Comedy for dummies

Cleese slates the state of the art

John Cleese has criticised the state of comedy, claiming that movies in particular have been dumbing down.

And he complained that humour was an art form that's often underestimated.

"Comedy's never taken seriously," he said. "I think you have to be very intelligent to realise how important it is."

He said there are possibly 15 perfect film comedies, including The Ladykillers, Dr. Strangelove and Some Like it Hot.

"It's probably harder to make really great comedies than really great dramas," he said.

Cleese acknowledged that there is "masses of talent" in comedy, but added: "I do see two things that worry me. I don't think there are many writers out there who are good at structure, and the Hollywood studios are aiming more specifically to younger audiences."

"Now if you have a set-up, the payoff is in the very next scene," he continued. "I see a general lessening of subtlety."

His comments came after he gave a lecture on WC Fields at New York's Cornell University, where he is a 'professor-at-large'.

Cleese said Fields had become neglected since his death in 1946, yet was a pioneer tackling subjects that might offend audiences, such as hitting children

"I think one of the great delights of comedy is when it gets into slightly dangerous fields," he said.

And he added that offending audiences often affected his own work, citing 1988's A Fish Called Wanda in which people didn't mind the murder of an old woman, but found the killing of a dog upsetting.

Cleese has recently been filming a role in Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle. "I don't really enjoy that very much," he told the campus newspaper Cornell Daily Sun.

"My career was based really on stuff I'd written myself. That supply of work more or less dried up."

Cornell Daily Sun article