Nothing Like a Little Judicious Levity

Plus I Met R. Eric Thomas!

The title on this newsletter is a line in the book “The Wrong Box” by Robert Louis Stevenson. I take it to mean that one should employ common sense when making a joke, which isn’t often the case. Anyone that’s ever spent time in a fraternity house or a political convention knows that. But let’s talk about the good use of humor today.

I spoke with the New York Times a couple of months ago about the role humor can play in easing stress and lightening the mood. The incident I mention in the article is pretty much the perfect example of judiciously using levity. I don’t always succeed in this, of course. Like the time a stringent woman in a PTO meeting asked me to include my emergency hospital of choice on the membership form, and I grabbed her pen and wrote, “The muthafokkin closest one.” Luckily that didn’t lead to me actually needing an emergency hospital.

Humor is best used when it breaks tension. It can be difficult to make a joke when dealing with something serious, so I don’t recommend trying if it’s not your forte. Nobody wants to be the guy at the funeral cracking a “She died as she lived. Denting bumpers in the Wal-Mart parking lot” joke. Read the room. Tread lightly. Know your audience.

You should, however, use humor to talk about your own tragedies and foibles. Good ol’ self-deprecation. (Which, to be a bit meta here, I pronounced “self-depree-cee-ating” until fairly recently.) (I believe this is called a “self-own.”) Poke fun at yourself. At least up until a point because you don’t want to make yourself a punching bag, either. But a great rule of thumb is to claim the laugh before anyone else can.

Someone that does this brilliantly is R. Eric Thomas. I was a bit stuck when I started writing I’m Wearing Tunics Now, but I read his humorous memoir Here For It and it knocked a few things loose for me. He is a top-notch comedic writer, as anyone with WiFi knows because his Eric Reads the News articles for Elle magazine were shared by literally everyone. And luckily for us all, he has a new book coming out in August called Congratulations, The Best Is Over!

But besides being hilarious, Eric is incredibly skilled at blending humor with deeper emotions and societal messages. He’s an award-winning playwright, with his Mrs. Harrison being produced in Michigan next month. And here’s some great news if you’re in Austin: The Austin Playhouse is producing his new play NIGHTBIRD March 3-26th.

NIGHTBIRD is about an artist in Baltimore tasked with creating something to replace the recently removed Confederate monument near her childhood home where she now lives with her brother, who is preparing for a Juneteenth festival in the park. It’s topical and witty, which is Eric’s trademark. He was in town last week for rehearsals, so I had the opportunity to chat with him a bit about the show. My friend Elizabeth McGuire tagged along so we could keep each other from fangirling too much. (It didn’t work.)

I’m not a legitimate reporter, so I won’t write this in interview form, but what we discussed with Eric was the play’s theme: liberation. The characters are cut off from their history but also trapped by it. How can they escape? What’s the nature of freedom? And what role can art play? The play’s undercurrent is old America at odds with new America, which perfectly sums up the current national mood. These are all serious issues, but the play Eric wrote tells these conversations in another way than purely weighty drama. That way is humor. “There’s no future without laughter,” he said to us. That’s something I also hold dear. The old “humor is a rubber sword; it makes a point without drawing blood” theory.

I can’t wait to see NIGHTBIRD, and I hope you all get a chance to attend a show. If you’re in Austin, or can make it to town, don’t miss it. The cast and artistic team are some of the best, and Eric is a genuine and true talent. Tickets can be purchased here: www.austinplayhouse.com/nightbird.

Once again, I learn the lesson that flannel is a cruel mistress. And you bet I just made that joke before any of y’all did.