Mark Fisher Quotes

Basic Instinct 2' is camp, not because it takes itself too seriously, nor because it sends itself up, but because we are not sure quite how seriously it wants us to take it.

The postmodern reply to the modern consists of recognizing that the past, since it cannot really be destroyed, because its destruction leads to silence, must be revisited: but with irony, not innocently. I think of the postmodern attitude as that of a man who loves a very cultivated woman and knows he cannot say to her, I love you madly, because he knows that she knows (and that she knows that he knows) that these words have already been written by Barbara Cartland. Still, there is a solution. He can say, As Barbara Cartland would put it, I love you madly.

Mystery Science Theater is really a postmodern show, it's really derived of many influences.

There's something grounded about 'Ugly Americans,' so I think it's good that I'm playing a version of myself in these elevated cartoon circumstances.

The original 'Scream' is one of those classic things, but it totally pokes fun at itself too. It's never taking itself too seriously, which is why I think it's such a cult classic.

I think that Ionesco's greatest weapon is that he's able to make us laugh at the darkest corners of our souls.

You achieve the surreal jokes through the realism by making it elastic.

There's always something at least a little smug about self-reference - magazine articles about idealistic journalists, TV shows about TV actors, ironic films within ironic-er films: all this meta-media populated by thinly disguised characters making oblique inside jokes.

A lot of people call horror movies 'campy,' and I can certainly see why they think that they are, but being a product of the 80s, I didn't notice that they were campy - I came from a campy generation. I mean, Ronald Reagan is campy. But I don't think they're campy.

Today I realize that many recent exercises in "deconstructive reading" read as if inspired by my parody. This is parody's mission: it must never be afraid of going too far. If its aim is true, it simply heralds what others will later produce, unblushing, with impassive and assertive gravity.

I've always loved absurdism and plays of that genre. I think that my humour is very much rooted in theatre and drama.

Frankly, I love 'Scream': I think it's one of the great scary/funny movies.

I find it funny that I'm a pin-up.

I see the absurdity in things, and I think it's my job to point it out.

Very few people took sordid things and made comedies out of them.

When you get the high art of William Shakespeare and the greatest love story ever told, and you collision crash it with the low art of the tacky garden gnome, you're going to have lots and lots of opportunity for fun and putting your tongue very firmly in your cheek.

If written with enough care and thoughtfulness, a joke can make you laugh at a belief you hold dear.

People say the comedy is so shocking, but if you read newspapers or look around generally - I mean, obviously I'm not writing about all the lovely things that there are, which I do see as well - but there is a lot of outrageousness around, slightly covered up. And obviously, it's fun to take that a little bit further.

'Take Her Up to Monto' is a very satirical song. I don't really like people calling it a folk song because it kind of isn't. It's a bit cheeky calling it 'Take Her Up to Monto,' but the whole idea was to be very irreverent.

I started out making fun of comedy. Then I became the thing I was making fun of.

Here's my take on Andy Kaufman... For Kaufman, comedy was a skill that was open for examination. He didn't just do comedy, he deconstructed it like it was a transistor set. He pulled out all the wires and switched them around, often in front of our very eyes.

My brand of comedy is taking a serious approach to silliness. Small moments of modern life and human behavior make me laugh. At least that's where everything starts, and then my other through line would be a dry absurdity that exponentially spirals out of reality.

The definition of comedy is 'unsafe space' - you can't control what people laugh at.

Louie Anderson thinks my thing is the absurdness of reality. That's what we do on 'Portlandia' all the time. I try to bring that absurdness of reality to everything.

I would love to be part of dark comedies. I love them! They are no-nonsense, no spoonfeeding, and the norms and cliches are left behind.