Justine (or, The Misfortunes of Virtue) is simple: two young sisters Justine and Juliette suddenly become orphans. Juliette takes her fate in her own hands and, by the use of all means, including her charms, prostitution and even crime, she will “make a life”. She ends up

19 It follows the tradition of Platonic dialogues. 20 The objectivation represents, in theatrical terms, the capacity the actor tries to develop to “see himself” from the outside, the skill to double himself and supervise his character, his corporal position, vocal and corporal expressions on the stage.

THEATRICAL COLLOQUIA rich, happy and because of her fortune she will have access to high society. This is Sade’s ironical life lesson for the ladies. To resume, it is a world upside down, just like in Standup comedy. The character Justine’s case is quite the opposite of her sister’s, and the whole novel illustrates the cruel destiny “reserved” to the young and innocent sister21. In spite of Justine’s good and pious thoughts, intentions and facts, the unhappy girl will never be rewarded for her constant faith in God: the sign expected by her the whole live doesn’t come. Justine’s unique intention is to keep her chastity and purity untouched, even she died of starvation. What does she get as a reward for her concern? She is repeatedly abused, raped, beaten to death and humiliated. She has to be the witness of the sinners’ welfare and in the end she will be condemned to death for their crimes, which she tried so hard to stop. When she finally meets her sinful sister who saves and helps her, poor Justine will ironically die in a very short time because of a thunder that will burn her alive. In conclusion, there is neither justice in this world, nor a fair God that takes care that anyone get what he deserves. For this reason anyone should make his own destiny. We should not pray, but action: we should simply take what we want instead of asking for it. Just like in Standup comedy, the conclusion is unexpected and opposite to the ethical norm. Just like in Standup, the audience (here, the reader) is shocked by the irony and lack of moral justice.

3. Enlightenment Rhetoric Strategies: Standup-Style Irony and Humor

Diderot does what Standuppers usually do: they say the opposite at the beginning, in order to get to the real point in the end - which is the definition of irony. Initially, the orator from Diderot’s Dialogue praises the Method actor, calling him “the talent” and “the genius”. But after a while, the orator asks: what happens if the genius has a bad day? Because, as we know, this happens frequently (and he gives examples). What is preferable, a genius who made

21 Justine has the same antithetical characters from the fairy-tales, but the end is opposed to the traditional end of fairy-tales: the guilty are happy, the good ones are punished and killed. The novel can be considered the perfect anti-fairy-tail.

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“miracles” on stage one day and the next day he played lousy because of various personal reasons, or a constantly good technician who was able to offer a constant level of performance every day? Probably the last one will not shine the way “the talent” did in one of his “good days”, but at least he will not be a disappointment the way “the genius” could easily be in one of his “bad days”. Using an old but famous rhetorical technique, 22 in the beginning of the discussion the orator pretended that he highly appreciated the “sparkling diamond”, the “talent”. But, after raising some questions in a Socratic manner, we get straight his real opinion: Diderot’s orator prefers the “technician”, the rational actor one can rely on every day. All the argumentation is rational: the actor needs to deliver constantly a good show, and to think, to use his rationality (instead of his emotions). The irrational actor is wonderful, but wrong, talented, but unreliable. The fact that the reader was trapped into believing that the first choice (“the talent”) was the best makes the discourse funny - a turn of the situation typical for Standup. Sade uses a similar rhetorical technique. The narrator of Justine seems to constantly praise and pity the virtuous heroine. He seems to be on the side of naïve religious Justine and totally disapprove her perverted sister Juliette, who turned the fate in her favor without any kind of hesitations or regrets. From the beginning to the end of the novel, Sade pretends to be on Justine’s side (as if he, the author, should not be the one that actually decides her fate) - and that’s ironic. He complains that the injustice comes too far, even if he is the one that commands it. He even declines any kind of responsibility: God wants things to happen that way. God wanted that. God wanted that, repeatedly - meaning that God is unjust. From the beginning to the end, the Virtue is punished. All the ten virtues are humiliated and punished, one by one. If in the beginning the reader is surprised of the facts and consequences, in the end there is no more surprise: it seems “natural” that things go so wrong. In a subtle humorous way Sade makes the reader give up any kind of hope of the Justice of God. Absolutely all the characters Justine meets are perverts, criminals,

22 The famous Socratic method of encouraging the opponent and then taking him by surprise can be easily detected - similarly to Mark Anthony’s Shakespearean discourse at Julius Caesar’s funeral (“I came to bury Caesar, not to praise him…”). In the Paradox case, the “irrational” type of actor is praised in the beginning in order to be demolished later.

THEATRICAL COLLOQUIA thieves and/or liars. She tries hard to stop each crime she finds out about, but she doesn’t succeed. Even more, she will be the one condemned, instead of the real criminals. If the effect obtained by Sade from the readers of Justine is, in the beginning, the surprise and indignation, or the expectations that things will turn well and the justice will be done, none still expects this in the end. The readers’ indignation is transformed subtly into amusement and also detachment from Justine’s unfortunate destiny. The poor “Sophia”23 seems to be terribly silly. She didn’t learn anything from her experiences with people. The reader sees her falling from one trap to another and, in the end, his initial sympathy is transformed into a subtle mockery. She seems to get what she deserves. There is another “sadistic” irony of the author: when Sophia tells the story of her life, every time when she describes the women-victims, she insists on their physical beauty very detailed. Sade makes Justine describe women in that eroticized way in order to express ironically that the poor girl is a lesbian in her heart, even if she doesn’t know it. And the fact that she doesn’t know it makes her so funny. She is punished by Sade for being so far from wisdom, for NOT being Sophia, for not thinking, judging and rationalizing the things that happened to her. These two Enlightenment works are quite different in form (dialogue versus novel), but the ideas expressed have a lot in common. In both cases, there are presented two antithetic models: the rational one, illustrative for the newborn Enlightenment philosophy, and the other one belonging to the darkness and traditionalism. In the first case the human being is the one that decides/makes things happen for himself/herself and he/she uses all the abilities and the techniques of persuasion for this purpose. In the second situation (Justine), the miracle is expected and, if it comes, it comes whenever it wants (just like “the good days” of the “talented” actor of Diderot). Or, the miracle does not come at all (in Justine’s case). Both the “natural talent” and the religious fervor are characterized by the lack of rationality and choice. The human being accepts, full of resignation, the good miraculous things to take

23 Justine has to change her name and she chooses Sophia - which is another cruel irony from Sade, who calls “Wisdom” a character that seems to not learn anything from her experiences and to be terribly far away from wisdom.

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THEATRICAL COLLOQUIA place only if God or Fate decide it’s time. The irony of Fate or God: “God is a comedian whose audience is too afraid to laugh.”24 Just like at Standup shows, the audience of Sade feels the irony, but might be afraid to laugh, and that is perhaps why the humor of Sade has not been studied yet. While in Sade’s Justine there are presented two antithetic types of women, Diderot describes two opposite types of actors. There is a strong connection between the status of women in society and the one of the actor on the stage. The actors play for the audience during the show. In a very similar way, women are “performing” in life for men. There is a whole feminist literature about the woman as the subject of the male gaze, subject which has to be victimized, marginalized or killed in order to get rid of the fear of “the female other”. In Sade, the subject is his contemporary women’s condition. The victims are mostly women: the mother of marquis de Bressac (whose son plans and then succeeds to kill her), the young girls which come to monastery in order to become nuns and, instead, they are transformed into monks’ whores, the mistresses of Dalville (who are humiliated having to do the work of slaves and constantly raped) and, of course, Justine herself. Women are victims, but also performers of a show destined to mankind as audience. They have to satisfy the male taste for cruelty, violence, rape, humiliation and finally murder. They have to be able to perform terrible tasks it in order to survive in a male dominated world. Just like in Diderot, in Justine are presented two types of “female-actors”: Justine represents the first type, Juliette is the second. Justine is representative for all the other female-victims who are praying and waiting for a miracle. Finally, after more than ten years of suffering, she has a “good day” (just like the talented actor of Diderot) when a miracle happens: she meets her lucky sister Juliette (who is a great Diderotian technical performer for a male audience). But the miracle doesn’t last too long for her: Justine will “accidentally” die being burned by a thunder. Here comes the moment when the audience is supposed to laugh, but might be afraid to do so. In conclusion, the subjects of the two writings, the actor in Diderot and the woman in Sade, have in common the male gaze focused upon themselves.

24 H. L. Mencken, The Book of Burlesques, New York, Alfred A. Knopf, 1920.

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The woman and the actor have to perform in and for a patriarchal society (both speakers from Diderot’s dialogue are males). And, in both cases, Sade and Diderot are proposing, in each of their personal philosophical manner, a strategy of survival. The two authors have different philosophies and, of course, they were received differently, both being well-known controversial figures of the Age of Enlightenment. The two works in prose differ, in their form and their content, as much as their authors do, but they still have in common a rational and ironic strategy. Another important common feature is the antithetical approach: the rational model preferred by each author is presented in opposition with the irrational one. Also similar types of persuasion organize the authorial rhetorical discourse, in both cases: following the Socratic tradition, both authors are pretending, in the beginning, to be on their opponent’s side. The difference is that Sade openly pretends to praise the opposite vision (the traditional Christian irrationality) till the end of Justine, while Diderot choses to be more subtle.

4. Standup Reason / Reasons

Now that we’ve seen what are the Enlightenment arguments, let us move back to Standup Comedy and see how they apply. What Standup does is that “it puts a person on display in front of an audience, whether that person is a comic character or an exaggerated version of the performer’s own self,”25 with the purpose of making that audience laugh. Even if the comedy is personal (and, in most cases, it is), it still is detached. Self-irony, making fun of the performer’s self is obviously a rational process. The Standup actor is present in the moment and communicates directly with the audience, while being rational. Going further, even if some heckers from the audience attack him / her, the Standup Actor needs to keep being detached and rational (instead of sensitive and embarrassed) in order to succeed and master the situation, otherwise the situation might get out of control. The visual sign of Standup is the microphone on the stand. As Jim Jefferies shows in one of his famous routines26 about visiting Mariah Carey

25 Double, 23. 26 Jim Jefferies, This is me now, Netflix, 2018.

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THEATRICAL COLLOQUIA and performing for her boyfriend anniversary, the only thing that visually makes him a Standupper, the only visible difference between himself and a crazy person who accidentally comes by and starts shouting nasty things to a gathering of people is that microphone. Returning to the main idea of this article, the microphone is the visual sign of reason and rationality. The microphone is the symbol of detachment, by which the actor masters the audience. A hierarchic sign, as well: the one who holds it is king. In fact, the audience can see it all the time, and every moment they are reminded that they chose to come to a Standup comedy show, a possibly politically incorrect show, and that’s the convention, so they should not be offended by the jokes. Since they are there, the common sense rules can be dropped for a short amount of time; in fact, they even paid for it.

Conclusions

The two iconic Enlightenment examples focused on acting (Diderot’s The Actor’s Paradox) and on gender issues (Sade’s Justine) suggest, in a comparative multidisciplinary manner, that Enlightenment philosophy can be considered as possible roots for Standup Comedy. Its more or less subtle irony and humour not only that can be later found in Standup, but it is essential for it. The Standup Comedian is the most rational and detached type of actor, the actor Diderot would rely on anytime. And, most importantly, the Age of Reason audience was not afraid to laugh at God’s jokes, just like today the public should not be afraid to laugh because of political correctness, if they came to a Standup show.

Bibliography: Allen, Steve, Funny Men. New York, Simon and Schuster, 1956 Allen, Steve, Funny People. New York, Stein and Day, 1981 Allen, Steve, More Funny People. New York, Stein and Day, 1982 Berger, Phil, The Last Laugh. New York, Morrow, 1975 Diderot, Denis, The Paradox of the actor (annotated): Le paradoxe sur le comédien (Humanities Collections Book 21), London, Kim Doyle, 2014

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Double, Oliver, Getting the Joke, the Inner Workings of Standup Comedy, Bloomsbury Methuen Drama, London, 2014 Franklin, Joe, Encyclopaedia of Comedians. Secaucus, New Jersey, Citadel Press, 1972 Mencken, H. L., The Book of Burlesques. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1920. Mintz, Lawrence E. “Standup Comedy as Social and Cultural Mediation”. American Quarterly, Vol.37, No.1. Special Issue: American Humour. The John Hopkins University Press, Spring 1985 Rutter, Jason, Stand-Up as Interaction: Performance and Audience in Comedy Venues. Doctoral Thesis, University of Salford, Institute for Social Research, September 1997 Sade, Marquis de, Justine, or the Misfortunes of Virtue. Oxford World's Classics Collection, 1st Edition, translated by John Phillips, Create Space Publishing Platform, 2015 Schwartz, Janine, Linguistic Aspects of Verbal Humour in stand-up comedy. Doctoral Thesis, 2010 Woodroff, Paul, “The Paradox of Comedy.” Philosophical Topics. vol. 25, no. 1, 1997.

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