
Funny Bones on Comedy
Joan: “You makin’ fun of me?”
Christina: “I was just playacting, Mommie, the way you’re always doing.”
Joan: “PLAYing!?”
—Mommie Dearest
What is funny? What isn’t funny? In my last solo performance I entered a giant space at Mass MoCA surrounded by Marc Swanson’s haunting sculptural works. I was wearing a huge black vintage Todd Oldham coat that was created to look like a grand piano cover and four-inch nude Margiela heels. Clutching the coat in one hand and a microphone in the other, I went up to each audience member, looked them in the eyes, and said: “You are going to die.” Some people laughed. Some didn’t.
I didn’t know what they were thinking. I also know that they weren’t entirely sure what they were thinking either. We can never be entirely sure. About anything. We aren’t a book; we are a library with many titles jockeying for our attention. We contain multitudes, as Whitman said. Or, from a Freudian perspective, we are always doing at least two things. As a trauma survivor, I would say at least 30. And who isn’t traumatized at this point?

Non-Consensual reality is the seat of trauma, and we are in a wildly stark moment of it. The sociological polarities are obvious. How could society not be in a state of psychotic rage when the common denominator of our very existence is denied—which is that we are all going to die. I don’t know how you will, but I know that you will. It’s the only thing I can say with certainty about you. Yet, this fact remains untended and uncared for. It is not held in any way, or honored, or respected. We have had no public mourning, no daily recognition, for how many people died in the crisis of Covid. Instead, there seems to be this hysterical rush forward in our fantasy “economy”—a great joke on the 99 percent, with the rich having only gotten richer during the pandemic. There is a strange hum of dread that is not going away. Something is right behind us and, like the lead in a horror movie, we are afraid to turn around and look.

Fear is a great controller. Keeping us in fear makes sure we are slightly off center while also hardening into our most accessible viewpoints. From our stations we fight against our opponent. As this societal war carries on, those in power sip cocktails in their towers, knowing those on the ground are too busy to look up.
“DE-pressing, in’it?” Jack says à la Bette Davis.
So now what? What would be the opposing action in a culture of hardened ideas and sociopathic egoism? Playing would be a good place to start. We can’t expect people to know how to grieve when there is nothing culturally to support it. When grief itself is such a vulnerable position, and when being vulnerable feels far too dangerous in such a dangerous time. Grief requires space. There must be space to breathe, to cry.
This is where humor steps in. Humor is the arrow that pops the balloon called “Certainty.”

Certainty is something we long for without realizing it’s a bear trap. As we try to gain full control, Life will have its way with us. I would say most of us can’t handle the truth that everything is actually out of control. Even in this post-pandemic-pandemic, we are still clinging to some hope that control can be gained. Our entire lives have changed, but we want to believe we still know how the story goes. Yet, we’ve seen what we have seen, and we can’t unsee it. The ringing bell echoes, sending a chill through us, and we aren’t sure which way to turn. And we become desperate to know.
Terror is a tight room, but humor punches holes in the walls. Trying to keep our bases covered, we can take bets on worst-case scenarios. And then those don’t happen. And maybe our hopes don’t happen either. But something else happens. And it’s funny.
If you have a sense of humor.
Comedy is frequently derided as silly, easy, lacking in importance. However, I’ve been asked to teach courses on comedy and have refused because it’s too hard to teach. With having a sense of humor, you either have it, or you need therapy. It makes sense to me that comedy would be derided. Being able to use comedy means you can understand life beyond your own personal context. Like anything, there is bad comedy. To get that out of the way, I’ll define that simply as lacking specificity. Poetry, in contrast, is not vague.
This is why the funniest people I have ever met can also hold the most sorrow. They are able to contain the wild spectrum of feelings this unpredictable life can bring inside their fragile mortal body. As I steer this discussion more toward performance, the greatest comedic performers and/or performers who can use comedy with the highest skill are also capable of being the greatest tragedians. I remember asking an actress I was working with, who is typecast in comedic roles, which role she would most like to play. “Phaedra,” she answered. She would be absolutely perfect in that role. I have too much to say about typecasting and its ignorant, isolating function in “The Arts.” Quickly, typecasting is tied to money and the old adage: When art walks in, money walks out. Safe bets.
With the spectrum of feelings these masterful performers have, they are able to touch on each string or strum, many at once. The notes are clear and resonate through us. We laugh unexpectedly, and it's a relief. As much as prediction failure is a pleasure, it enables greater space in our psyches.

I take my work seriously, but it is a real problem if I start taking myself too seriously. Self-seriousness and self-importance lack the flexibility of thought to think and create new visions. The most dreadful artists, thinkers, politicians, and people in general are those who are ferociously self-important. Everyone wants to be important. Everyone wants to be taken seriously. It requires a hearty ego to suffer the ego death of not feeling seen. With that ego-death feeling so close to one’s own mortality, there can be a hand-over-fist climb to the top of the mountain of “I.” It feels so righteous from this empirical view.
Humor is down in the valley, eating grapes by a stream, laughing at us for that ridiculous climb. Humor is able to destabilize the singularity fascism requires. Power doesn’t need power; it needs subjects.

As a queer person who grew up very bullied, I also understand that people don’t want to be ridiculed—even if they are being ridiculous. Which is why being specific is so important. What do I mean by being specific? Not taking oneself out of the equation. Inhabiting it while indicting it. Don’t show me the thing, be the thing. Understand you, yes you, are part of the problem. We are all part of the problem, which is what makes us all part of the solution. When weaponized well, humor can make light of our problems while shedding light on them. Lightening our load makes us more nimble. In this capitalist survival horror game, at each turn in the maze is another tactic to scare us into submission. We aren’t all powerful, but neither are those who are pretending to be. Without subjects, there are no kings.

But what about me? I’m a Queen! Yes, yes! The Queen of the World. And it’s an honor, a total honor, to be seen by The Academy for my work as a storyteller. Ever since I was a little boy or a little girl, I knew that I wanted to be a storyteller so that people wouldn’t feel as lonely as I did. God, I was so alone. You have no idea how lonely I was. I had to do everything myself. Do you know how hard that is for a baby! Oh Momma, if you only knew what I’ve done to make you love me! But here I am now, the Queen of the World, accepting my Oscar, and I can’t wait to celebrate with my friends, who not only support me but who are also in my income bracket and so I don’t have to pay for everything all the time. I can’t tell you how exhausting that feeling is—of always paying. My friends have always said to me: “You know, you give and you give, and you are going to burn out. You are going to kill yourself being so generous!” And I don’t want to kill myself. Not yet anyway! Not after winning this award, which means I’m likely to win more awards. I’m not doing this for the awards! But it does feel nice to be seen. That’s all I’ve ever asked for: to be seen. And loved. Really loved. Love which is demonstrated, not just spoken. I don’t need any more people screeching: I LOVE YOU.
As if! If they did then I wouldn’t have to be doing everything alone all the time! They would, like, help me get my tax receipts together and stuff. Love is shown through actions. Like this award!
Humor can be shocking. A surprise. Mystery and humor: these are two qualities I work with and I admire most in Art and in Life. They are always a relief. Again, to be reminded that we don’t know everything—and we never will.▪︎

Jack Ferver is a New York based writer, choreographer, and director. Their genre defying performances, which have been called “so extreme that they sometimes look and feel like exorcisms” (The New Yorker), explore the tragicomedy of the human psyche. Ferver’s “darkly humorous” (The New York Times) works interrogate and indict an array of psychological and socio-political issues, particularly in the realms of sexual orientation, gender, and power struggles. Their visionary direction blurs boundaries between fantastic theatrics and stark naturalism, character and self, humor and horror.
Watch their newest collaboration with Jeremy Jacob here.