Lisa Trahair outlines Freud’s understanding of jokes and how the unconscious plays a pivotal part in their production; specifically, in tendentious jokes. In his description of tendentious jokes, Freud asserts that “the pressure of the unconscious itself and the strength of antisocial impulses (aggressive, sexual, cynical, and skeptical) are credited with its production.” [1] Immediately I thought of Curb Your Enthusiasm, the show that follows Larry David as he lands himself in societal predicaments through his antisocial remarks and actions; whats more is that the show is mostly improvised, meaning the jokes and dialogue are thought of through the ‘spontaneity of the moment’. Below is a video diving deeper into why its better without a script and outlines a particular scene:
Now that the scene is outlined, here is the actual scene:
Off the bat there are a number of similarities between the production of a tendentious joke and the structure of this scene. First is the antisocial content: Jeff loudly exposing Larry’s purchase of porn in a public setting and the aggressive shouts exchanged by the two throughout serve the “aggressive” and “sexual” aspects of the antisocial impulses. Second is the fact that, although an outline was scripted for this scene, the jokes are all created on the spot. Whats even more impressive about this scene is that the hotel clerk is an actual employee at that hotel. She was not casted for the part nor given any directions other than to “do what you would normally do in this scenario”. This unscripted aspect not only serves to create a fluid dialogue that seems “life-like”, but it allows the actors to build upon each other and take the scenes to new levels that previously wouldn’t have been possible with a script. Although scripted shows still include some improv, they are much more limited in their options and direction of the jokes. Curb Your Enthusiasm on the other hand has almost limitless options for the direction of the jokes in the scene, and all because of the ‘unconsciousness’ of it.
[1] Lisa Trahair, The Comedy of Philosophy : Sense and Nonsense in Early Cinematic Slapstick (State University of New York Press, 2007), 117.