That is the question. Or is it?
As writers of comedy, it may be surprising to learn that we don’t have to be hilariously funny all the time. Not only do we not have to be funny. We can introduce darker tones too. We can have sad scenes. In fact, comedy often benefits from variations in tone, since it bequeaths more depth and humanity, enriching the overall work. But how can we do this without confusing the reader and making them feel as if we have suddenly switched genres without warning?
As every experienced writer knows, genre is important, not just when we are pitching to agents and publishers, but for ourselves too. It can help us to figure out the kind of story we want to tell, enabling us to tell a story that feels consistent and coherent in both character and plot.
Genre is also part of the ‘contract’ we set up with the reader from our first line to our last. When a reader picks up a book that is described as ‘comedy’ they may not expect laugh-out-loud moments in every scene, but they will certainly expect to be chuckling or at the very least, smiling regularly throughout most of the story. In other words, they will expect a story containing humour. As writers it is our job to fulfil that expectation, to keep to our part of the bargain have made with the reader.
Yet we can all call to mind books or television series in which the humour temporarily fades a little to make way for a scene, for example, where there is a death, or where a character is diagnosed with a life-threatening illness.
In Sue Townsend’s later Adrian Mole series, Adrian Mole, The Prostrate Years, our protagonist is diagnosed with cancer. Even the title, punning as it does on ‘prostrate/prostate,’ indicates that there is humour to be found in a story that has darker elements, and yet the signature lively humour of the book prevails. The mood is lightened by Adrian’s childhood sweetheart, Pandora, visiting him in hospital when he is ill. What Townsend allows the reader to do, is to glimpse the sadness beneath the humour, creating a bittersweet feel and thereby blending comedy with melancholy.
Sadly, Sue Townsend died before completing the sequel, so we don’t find out what ultimately happens to Adrian. But throughout the novel humour is used as a way of the main character coping with the gravity of his situation, and as catharsis for the reader.
So that is one way of making humour work in sad or scary situations – playing on how in real life, we often make jokes about the things that frighten or hurt us in order to mitigate the fear, or as a panacea to the pain of loss.
In the comedy television series, Blackadder, the final episode, ‘Over the Top,’ depicts a scenario in which both Blackadder and Baldrick, lose their lives in the First World War, finishing as they emerge from the trenches and are immediately shot down by enemy fire.
The humour in this scene too, is still there, but softened by knowledge of what lies ahead, and of what the viewer knows is in store for them. The credits play out without the music, a sobering end to a sparklingly witty series.
Of course, the humour doesn’t have to fall away to allow the sadness to emerge. We can always use black humour, which can be cited as another coping mechanism in the face of dark times. We can laugh in the face of death, disaster, or misery because when we introduce these elements, we can rely on the reader to pick up on, for example, the sadness of a death, as we have all lost someone and understand how it feels.
What is important is how we set up the premise, and flag up early on in the story, any shifts in tone that will later occur. In Last Tango in Halifax, Sally Wainwright’s comedy television series, elderly couple, Celia and Alan were childhood sweethearts who meet again several decades later.
From the beginning, we get a sense of the time they wasted not finding each other sooner, and the sense of there not being much time left, as both are advanced in years, and when Alan has a heart attack that bittersweet tone is foregrounded.
Yet precisely because of that feeling of time running out, there is a gloriously devil-may-care quality to this story of two elderly people finding romance so late in their lives. This allows the humour in the story to flourish, to become an act of defiance.
In short, there is no hard and fast rule other than to make it clear as early on in the story as possible (the first three or four pages) that there may be dips in the humour, or tonal shifts. We can achieve this by fleeting references to a back story that has a tragic element, or hinting at plot points which are picked up later in the novel. We can also achieve this by introducing a character whose attitude to life is comedic, even in the face of death, and who may even make social gaffs by cracking jokes at inappropriate moments, such as at a funeral or bedside the hospital bed of a character whose is dying. These are all devices we can employ to keep the story from nose-diving into a different genre and flagging up to the reader that they are still reading an essentially humorous tale.
Contributed by Julia Wood
leicesterwritersclub.com 