Dstark, you can’t return this book for a refund; it’s been in the restroom!
^ [Yeah, that’s right](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/GsC8sKIZjL4/hqdefault.jpg)
@LakeWashington, LOL!
I remember when Beta and VHS machines hit the market. My brother bought a vhs machine for $1,000. Thst was a lot of money. We would sit and watch the old comedies and comedians. Charlie Chaplan. Buster Keaton. The Marx Brothers. WC Fields. Soooo cool.
And years later I had kids and I thought…wow…we are going to watch the old comedies together.
Uhhhhh no.
My kids don’t want to watch Charlie Chaplan’s The Kid? Or City Lights? Buster Keaton’s The General? Duck Soup?
Duck Soup still holds up…maybe the Harpo scenes don’t. ( I still love Harpo). Otherwise Duck Soup is a classic.
But no…my kids aren’t interested.
I don’t think my kids care about Mel Brooks either.
When some famous comedian dies, somebody who is alive will say, “People will be watching the comedian’s movies forever”.
No. They won’t.
I hope people are still going to watch Fred Astaire and Gene Kelly over the next several decades. Fred Astaire is still amazing!
My kids won’t.
I watched The Comedians with cars and coffee episode with Mel Brooks and Carl Reiner. I found the episode enjoyable. My kids…no way.
I watched Jerry Seinfeld. He is 61 years old. My nephew looks just like Jerry Seinfeld which is bad for my nephew. My nephew is in his late 20’s.
Duck Soup still holds up…maybe the Harpo scenes don’t. ( I still love Harpo).*
D’s high school performed Duck Soup for their spring musical.
Another yr they did On the Twentieth Century, also hilarious. I think it’s currently on Broadway.
Dstark, my dad introduced me to Harold Lloyd.
Classic.
Duck Soup as a spring musical?
Was it good?
Harold Lloyd was great… Hanging from that clock!
My 20 year old DS is very interested in comedy , and is part of a professional improv troupe. He loves the Marx Brothers and Buster Keaton. I introduced him to the Smothers Brothers on YouTube, and he was impressed with them too. We bought him a Bob Newhart CD one Christmas.By now, he knows more about the old comedians than I do. I can even remember a report he did in HS, in which he made a black and white film dressed as Charlie Chaplin (I know, nerd city,haha).He likes some of Jerry Seinfeld’s standup bits. Political correctness has nothing to do with his preferences, as he also likes a lot of vulgar/outrageous acts. We discuss why something is funny or not all the time. I’ll get back to you when we come up with the answer.
HotCanary, after reading your post, this is what I want to know…
Can I adopt your son? 
Love your post!
Ha! He’s definitely fun to have around !
Mine does, but she’s a dancer. And maybe an old soul. Once she came in while I was watching It Happened One Night, and sat down. After a few minutes:
D: “Who’s that?”
Me: “Clark Gable. In my opinion, the most handsome man who ever walked the earth.”
Pause.
D: “You might be right.”
Larry Olivier wasnt bad either.
I was always partial to Fred Astaire, because he looked like my grandfather.
But one of our familys favorite movies is The Lady Vanishes, with Michael Redgrave & Margaret Lockwood.
D is a cinema major. She loves the old Rogers & Hammerstein mucicals, as well as the stuff on Turner Classic Movies, except some weeks she had to watch over two dozen movies and critique them, so she is more selective about what she watches for fun. She still thinks the classics are amazing and that actors and actresses and plots were very interesting before–in many ways more than nowadays.
Even with the sexism, she and I both liked the early MASH shows. I also enjoyed Dick VanDyke and Lucy. I’ve just never really liked Seinfeld or Friends much. Not a fan of The Middle or Modern Family either; really don’t relate.
When S is home, he and H watch MASH as a nightly routine.
But tastes do change. To me, David Letterman was the cool new guy on late night TV. To my kids, he’s as dated as Johnny Carson or Jack Paar were to me, it is possible that today’s college kids are too PC for Seinfeld, but to me Seinfeld touring a college campus could be like Johnny Carson or Bob Hope touring a college campus in my day. If they’re perceived as “my parents’ generation” it may just not be appealing.
I love The Lady Vanishes! I a.so liked The 39 Steps.
As for humor, I still think of some of the old WKRP in Cincinnati episodes. Oh, the humanity!
Oh, I get it.
http://www.alternet.org/culture/jerry-seinfeld-white-hetero-male-worth-820-million-thinks-world-too-pc
From an article about the controversy:
Forget PC–this is just a bad joke, using a dated outlook. It’s like when I’m listening to a sermon and the (elderly) rabbi tells some ancient joke where the punch line depends on having a 1950’s era view of marriage. Maybe the spouse and I smile a little tightly to be polite. Our D’s (who do like Mel Brooks and Charlie Chaplin) just look blank.
I am technically a millennial (born in the mid 80s) but my range of interest in comedy is quite large. I like old time comedy (pre-1970s) like buster keaton, abbot and costello, and get smart (tv show). Blazing saddles, young frankenstein, national lampoons vacation, airplane, pretty much any John Candy or Chevy Chase movie… the list goes on.
After about 2000, my interest in comedies/comedians pretty much waned. I don’t find many modern comedies funny, and comedians have gotten too PC for my taste. The only exception would be Bill Burr, who I find hilarious! He always pulls out all the stops on PC-ness, and delivers his content beautifully.
Different generations like different comedians and musicians, because that’s what they hear the most of. My D and her friends didn’t know much about the tv show “Friends” until it came to Netflix. Maybe having “Seinfeld” stream on Hulu will open up a new audience.
Many kids don’t know about the Seinfeld show. At my D’s family weekend, a young girl performed a very funny stand up act during a variety show. I heard her talking afterwards and she was quite excited because “that Seinfeld guy” was in the audience. I mentioned to my H that I didn’t think she knows who George Costanza is, as we walked to the dining hall draped in velvet.