Witty matters

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The days of wisecracks and insightful humour are due for a comeback on televisionOn television, nothing works like laughter. Banana peels, funny accents and mistaken identities—all are great fodder for comedy mills which regularly churn out jokes and gags, whether they're stand-up comedy shows or daily sitcoms. If there's anything to complain about at all, it's the lack of wit. Actress Suchitra Pillai laments, "There is too much slapstick on television these days and no intelligent jokes. Good spoofs and satires seem to have gone off air."It seems though that gap is slowly being filled now. SAB TV is telecasting a show about a town that India forgot—called Lapataganj—which satirises the common man's struggle against the powers that be. Channel V too has a slew of shows spoofing Bollywood, such as V Are Family, Bollywood Nonsensex and Deadly Dus. Sheetal Sudhir, creative head of the channel, explains that the effort is to make people take life a little less seriously. Deadly Dus, for instance, pokes fun of Indian media's obsession with celebrities and film gossip. "Even the most ridiculous of news items is taken so seriously. We're trying to make the point that television needs to be lighthearted. We need to be able to laugh at ourselves and this is one way of doing that," explains Sudhir.Most recently, Mastiii, a new channel from the Adhikari Brothers, a Mumbai-based production house, brought back satire to the small screen. "We're hoping to provide clean, cerebral humour to viewers," explains Anita Varma, associate vice-president programming of Mastiii which went on air earlier this month. "It will not only be a great stressbuster for viewers but will also engage with them intellectually." The channel does not have any shows per se—instead, it has renowned comics like Raju Srivastava and Suresh Menon enact short gags of about a minute each in which they lampoon everyone from politicians to movie stars and sports personalities.The importance of satire to any culture is undeniable. Menon points out, "We don't live perfect lives and a lot of things go wrong for us common people. Which is why using sense of humour to deal with a bad situation is necessary—it helps us cope with it." The genre has an illustrious history on Indian television. Flop Show, probably one of India's wittiest and best written shows, was a spoof on the Indian middle class's problems and obsessions—from Maruti cars to television sets to gas connections. Another show popular for the way it lampooned Indian celebrities was The Great Indian Comedy Show, which featured some of India's most prominent wits including Vinay Pathak, Ranvir Shorey and Sunil Pal, while Shekhar Suman livened up week nights with his spot-on imitations of Indian politicians—most notably Lalu Prasad Yadav—on his show Movers and Shakers.All these shows did fabulously well, so why did satire go off air? Veteran comic Jaspal Bhatti contends that the reason for satire's disappearance from television is the explosion of reality television. "Reality shows became the new hit formula and channels and producers no longer wanted to take risks with ratings or revenues. So all we have left these days is slapstick humour." Sudhir adds that even the wittiest of jokes can get stale if told over and over again and that is exactly what happened with satire. "How many times can you repeat the same Sholay joke?"However, it's not fair to blame just reality television. Good writing for smart comedies has become increasingly difficult to come by. Markand Adhikari, vice-chairman and managing director of SAB group acknowledges, "Writing, performing and producing comedy is not at all easy and not many can do it." Srivastava agrees. "Clever writing is really the key to sharp satire. Writers have become lazy these days—they either repeat jokes or don't make a good enough attempt. They need to pull up their socks," he says.So can satire return to the prominence it once held? Menon thinks yes. "While reality television took away a huge slice of the entertainment cake, there is still great scope for shows like Office Office and Ji Mantriji. People still come up to me these days and ask if The Great Indian Comedy Show will make a comeback. So it's a good sign that channels are finally taking note of this demand and slowly bringing back satire," says the comedian.

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