Dorothy Parker Humor Both Loved and Feared

Izvor: KiWi

There are several forms of humor: slapstick, situational, grim, self-deprecating, silly, serious, raw, light hearted, visual, plays on words and rhymes, and on and on. The one thing that most humor has in common is 'the unexpected'. Dorothy Parker's humor was certainly the unexpected. She played off of every funny quotes predicament and stated or wrote precisely what she was 'thinking' - especially if it was 'out with the box' of social propriety. Her words were fast, biting and unexpected - eliciting genuine laughter, and perhaps nervous laughter too.

Dorothy grew up at a time when young ladies have been anticipated to be seen in lieu of heard. She enjoyed challenging authority by speaking out - at occasions inappropriately - to acquire laughs from her fellow schoolmates. Even though entertaining her pals, she would problems the nuns within the private college she attended by saying plays on words like, the "Immaculate Conception" was a "Spontaneous Combustion." For this she was asked to leave the Convent from the Blessed Sacrament on West 79th Street in New York City.

By the time Dorothy Parker sold her initial verse to Vanity Fair magazine in 1914, she was both rapid witted and fearless. Her talent for humor was recognized and appreciated by Vanity Fair, hence she was selected to fill in for their own humor writer P.G. Wodehouse when he was on trip - rather large shoes to fill for this petite and by burgeoning feminist beauty.

Dorothy soon wrote theatrical play critiques for Vanity Fair and became quite common with her readers; even though eventually feared by Broadway producers. Her cutting remarks could devastate the good results of a meticulously and expensive mounted play. She when wrote that a actress "... ran the gamut of feelings from A to B." No aspect of a production was safe from her clever and cutting words: from dialogue to casting to wardrobe. In certainly one of her evaluations Dorothy observed, "She wore as really a horrible dress as I've ever seen around the American stage. Had she not been strangled within the Second Act, I must have produced my way to the stage and carried out her in myself."

With stress mounting from Broadway producers, Vanity Fair terminated Dorothy Parker's employment. Vanity Fair writers and fellow members of your Algonquin Round Table, Robert Benchley and Robert Sherwood, quit in protest - a true act of loyalty for their eventual lifelong friend. Dorothy's termination from Vanity Fair was a blessing in disguise. She was hired to write for a newly designed magazine titled, The New Yorker and ultimately enjoyed a successful profession as a writer of quite a few hundred poems, books, plays, articles, music and screenplays. She became a two time Academy Award nominated screenwriter in Hollywood - and was heralded by fans and good friends who each feared and adored her.

Dorothy Parker's spontaneous humor along with the potential to speak her thoughts, carried over to her individual life. She would be type to someone's face, then wait for them to leave the room and say cutting remarks. Dorothy's husband Allan Campbell was normally the brunt of her humor - at the same time as close friends who knew and loved her - and yes feared her at the same time. One could say that Dorothy Parker was the Don Rickles of her day - a well-known contemporary comedian who, both loved and feared, enjoys receiving laughs at others' expense.