>John R Groch <[log in to unmask]>wrote:
>Subject: Genealogy of "Horror-Comedy"
>
 
>1.  What defines a "horror-comedy"?
>
>2.  What is its genealogy?  When does it appear, and why?  If, as it
>seems, the sub-genre emerges in the early-to-mid-1980's, what is it about
>this period that gives rise to the mixing of the two genres (aside from
>the fact that the Reagan administration was at once horrific and comedic).
>
 
I've always pictured this genre in its current manifestation as starting up, as
you say, in the early 80's.  The first instances I recall were some of John
Sayles' nifty scripts, particularly The Howling, which nicely merged
tongue-in-cheek satire with straight ahead horror and special effects.
 
There have been earlier versions of horror/comedy.  While the Abbot and Costello
movies seem to me to be "just" Abbott and Costello movies with a then-topical
theme, I do recall being hugely entertained as a kid (early '60s) by The Raven,
an American International picture with the obligatory Vincent Price plus Peter
Lorre and others (Lorre creeping about in the standard-issue spider-infested
castle: "kind of hard to keep it clean, huh?")
 
To me, this was the first instance of a movie that seemed to be informed by the
comedic conventions of Mad Magazine, and thus was irresistible to an early teen
of the era dying for a style of comedy that transcended the Sam Levensons et.
al. that I saw weekly on Ed Sullivan.
 
In fact I  think there is a tie between the Raven/Mad Magazine approach, the
Howling on through Reanimator and Evil Dead.  So, far from laying the blame, as
people so often do, on old man Reagan (who, after all, exemplifies square
values), this brand of comedy is very much tailored to boomer tastes.  Reagan
always seemed to me to be saying "it's not too late to be authentic"; the boomer
style from Mad to Saturday Night Live to Letterman says "there's no reasonable
way to be authentic, so let's be sarcastic".
 
Jeff Apfel
 
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