Patton Oswalt The Carnivalesque Comic Jim Sisto Columbia College Chicago (2014)
One can look at the nearly thirty-year career of Patton Oswalt and see a trail blazed by the likes of Lenny Bruce and George Carlin. All three comics’ styles can easily be tied to the carnivalesque. The term “carnivalesque” comes from the Russian literary theorist Mikhail Bakhtin, who used the word to describe our routines and daily life as suspended in room for excitement, revelry, and danger. It is this dance with the devil that draws many audiences, and in this soiree, we lay down our expectations and are taken to a strange territory in delight.
Much of Oswalt’s career has been committed to visiting “these odd places” on the edge. In several ways, Oswalt is the wild, intellectual child of Bruce and Carlin. Their material is not only challenging, but utilizes jet-like stream of consciousness. They are masters of their language Watercooler Journal
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who constantly play against the grain and talk about topics deemed just taboo enough to irk particular audiences when it comes to particular ideologies. Similarly, Oswalt’s act often reveals his pent-up rage regarding “society” and himself. His situations always allude to ridiculous pop culture references like the Sarlacc Pit from Star Wars and William S. Burroughs. By remaining unfiltered and unflinching while satirizing the ridiculous nature of politics and culture, Oswalt is able to travel to the depths of carnivalesque comedy and find a massive audience.
“…we are able to laugh alongside Oswalt’s retellings even if he brings us to unchartered territory as he sets his life up as a punch line.” Oswalt stands for the nerdy, middle-class demographic. He drenches his acts in references to gaming, pop culture, and every graphic novel/comic book character ever created. Oswalt also constantly paints America as fragmented and hopeless, and combines both of these stylistic elements in My Weakness Is Strong: “What if Obama starts slinging amazing technology, hover boards, teleportation pills… At that time would there still be, like, two racists left? Oh yeah, there’s that nigger that gave us anti-gravity… BLEEP. Yeah, I’m going to be late to the cross burning, my free government blowjob robot broke down.” Here, Oswalt walks a tightrope on an innocuous standpoint and then slams the audience with an unexpected angle while simultaneously targeting racists and hinting that there will always be racists. This fulfills Horton’s requirements for standup: “…standup comedy champions individualism and at least potentially radical ideologies, whereas situation comedy favors the status quo and social consensus” (4). Dr. Seuss often slyly inserted social and political commentary through his cartoon aliens, and his career tackled many layers of carnivalesque. In most of his books, “the perfect scenario” doesn’t pan out in the end but becomes more of a critique of the futile issues that humans are incapable of overcoming—just like Oswalt’s material. Oswalt persuades viewers by drawing them in immediately. The more he paints up a story, the more he suspends his audience into thinking that it may end pleasantly and politely. Of course, this is never the case. Oswalt worries out loud regarding his parenting—he often is uncertain if he is “doing the right thing.” What will be the factor that will damage his daughter’s perfect mind? The bloody Wolf Man scene she accidently watched? He often admits that raising a child is a chaotic and Watercooler Journal
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random thing, but in the end you must trust your instincts, a quality, he states, highly lacking today. Many of his stories play on the idea of our inability as humans to be trusted.
In 2012, Oswalt made an appearance on Conan and detailed his depression. He described how he became blissfully suicidal while staring at the frozen food section in a Trader Joe’s as Toto’s “Africa” came on the radio speakers. He mentions his thought that police probably get a call about that specific suicide on a regular basis and claims how his depression is more like “a friend I have to just hang out with occasionally.” A big staple of Oswalt’s life has been his battle with depression, but by subverting viewer expectations and creating a persona, people can laugh at this. Audiences relate to him through his struggles; we are able to laugh alongside Oswalt’s retellings even if he brings us to unchartered territory as he sets his life up as a punch line. Life is a tragedy in more than a handful of ways, but we strive on, most of the time in a state of illusion. What Patton Oswalt does best is to stare down the beast festering us inept. Oswalt accepts the way the world is and details the truth, as he casually makes a derision of it all. Horton writes that in most of Aristophanes’ comedies, ”a middle aged adult goes through three stages: he or she is dissatisfied, dreams up a plan to cure that dissatisfaction, and then Watercooler Journal
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carries out that plan to a successful resolution. The final phase is a glorious celebration of the character’s success” (11). When Oswalt subverts the final phase with a dismal and often embarrassing account of his life, his “character” succeeds for both him and his audiences nonetheless.
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works cited Horton, Andrew S. Comedy/Cinema/Theory. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1991. Print.
image credits, in order: ŠComedy Central ŠTurner Broadcasting Watercooler Journal
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