In her essay on jokes, Mary Douglas makes a comparison between Bergson’s and Freud’s theses on jokes and laughter, saying that for Bergson “the essence of the joke is that ‘something living’, natural nobility, triumphs over ‘something encrusted’, false imitation of breeding” (p. 96) and for Freud “the joke is an image of the relaxation of conscious control in favour of the subconscious” (p. 96): Bergson finds that the origin of comic forms comes from taking human life and making it mechanical, while Freud thinks that people often use humour to release energy and to circumvent social repression.
Reading what Douglas said about Bergson’s theory made me think of the film “The Truman Show” (1998, dir. Peter Weir), which narrates the story of Truman Burbank, a man whose life is broadcasted 24/7 through thousands of hidden cameras, but one day he discovers the truth (or should I say the “lie”?) about his existence: everyone, even his friends and his wife, are paid actors who know about this worldwide broadcasted soap opera, the so-called “The Truman Show”.
Truman’s life has always been a product of consumption and entertainment: it is almost like he became a puppet people can laugh at, “something mechanical encrusted on the living“, as Bergson would say. Truman repeats the same actions every single day: he wakes up, he goes to the bathroom, he waves at his neighbours, he goes to work and so on: his entire life is just a repetitive loop of mechanical gestures.
The scene where Truman gets out of his house and greets his neighbours may, for example, reveal this mechanism: it is like everyone knows what Truman is going to do and say because he became a sort of machine that repeats the same gestures and sentences every single day, as if he was playing a role himself without being aware of it.
I find this really interesting and I agree with your observations about Truman as puppet. However, the film does not stay funny, and takes a more sinister turn as Truman starts discovering the truth – I wonder whether it is the audience awareness or Truman’s self-awareness which triggers the tonal shift from funny to ominous?
Hi! I personally love the Truman show and I think your relating it to Bergson’s point about comedy coming from human life being made mechanical is a really interesting and applicable interpretation of the film. I feel like this could also be linked back to the Michael North reading from last week as he, similarly, draws a comparison between the repetitive nature of machinery and some comedic performances. Using this point to analyse the Truman show, I believe that Truman’s repeated daily actions amusing those who watch him confirms North’s argument, as the comedy here is seen through the mechanical repetition of his actions.
I find your description of Truman’s daily routine as “mechanical” to be quite interesting. What appears the most striking to me in this film is that Truman does not try to be funny: he does not repeat the same actions on purpose, he does it organically. I wonder if being raised and living in this artificial community somehow influenced the development of his daily routines.
It also made we think about Truman Show being a kind of a “comfort show” for its viewers, due to Truman’s very predictable behaviour and his never-changing personality.