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  At dead center, of course, is the seductive pleasure of animation. There is just something about 'toons that is nonthreatening and invites us all to be kids again. Add to this that the kind of animation is "line animation," using cartoonish, broadly done figures and scenes as opposed to the lush detailed work of Disney, which was often, as in the case of Snow White, rotoscoped (a process of using a live model on film and then drawing from the film version). A lot of the humor, of course, is the 'toonish exaggeration of the characters, making them more caricatures than fully developed characters.

  In terms of comedy, we should note how broad a path Groening and team cut across the landscape of humor. Remember our delineation of the comic spectrum in the introduction. We explored comedy in terms of the following:

  The Simpsons chalks up all of the above except for comic drama and perhaps romantic comedy, which is drained of real non-comic emotion on the show.

  Take the sneaky level of parody and satire, for instance. The Simpsons is a kind of ludic encyclopedia of winks to those in the know about movies, music, books, headlines and other television and media events. Start with the titles of many of the episodes, which immediately blend satire and parody: "Homer Alone," "Lisa the Greek," "Mr. Lisa Goes to Washington" or "A Streetcar Named Marge." For adults especially (how many of us laugh when our children don't and then have to explain each Simpsons gag or allusion that they missed?), these gag/ allusions pepper each episode.

  Our chosen episode is an early one, "There's No Disgrace Like Home," written by veteran Simpsons writers Al Jean and Michael Reiss (labeled First Draft, May io, 1989, and aired January 28, 1990). The scene near the end in Dr. Monroe's family therapy laboratory is described in the script as looking like a scene from Kubrick's Clockwork Orange, while an early shot in which the Simpsons approach Mr. Burns's mansion for the annual company picnic has us (the camera) going through the iron fence and past a NO TRESPASSING sign as we pan up to the mansion on the hill in exact imitation of the opening of Welles's Citizen Kane.

  How else does the show reward paying attention? As Groening comments, even the background signs become "throwaway" gags that add much to the comic texture and density of the show. In Groening's excellent book, The Simpsons: A Complete Guide to Our Favorite Family (1997), the Simpson fan is given a key to such intentional playful trivia. We learn that various episodes have had signs such as PUPPIES FOR FREE OR BEST OFFER; WE CRAM FUN DOWN YOUR THROAT (at Wall E. Weasel's Pizzeria/Arcade); and COME FOR THE FUNERALS, STAY FOR THE PIE (at the Springfield Cemetery). In short, the strong anarchistic bent of the show absolutely suggests that, as we have often noted about pure comedy, nothing is sacred, as religion, minorities, races, politicians (remember when George Bush moved to town?), marriage, sex and even motherhood are called into playful question. In the carnivalesque world of the Simpson family, everything and anything in American culture is fair game for the show.

  Start with the family itself: in the sitcom tradition, each member is a strong individual, and taken together they form a unit that agrees to disagree each week over the situation at hand. In this sense the show supports the idea that in an age of increasing divorce and single-parent households, sitcoms reinforce the notion of a nuclear family. But even though Homer wants to believe they are a "normal" family, the whole decade of The Simpsons celebrates if not a dysfunctional group, at least the nuttiest family in the history of sitcom.

  Homer J. Simpson, age 36, over 250 pounds, works at a nuclear power plant, is best known for saying, "D'oh!" when mad and "Mmmmm" when happy, and struggles to survive as a father and husband in a zany household. He is more buffoon than ironic figure, more victim than instigator.

  Marge Simpson, 34, beehive blue hairdo, is the mother and wife who somehow holds the family together, listens to Tom Jones's music, cooks marshmallow squares, has webbed feet and has in the past been convicted of shoplifting.

  Bart Simpson, age io, is a hell-raiser, trickster and practical joker who once sold his soul for five dollars and destroyed Australia's ecosystem with a single bullfrog.

  Lisa Simpson, age 8, is the brain and moral center of the family. Her first word as a baby was "Bart!" and she loves to play the saxophone in the style of Bleeding Gums Murphy.

  Maggie Simpson, age one, sucks constantly on a pacifier and gets put through the supermarket price scanner (she's worth $847).

  Put them together and commedia dell'arte meets vaudeville plus one standup line after another.

  "There's No Disgrace Like Home" Up Close

  When will I learn? The answers to life's problems aren't at the bottom of a bottle. They're on TV!

  Homer Simpson

  This early episode concerns the Simpsons attending the annual company picnic given by Mr. Burns at his estate. Of course everything goes wrong: Bart makes a nuisance of himself, especially when he almost beats Mr. Burns in the sack race, and Marge gets quite drunk with the wives. This leads Homer to Moe's Bar to drown his sorrows about what a mess his family has become. But in the midst of his self-pity, he sees a television ad for Dr. Marvin Monroe's Family Therapy Center, and after hocking the family television set at the local pawn shop, he drags his reluctant family into therapy. The comic plot is thus central character with a difficult task or quest. Not only do the Simpsons prove incurable, however; they drive Dr. Monroe so crazy by show's end that he gives them double their money back. Thus two more comic plots have kicked in: a parody and burlesque of family therapy and reductio ad absurdum as the therapy becomes a carnival of destruction. Fade out with a happy ending: the Simpsons leave as a family in harmony at last, now that they have enough money for frosty chocolate milkshakes and their television. Lisa's take? "It's not the money as much as the feeling that we earned it."

  Structure: Three acts, twenty-eight scenes. Act One is Mr. Burns's party; Act Two deals with the Simpsons spying on other families to see what they are like and contains the longest scene in the episode, the Moe's Bar sequence (seven-and-ahalf pages); and Act Three is the attempted therapy at Dr. Monroe's office and lab.

  Comic climate and comic density: The Simpsons is, as always, wildly inventive, extremely packed with sneaky (and we could say "cheeky"!) comic details that create a climate that ranges from pure farce to hilarious satire and parody. The major object of satire and parody in this episode? Family therapy! The gang on the writing staff at The Simpsons often takes swipes at psychotherapeutic jargon and trendy self-improvement movements, and this is one of the first (if not the first) episodes to do so.

  Let's use Seinfeld as a comparison here. While both shows are dense in terms of being full of jokes and multiple stories, The Simpsons is less verbally (read: joke) centered than Seinfeld, as one can immediately see from the page lengths: seventyone pages for Seinfeld, fifty-two for The Simpsons. But note that part of the "brevity" of the Simpsons script has to do with how totally cinematic it is, making more use of visuals and montage editing effects than Seinfeld. The final Clockwork Orange family therapy electro-shock scene in Dr. Monroe's lab, for instance, is complete slapstick farce on a visual and sound level, thus requiring a lot less script space than a series of jokes:

  INT. LABORATORY- CONTINUOUS: The Simpsons are now zapping each other with wild abandon-at least three of them are being electrified at any one time. The room is full of smoke.

  On-screen such a brushstroke description becomes a hilariously worked-out scene, as each in turn zaps the others, acting out their aggressions in an orgy of catharsis.

  Four Elements of Vintage Simpsons Writing to Admire

  1. Sharp nutty dialogue. The opening scene sets the tone and theme of the whole episode. Lisa and Bart are fighting as usual. But why?

  HOMER: Hey! What's the problem here?

  Lisa: We were fighting over which one of us loves you more. Homer sniffles. There is a tear in his eye.

  HOMER: Go ahead. Some things are worth dying for. The fight starts again, with the same cloud formation.

  BART: You love him more!

 
LISA: No, you do!

  The writing team for The Simpsons-Al Jean and Michael Reiss in this episodedelights in raiding all of American humor for its material, and this fighting over love reworks a classic W. C. Fields routine, in which he is about to hit his son at the breakfast table when the boy claims W. C. doesn't love him. Fields, his arm raised: "No child of mine is gonna get away with saying I don't love him."

  Whether this Simpsons episode is consciously beginning with a Fields routine is not the point. I am simply reiterating the fun the writers are having, working in a rich comic tradition that includes everything from vaudeville and silent comedy to old TV shows and movies. More importantly, the opening sets up the comic tension between family-that is, love-and violence. And the dialogue is wonderfully upside down, reversing our expectations: each feels the other loves him more.

  2. Numerous details in the script for the animators that may or may not "appear" on-screen. At the party, Mr. Burns (called Mr. Meaney in this early script) is described as "a doddering, dignified Reagan type" (5). That is, in fact, how he looks, and yet not everyone will "get" the Reagan note.

  3. Carnivalesque moments that allow characters to act out of character. In this episode it's a howl to watch Marge get drunk and start singing:

  Marge continues to drink with the other women. They are all singing.

  MARGE: (singing) Here we sit, enjoying the shade.

  OTHER WOMEN: (singing) Hey, brother, pour the wine!

  MARGE: (singing) Drink the drink that I have made.

  OTHER WOMEN: (singing) Hey, brother, pour the wine!

  And while on the one hand this is a comic moment in and of itself, it fits into the general theme of the Simpsons being a dysfunctional family.

  4. Finally, the episode portrays the Simpsons as being as dysfunctional as can possibly be imagined, only to bring them all together again by the closing. Homer sets the tone for act 2 when he calls a family meeting in the living room-that center of all family sitcoms, but also the room in which the Simpsons watch ... television. Homer announces there is not enough love in their family. They have already disgraced themselves at Mr. Burns's party. What follows is the parody of family therapy at Dr. Monroe's clinic as they electrocute and zap each other. But a happy family ending follows, as Monroe doubles the refund, and they leave not only pleased that they will be able to repurchase their television set, but looking forward to the chocolate milkshakes Homer offers to buy everyone.

  Earlier on, however, perhaps the key line of this family sitcom is uttered by Lisa: "The sad truth is all families are like us."

  Comedy resolves the contradictions and rights the balance by showing us our failings, and if we consider them failings, we recognize higher standards.

  Harry Levin

  Humor hasn't the time to be hypocritical, it hasn't the patience to be polite, it hasn't the tolerance to be timid.

  Sol Saks

  Let's start writing comedy.

  But take seriously the basic pitch of the book: allow yourself the pleasure and freedom to be a clown or to fool yourself. Don't try to second-guess the market, audiences or producers. One film to watch before jumping in? Very hard choice, but what the hell, if you haven't seen it, invite over some of your friends, open a good bottle of wine and rent a South African comedy: The Gods Must Be Crazy (i98i). After you've seen it, ask yourself this: what Hollywood producer would ever fund a film that would have to be described as a story about a Coke bottle that falls out of a plane over Africa and lands in a tribal village that has never tasted the drink of the twentieth century? Take it from there.

  Getting Started

  Why fifteen weeks for a feature comedy? Simple. That is the length of the average American college semester. This chapter presents a comfortable pace for students to get through a term without anxiety attacks and with, finally, a complete script of which they can be proud. Your pace depends, of course, on your own frame of mind and time commitments. Some may find they can do a feature script in a month, and others may need a year. Fifteen weeks is only a convenient starting point that can be adjusted to please your own particular needs.

  Writing a feature-length comedy brings up all of the issues of writing any feature screenplay. You must necessarily tackle the intertwining of story, character, structure, pacing, genre, texture, subplots and minor characters with theme and atmosphere. And whatever screenwriting skills you have acquired on your own, or through courses or the bookcases full of screenwriting books, should serve you in comedy as well. I refer you to my previous book for more on the basics of screenwriting, including format: Writing the Character-Centered Screenplay (University of California Press).

  Our particular mission, however, is to focus on comedy and the capturing and developing of the comic spirit in your script.

  Good luck, enjoy the journey, and here goes!

  Week 1: Comic Explorations

  Use this opening week to begin to explore comedy more fully. Read this text, and follow some of the suggestions in chapter 2, Exercises to Nurture the Comic Muse. Also make a commitment to watch two or three feature comedies you haven't seen or haven't watched in years that are mentioned in the text or in appendix I each week. That's right. This should be an ongoing assignment, to keep that comic stimulation going as you work on your own project.

  ASSIGNMENT:

  1. Complete the comic self-portrait called for in chapter 2.

  2. Get hold of at least two screenplays for films mentioned in this text and read them carefully, with an eye to all of the issues discussed in this text. If a script is not published in book form-as are Preston Sturges's scripts, for instance, and Fargo, Smoke and Kolya-you can purchase a photocopy of any American script by contacting Script City at (800) 676-2522.

  3. Start a comic journal in which you brainstorm ideas and jot down observations, lines of dialogue heard and reactions to comedies seen or read.

  Week 2: Humorous Brainstorming, or Three Ideas Are Better than One

  Use this week to begin to brainstorm on a comic concept, but do not narrow your ideas down to the one you think you will do. Surprise yourself and keep your options open, exploring more fully and winding up the week with at least three ideas.

  Where do comic feature film ideas come from? Everywhere. Just look at the films discussed in this text. But consider the following sources:

  1. Your life and that of those around you.

  2. True life stories from the news, journals and television. We explored this one in chapter 2. Keeping a file of stories from the paper or news is definitely worthwhile.

  3. History. Buster Keaton's The General (1927) features great gags involving trains and chases, but the actual story was based on a historical event during the Civil War. Humor and history cross paths and illuminate each other. Another example from appendix 1 would be George Roy Hill's Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, from William Goldman's script. Goldman did his homework and became fascinated with these two fellows from New Jersey who wound up out West and then disappeared in South America (Horton, The Films of George Roy Hill, 124).

  4. Adaptations, remakes and spinoffs. In this area you are counting on an "original" source in another creative work that you can inject your humor and imagination into to make it yours. This can be a rich area, especially for beginners, for you do not have to come up with everything and yet the opportunities for true creativity are there.

  5. An imaginative cross-fertilization of several of the above.

  ASSIGNMENT:

  Building on the suggestions in chapter 2, make sure you have either a comic "partner" who will prove supportive in devoting time to you both for brainstorming and for reacting to your writing. Spend an evening over a tasty meal or an afternoon with a full coffee pot, brainstorming comic ideas. Even better, if you develop a comic story circle, devote one session to you and ideas you are thinking about. Draw up three comic possibilities on the following scale: a "safe" comic idea, a slightly outrageous idea, and a third one that is really out there. W
here are the boundaries? Only you know for sure, and that is all that matters. For instance, we could say Dumb and Dumber is very safe because it simply goes for pure farce. Clueless is more daring because it takes a chance on adapting a British classic in a hip California mode and tone (not to mention accent!). And The Full Monty and There's Something about Mary (1998) are very much over the edge.

  On Creating Truly Zany Script Ideas

  Most of us play it too safe most of the time. For at least one of your ideas, allow yourself the freedom to follow outrageous ideas for the fun of it. How will you know how humorous you can be unless you are in the playful realm of experimentation.

  I give you one clear example. My friend and colleague Srdjan Karanovic of Yugoslavia, mentioned in chapter 2, began his feature career with a film called Social Games (1974). What was his concept? Simple: to write a script based on the responses to an ad placed in many Yugoslav newspapers: "Anyone who wishes to be in a feature film, please send in a photo, describe your occupation, and explain what role you wish to play in a film." He received more than four thousand letters. He and his writing partners and staff chose the one hundred they found most interesting and invited those hundred letter-writers to Belgrade for interviews.

  One person explained that he was a bricklayer from Zagreb and wished to be a detective like Humphrey Bogart. Another said he was a minor employee in his twenties who had hated his mother's lover since his father died and wished to murder him with a knife. And someone from the countryside explained that he had always wanted to be a messenger for Tito's Partisans fighting the Nazis during World War II but had been too young at the time.

  Once the interviews were completed, Karanovic wrote the script and used about thirty of the actual people he had interviewed to play themselves. He started his "documentary fairy tale" with each person facing the camera and explaining who they were, what they did and what role they wished to play. Then the film "begins" and they become the parts: a young man murders his mother's lover with a knife, a detective investigates the murder, a messenger in a Partisan uniform delivers messages throughout the film for no reason at all.