Word: humorizing
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...upper-middle-class comedy alive long past its prime. In the precision of his diction, the seeming intimacy of his asides, and that dry cackle of a laugh, he was the movies' Johnny Carson. Surely no one devoted as much intelligent energy as Lemmon did to chic, Hollywood-style humor in its mature years. Out of his mouth came acerb insights fashioned by Billy Wilder (seven films), Blake Edwards (six) and Neil Simon (four). The list includes The Apartment, Operation Mad Ball, the Odd Couple--and the all-time funniest farce, Some Like It Hot, in which he and Tony...
...Central's The Daily Show, a blessed wedding of performer and format. Free of the burden of a full stand-up monologue, Stewart is able to put all his energy and wit into the news and guest spots. The word energy is almost too strong. Much of Stewart's humor seems to spring from an underlying terrain of world-weariness...
...more controversial selections. Just last month, The New Republic devoted 4,000 words to explain why he and fellow African-American comic Chris Tucker were "reactionary" and to decry Rock's "reliance upon minstrelsy and coon comedy." The criticism echoes a frequent complaint that Rock's politically incorrect humor gives cover to racists--most infamously his "Niggas vs. Black People" routine from the Bring the Pain HBO special that helped revive his career in 1996 after three years in the wilderness that followed his underutilized tenure on Saturday Night Live. As the heart of the bit went: "Every time black...
...blessed, from time to time, with a spontaneous generation of humor and insight. And nowhere is this more exciting than in the emergence or the reinvention of an art form. Ruth Draper did it onstage. She took a parlor turn, the monologue, and turned it into great American drama. Nichols and May took the traditions of the Jewish wedding jester, the commedia dell'arte and the vaudeville comic, and invented improvisational theater. And now here's Ira Glass, 42, who seems to have reinvented radio...
...saying, let him take over the FBI, it'll be great theater, and he'll run it into the ground in six months," says one former prosecutor who found Mueller overbearing. But his friends insist that behind his earnest demeanor, Mueller has the balance, wisdom and wry sense of humor to manage the task...