Comedy movies have all but vanished from theaters. Horror proves cheap, crowd-pleasing films can be huge hits, so why won’t Hollywood bet on comedy again?
I think the "legends" aspect is the most important. Horror works without major stars (hell, sometimes that makes it work more).
Every previous comedy "era" was driven by a star. The 90s was Jim Carrey and Adam Sandler in front of the camera, and people like the Farrelly brothers behind it. The 2000's was Will Ferrell and the Judd Apatow cohort. Obviously there are comedies that weren't fully star driven and a bunch that don't fall under that bracket, but generally speaking comedies were kept afloat by a few important people.
I think the issue, really, is that there has been a breakout comedy star in years, and I don't actually think the legends will be able to carry the torch. They've all aged out of their manic antics in different ways, or have made a string of disapointments.
But I do think Hollywood NEEDS to be searching for that new blood.
Jeff, I'm with you on everything you said in this piece. At least we're getting 24 Jump Street next year. I hope that will be a smashing success and show studios that audiences want comedies.
This is my mission! As someone who has worked primarily in the comedy space on my first two features, the second "That Friend," which is currently in final stages of distro, I'm happy being transparent that I think distributors have created a self fulfilling prophecy of, "comedies are hard to sell and so they're a big risk" as a means of devaluing the property and buying it for a bargain. Or that they are, "too small." As if every comedy needs to look and feel like a $35m Hangover budget to legitimize that it can be funny and/or watchable. This is what we're seeing. Whether they're conscious of this or not, I don't really know. But because the genre has so shifted to streamers, trying to make a comedy to please one's hypothetical algorithm has meant making unfunny movies that please no one (and make no one laugh). To your point, there's value in laughing together the way we would at a comedy show, but the streamer data argument that no one cares about comedy is what execs are pointing to, not that 40% of a theater going audience is now Gen-Z. Or when something like "One of them Days" explodes they get to call it a fluke rather than evidence that audiences are hungry to laugh together in the dark. One of our recent festival screenings for TF was oversold. People stood in the back of the theater for the entirety of the movie because they got to be part of the collective comedy experience and enjoyed it. In talking to them after the show, in talking to anyone after a screening, the feedback is always a resounding, "we need comedy now more than ever." While studios say, "comedy is an unsafe bet." There is a major disconnect from what studios think and what audiences think, and, shockingly, it can only be learned by testing well written comedies in the theater. The well written part, of course, the most difficult thing to get someone to believe in and trust. But I think people are ready for catharsis via comedy the way John Hughes, Mel Brooks, Monty Python, the Marx Brothers, and so many throughout history have provided.
I think the "legends" aspect is the most important. Horror works without major stars (hell, sometimes that makes it work more).
Every previous comedy "era" was driven by a star. The 90s was Jim Carrey and Adam Sandler in front of the camera, and people like the Farrelly brothers behind it. The 2000's was Will Ferrell and the Judd Apatow cohort. Obviously there are comedies that weren't fully star driven and a bunch that don't fall under that bracket, but generally speaking comedies were kept afloat by a few important people.
I think the issue, really, is that there has been a breakout comedy star in years, and I don't actually think the legends will be able to carry the torch. They've all aged out of their manic antics in different ways, or have made a string of disapointments.
But I do think Hollywood NEEDS to be searching for that new blood.
Jeff, I'm with you on everything you said in this piece. At least we're getting 24 Jump Street next year. I hope that will be a smashing success and show studios that audiences want comedies.
This is my mission! As someone who has worked primarily in the comedy space on my first two features, the second "That Friend," which is currently in final stages of distro, I'm happy being transparent that I think distributors have created a self fulfilling prophecy of, "comedies are hard to sell and so they're a big risk" as a means of devaluing the property and buying it for a bargain. Or that they are, "too small." As if every comedy needs to look and feel like a $35m Hangover budget to legitimize that it can be funny and/or watchable. This is what we're seeing. Whether they're conscious of this or not, I don't really know. But because the genre has so shifted to streamers, trying to make a comedy to please one's hypothetical algorithm has meant making unfunny movies that please no one (and make no one laugh). To your point, there's value in laughing together the way we would at a comedy show, but the streamer data argument that no one cares about comedy is what execs are pointing to, not that 40% of a theater going audience is now Gen-Z. Or when something like "One of them Days" explodes they get to call it a fluke rather than evidence that audiences are hungry to laugh together in the dark. One of our recent festival screenings for TF was oversold. People stood in the back of the theater for the entirety of the movie because they got to be part of the collective comedy experience and enjoyed it. In talking to them after the show, in talking to anyone after a screening, the feedback is always a resounding, "we need comedy now more than ever." While studios say, "comedy is an unsafe bet." There is a major disconnect from what studios think and what audiences think, and, shockingly, it can only be learned by testing well written comedies in the theater. The well written part, of course, the most difficult thing to get someone to believe in and trust. But I think people are ready for catharsis via comedy the way John Hughes, Mel Brooks, Monty Python, the Marx Brothers, and so many throughout history have provided.