Document Type
Other
Publication Date
2024
Abstract
The comedy has always been an incredibly versatile genre: although it certainly contains rote story formulas meant to provide lighthearted entertainment, the comedy can also reveal interesting perspectives pertaining to darker underlying issues, allowing audiences to process these hypocrisies as from behind a screen of safety. Such is the case of the movies The King of Comedy (1982), Wag the Dog (1997), Bowfinger (1999), and Grand Budapest Hotel (2014), all of which can be classified as comedic escapades yet fail to conceal their corrupted underbellies from a prying viewer. The four films, despite occurring in wildly different worlds and containing unrelated plots, are linked through a singular common denominator: each movie’s characters are implicit in a successful façade, one that allows them to abandon basic moral principles in favor of the achievement of a material goal.
Publisher
South Dakota State University
Rights
Copyright © 2024 Abigail Muller
Recommended Citation
Muller, Abigail, "The Successful Façade: The Powers of Postmodernism within the Comedy" (2024). Schultz-Werth Award Papers. 69.
https://openprairie.sdstate.edu/schultz-werth/69