A Comedy Doesn’t Always Have to Make You Laugh

The entertainment industry has something for everyone when it comes to music, television, and movies. But comedy has been a genre for these mediums for as long as I can remember. Every time I watch or listen to something that is put in the group comedy, I know I am going to laugh and make myself happy. Although, some things that are put in the comedy genre can also make me feel a wave of other emotions. Three specific things come into my mind when I think of a comedy that hasn’t made me feel joy. But has made feel things like sadness, fear, or anger. There is a musician, a television show, and a movie that are considered comedies that have made me feel something other than happiness.

Many people do not think of comedy as a genre of music, but there are musical comedians. Bo Burnham is a musician who performs comedic songs that I laugh at. But there are some songs that he has performed that have made me burst into tears. Bo Burnham has been performing musical comedy for years. but I didn’t know who he was until I heard him on Apple Music. A friend told me to listen to him, and I instantly loved what he had to say and sing about. The first few songs I listened to made me laugh hard, then I kept listening. In 2021 Burnham, put out a musical comedy show that he wrote, filmed, and edited 2020. I was expecting some joyfulness in the hard times most of us had during the COVID-19 pandemic. He did perform songs that made me laugh, but he also did some songs that hit a hard emotional core. This comedy was called INSIDE. The song that put me into tears was called All Eyes On Me. At its core, this song showed how the pandemic had a hard impact on Bo’s life and it’s okay to go through that. Below is that song (Explicit Warning).

Television has been a medium for many people who love entertainment. Comedy has been on the silver screen for many decades, and it will continue to dominate in the industry for years to come. A tv show that I have always loved in the comedy genre is Scrubs. This show ran for nine seasons, with the lead role as the talented Zach Braff. After season seven the show got canceled by NBC but was picked up for another season by ABC. Scrubs was a comedic look at doctors working in a hospital. It was kind of like a less serious version of Grey’s Anatomy. In my personal opinion, Scrubs is better than Grey’s Anatomy because it has a light-hearted take on what doctors go through as they work in a hospital and it wasn’t life-changing in every episode. Most people who have seen Scrubs usually laugh at what the characters go through, but there are some serious moments that the series tackles.

The episode of Scrubs I watched that made me feel something other than joy was called My Old Lady. It was the fourth episode of season one, so it was early on in the series. The episode had the realization that not everyone survives going to the hospital. It showed the three main characters go through the loss of their patients that they were residing over that episode. When I first watched this episode, I realized that life isn’t always going to work out in your favor. Some people die and sometimes it is hard to understand, as long as you know you tried to do everything you can to help. I never thought that a sitcom would make me feel these types of fear and loss.

In my opinion, music and television are fantastic, but movies are my favorite medium in the entertainment industry. Movies have always been my go-to activity when I have some free time on my hands. I have seen hundreds of movies and I have collected every movie ticket I have gone to go see since 2015. A comedy movie is something people usually watch with friends because laughing together makes it better. But, in my case, I will watch a comedy by myself. One movie that was put in the comedy genre that made me feel all types of other emotions is The Truman Show. The Truman Show is a movie that shows the main character staring at a tv show that was built around his whole life, but he doesn’t know it. Everyone around the world watches this show in the movie, and the man in the show thinks that his life is perfectly normal. Who else but Jim Carry could star in a movie that has this premise. No spoilers for this movie of course. But this movie made me feel like you can get out of something that you have been stuck in your whole life without even knowing you’re stuck. Below is the trailer for The Truman Show.

Now every time I watch or listen to something that is considered a comedy, I try to notice things that would have other emotions. Not everything is as it seems, including genres of music, television, and movies.