|
Joe Miller's Jests
Joseph Miller (1684 – 15 August 1738) was an English actor, who first appeared in the cast of Sir Robert Howard's ''Committee'' at Drury Lane in 1709 as Teague. Trinculo in '' The Tempest'', the First Grave-digger in ''Hamlet'' and Marplot in Susanna Centlivre's ''The Busybody'', were among his many favourite parts. He is said to have been a friend of Hogarth. In 1715 he appeared on bills promoting a performance on the last day of April, where he played Young Clincher in Farquhar's comedy, ''The Constant Couple''. On 25 April 1717 he played Sir Joseph Whittol in William Congreve's "Old Batchelor". Tickets for this performance were adorned by a design by William Hogarth showing the scene where Whittol's friend Captain Bluffe is kicked by Sharper whilst his friend Bellmour tries to pull him away. This is described as a "very valuable engraving" in 1868. This ticket design was used for Joe Millers benefit performance on 13 April 1738. In "vacation periods" between working at ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Charles Dickens
Charles John Huffam Dickens (; 7 February 1812 – 9 June 1870) was an English writer and social critic. He created some of the world's best-known fictional characters and is regarded by many as the greatest novelist of the Victorian era.. His works enjoyed unprecedented popularity during his lifetime and, by the 20th century, critics and scholars had recognised him as a literary genius. His novels and short stories are widely read today. Born in Portsmouth, Dickens left school at the age of 12 to work in a boot-blacking factory when his father was incarcerated in a debtors' prison. After three years he returned to school, before he began his literary career as a journalist. Dickens edited a weekly journal for 20 years, wrote 15 novels, five novellas, hundreds of short stories and non-fiction articles, lectured and performed readings extensively, was an indefatigable letter writer, and campaigned vigorously for children's rights, for education, and for other social ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Daffy Dilly
''Daffy Dilly'' is a 1948 Warner Bros. ''Merrie Melodies'' cartoon directed by Chuck Jones. The cartoon was released on October 30, 1948, and stars Daffy Duck. "Daffy Dilly" is notable for being an early example of a greedy, self-centered Daffy (with some "screwball" elements), as perfected by Jones. The title is a word play on daffodil. Plot Daffy Duck is a struggling novelty gag salesman operating on the sidewalk of a large city, futilely hawking things like flower squirters, a Joe Miller joke book, a rib-tickler, a chicken inspector badge and a 200-volt electric hand buzzer, inadvertently demonstrating the latter on himself ("It's... shocking..."). But then he hears a news bulletin on a nearby radio that buzzsaw tycoon J.B. Cubish, who has not laughed in 50 years and is on his deathbed, is offering one million dollars to anyone who can make him laugh just one more time before he dies. Seeing his chance at a huge payday, Daffy immediately sets off for the Cubish's mansion, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Merrie Melodies
''Merrie Melodies'' is an American animation, animated series of comedy short films produced by Warner Bros. starting in 1931, during the golden age of American animation, and ending in 1969. Then some new cartoons were produced from the late 1970s to the late 1990s, as well as other made productions beginning in 1972. As with its sister series, ''Looney Tunes'', it featured cartoon characters such as Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Porky Pig, and Elmer Fudd. Between 1934 and 1943, the ''Merrie Melodies'' series were distinguished from the black-and-white, Buddy (Looney Tunes), Buddy or Porky Pig–starring ''Looney Tunes'' shorts by an emphasis on one-shot stories in color featuring Warner Bros.–owned musical selections. After Bugs Bunny became the breakout recurring star of ''Merrie Melodies'', and ''Looney Tunes'' went to color in the early 1940s, the two series gradually lost their distinctions and shorts were assigned to each series more randomly. ''Merrie Melodies'' was originally ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Short Film
A short film is any motion picture that is short enough in running time not to be considered a feature film. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences defines a short film as "an original motion picture that has a running time of 40 minutes or less, including all credits". In the United States, short films were generally termed short subjects from the 1920s into the 1970s when confined to two 35 mm reels or less, and featurettes for a film of three or four reels. "Short" was an abbreviation for either term. The increasingly rare industry term "short subject" carries more of an assumption that the film is shown as part of a presentation along with a feature film. Short films are often screened at local, national, or international film festivals and made by independent filmmakers with either a low budget or no budget at all. They are usually funded by film grants, nonprofit organizations, sponsor, or personal funds. Short films are generally used for industry experience and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gallows Humor
Black comedy, also known as dark comedy, morbid humor, or gallows humor, is a style of comedy that makes light of subject matter that is generally considered taboo, particularly subjects that are normally considered serious or painful to discuss. Writers and comedians often use it as a tool for exploring vulgar issues by provoking discomfort, serious thought, and amusement for their audience. Thus, in fiction, for example, the term ''black comedy'' can also refer to a genre in which dark humor is a core component. Popular themes of the genre include death, crime, poverty, suicide, war, violence, terrorism, discrimination, disease, racism, sexism, and human sexuality. Black comedy differs from both blue comedy—which focuses more on crude topics such as nudity, sex, and Body fluids—and from straightforward obscenity. Whereas the term ''black comedy'' is a relatively broad term covering humor relating to many serious subjects, ''gallows humor'' tends to be used more specif ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Stephen Dedalus
Stephen Dedalus is James Joyce's literary alter ego, appearing as the protagonist and antihero of his first, semi-autobiographic novel of artistic existence ''A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man'' (1916) and an important character in Joyce's 1922 novel ''Ulysses''. In ''Stephen Hero'', an early version of what became ''Portrait'', Stephen's surname is spelled "Daedalus" in more precise allusion to Daedalus, the architect in Greek myth who was contracted by King Minos to build the Labyrinth in which he would imprison his wife's son the Minotaur.Ovid, in his ''Metamorphoses'', suggests that Daedalus constructed the Labyrinth so cunningly that he himself could barely escape it after he built it. Buck Mulligan makes reference to the mythic namesake in ''Ulysses'', telling Stephen, "Your absurd name, an ancient Greek!" In revising the mammoth ''Stephen Hero'' into the considerably more compact ''Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man'', Joyce shortened the name to "Dedalus". Fi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ulysses (novel)
''Ulysses'' is a modernist novel by Irish writer James Joyce. Parts of it were first serialized in the American journal ''The Little Review'' from March 1918 to December 1920, and the entire work was published in Paris by Sylvia Beach on 2 February 1922, Joyce's 40th birthday. It is considered one of the most important works of modernist literature and has been called "a demonstration and summation of the entire movement." According to Declan Kiberd, "Before Joyce, no writer of fiction had so foregrounded the process of thinking". ''Ulysses'' chronicles the appointments and encounters of the itinerant Leopold Bloom in Dublin in the course of an ordinary day, 16 June 1904. Ulysses is the Latinised name of Odysseus, the hero of Homer's epic poem the ''Odyssey'', and the novel establishes a series of parallels between the poem and the novel, with structural correspondences between the characters and experiences of Bloom and Odysseus, Molly Bloom and Penelope, and Stephen Dedalus ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
James Joyce
James Augustine Aloysius Joyce (2 February 1882 – 13 January 1941) was an Irish novelist, poet, and literary critic. He contributed to the modernist avant-garde movement and is regarded as one of the most influential and important writers of the 20th century. Joyce's novel ''Ulysses'' (1922) is a landmark in which the episodes of Homer's ''Odyssey'' are paralleled in a variety of literary styles, particularly stream of consciousness. Other well-known works are the short-story collection ''Dubliners'' (1914), and the novels ''A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man'' (1916) and ''Finnegans Wake'' (1939). His other writings include three books of poetry, a play, letters, and occasional journalism. Joyce was born in Dublin into a middle-class family. He attended the Jesuit Clongowes Wood College in County Kildare, then, briefly, the Christian Brothers-run O'Connell School. Despite the chaotic family life imposed by his father's unpredictable finances, he excelled at the Jesuit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Diary Of A Nobody
''The Diary of a Nobody'' is an English comic novel written by the brothers George and Weedon Grossmith, with illustrations by the latter. It originated as an intermittent serial in ''Punch'' magazine in 1888–89 and first appeared in book form, with extended text and added illustrations, in 1892. The ''Diary'' records the daily events in the lives of a London clerk, Charles Pooter, his wife Carrie, his son William Lupin, and numerous friends and acquaintances over a period of 15 months. Before their collaboration on the ''Diary'', the brothers each pursued successful careers on the stage. George originated nine of the principal comedian roles in the Gilbert and Sullivan operas over 12 years from 1877 to 1889. He also established a national reputation as a piano sketch entertainer and wrote a large number of songs and comic pieces. Before embarking on his stage career, Weedon had worked as an artist and illustrator. The ''Diary'' was the brothers' only mature collaboration. Mo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Weedon Grossmith
Walter Weedon Grossmith (9 June 1854 – 14 June 1919), better known as Weedon Grossmith, was an English writer, painter, actor, and playwright best known as co-author of ''The Diary of a Nobody'' (1892) with his brother, music hall comedian and Gilbert and Sullivan star George Grossmith. Weedon Grossmith also illustrated ''The Diary of a Nobody'' to much acclaim. Grossmith trained as a painter, but was unable to make a living in that capacity and went on the stage largely for financial reasons. He was successful as an actor and as an impresario, and wrote several plays. As an actor, he specialised in comedy roles, and his typical characters, harassed and scheming, became so identified with him that the "Weedon Grossmith part" became a regular feature of the theatre of his day. Life and career Early years Grossmith was born in London and grew up in St. Pancras and Hampstead, London. His father, George Grossmith (1820–80), was the chief court reporter for ''The Times'' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
George Grossmith
George Grossmith (9 December 1847 – 1 March 1912) was an English comedian, writer, composer, actor, and singer. His performing career spanned more than four decades. As a writer and composer, he created 18 comic operas, nearly 100 musical sketches, some 600 songs and piano pieces, three books and both serious and comic pieces for newspapers and magazines. Grossmith created a series of nine characters in the comic operas of Gilbert and Sullivan from 1877 to 1889, including Sir Joseph Porter, in ''H.M.S. Pinafore'' (1878), the Major-General in ''The Pirates of Penzance'' (1880) and Ko-Ko in ''The Mikado'' (1885–87). He also wrote, in collaboration with his brother Weedon, the 1892 comic novel ''The Diary of a Nobody''. Grossmith was also famous in his day for performing his own comic piano sketches and songs, both before and after his Gilbert and Sullivan days, becoming the most popular British solo performer of the 1890s. Some of his comic songs endure today, including " ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
