Comedy (drama)

A comedy is entertainment consisting of jokes and satire, intended to make an audience laugh. For ancient Greeks and Romans a comedy was a stage-play with a happy ending. In the Middle Ages, the term expanded to include narrative poems with happy endings and a lighter tone. In this sense Dante used the term in the title of his poem, La Divina Commedia.

The phenomena connected with laughter and that which provokes it has been carefully investigated by psychologists and agreed upon the predominating characteristics are incongruity or contrast in the object, and shock or emotional seizure on the part of the subject. It has also been held that the feeling of superiority is an essential factor: thus Thomas Hobbes speaks of laughter as a "sudden glory." Modern investigators have paid much attention to the origin both of laughter and of smiling, as well as the development of the "play instinct" and its emotional expression.

Much comedy contains variations on the elements of surprise, incongruity, conflict, repetitiveness, and the effect of opposite expectations, but there are many recognized genres of comedy. Satire and political satire use ironic comedy used to portray persons or social institutions as ridiculous or corrupt, thus alienating their audience from the object of humor.

Comedy-drama

Comedy-drama, occasionally known as dramedy (portmanteau of words drama and comedy), is a subgenre in contemporary forms of tragicomedy, especially in television, that combines elements of comedy and drama.

History

Early television

The advent of radio drama, cinema, and in particular television created greater pressure in marketing to clearly define a product as either comedy or drama. While in live theatre the difference became less and less significant, in mass media comedy and drama were clearly divided. Comedies were expected to keep a consistently light tone and not challenge the viewer by introducing more serious content.

By the early 1960s, television companies commonly presented half-hour-long "comedy" series or hour-long "dramas". Half-hour series were mostly restricted to situation comedy (sitcoms) or family comedy and were usually aired with either a live or overdubbed laugh track. One-hour dramas included such shows as police and detective series, westerns, science fiction, and serialized prime time soap operas.