I think a lot of American comedies tend to apologize for their bad behavior in the last 10 minutes of the movie.
I think the longer a sitcom is on the air, by necessity, the dumber the characters have to get: otherwise, they would be learning and growing, and they won't be funny, so they have to get more and more extremely whatever they are.
When I was growing up, we didn't have 'Will & Grace.' The one gay character was Monroe from 'Too Close For Comfort' - and he wasn't even gay! At least they didn't say he was. Same with Mr. Furley from 'Three's Company.' You know, these were the characters that people would always make fun of.
Up until 'Bridesmaids', the general consensus was that women preferred comedy a bit softer.
My first few films were institutional comedies, and you're on pretty safe ground when you're dealing with an institution that vast numbers of people have experienced: college, summer camp, the military, the country club.
Female roles in comedies are usually quite silly, I think.
No Bengali comedy show is complete without mocking my mannerisms.
People want to see comedies where characters aren't sacrificed for the jokes.
The male is always the pawn in a romantic comedy. Come together, break up, go chase her, get her, roll credits. That's what happens in all of them.
Situation comedies are old-fashioned - they stick to formulas. I resent their music which is old fashioned. I resent the use of a laugh track.
There are lots of comic bosses and fathers in sitcoms, but the comic landlord remains rare.
I don't want to get stuck in romantic comedy.
There remains a degree of anti-black intellectualism in entertainment. Middle and upper-middle class blacks have often been portrayed as buffoons in popular culture; witness the characters of Carlton Banks on 'The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air' and Braxton P. Hartnabrig on 'The Jamie Foxx Show.'
Fat bodies are used comically. I respect Rebel Wilson so much, and Melissa McCarthy. I love them both. But so often, I feel like fat female bodies are used as props.
Guys can look like pigs. The girl always has to be a looker. Look at most TV shows: According To Jim - pig and a looker. Still Standing - pig and a looker. Ralph Kramden [on The Honeymooners] - pig and a looker. Family Guy - pig and a looker. It's a theme.
When you look at the comedies that are out there, 99 per cent of the time, men are the heroes. It's often thought that a woman can't be funny, that women are supposed to be sexy, not funny.
American comedies especially are all about these men being browbeaten by their wives and it's impossible for me to watch.
I feel American comedy is a little too light. World cinema, and Latin cinema, is much more comfortable with darker emotions.
Sitcom storylines are usually incredibly contrived.
Yeah, sometimes it gets a little sappy for me, but I'm tired of hearing about dysfunctional families in sitcoms. That's been done to death, and that's probably what everybody expected from me. But that's not what I wanted to do.
The general image of a man in an American sitcom is like a complete moron. You'd think the industry was run by a feminist cabal.
I always find it actually funny that the analysis is that the characters I play in comedies are the manchild, the adolescent, characters that refuse to grow up. And yet, if you look back in the history of comedy all the way back to the Marx brothers, that's a big part of comedy.
Growing up, you see movies, and the big person is always the butt of a joke or the funny best friend, or they lose weight, and that's when they become redeemable.
You know what? At the end of the day, funny is funny. I hope to see the end of all the female cliches that are written in a lot of comedies that are named chick flicks.
It's not common for a woman on television, especially if she's the mom of the family, to be funny. She's usually a straight man or foil.
