Incongruous Entertainment

Cohan, Steven. "Introduction." Incongruous Entertainment: Camp, Cultural Value, and the MGM Musical. Durham: Duke UP, 2005. 1-40. Print.

Cohan introduces his book by discussing what camp is and then by giving brief examples of how it infiltrated MGM’s studio era. Cohan refers to camp in many contexts and cites many sources as to the correct way to interpret camp, but overall he explains camp as a sort of hyperbole that has infiltrated gay culture. Anything over the top, yet hidden in plain view, is camp (10). In many ways, camp was the gay culture hidden in the center of a heterocentric society (14). Judy Garland’s over-the-top performance of “The Man That Got Away” in A Star is Born shows that Garland’s camp appeal springs from how and why she is singing, not what she is singing (26). Conversely, while Garland’s singing makes her camp, Fred Astaire’s dancing makes him camp. In an analysis of “Sunday Jumps,” Astaire is characterized as camp because of his theatrical, yet light and airy dancing (38). Cohan concludes his introduction by explaining that camp encourages reconsiderations of the musicals’ representations of gender and sexuality (40). 

I read the introduction to this book about camp in MGM musicals. To be quite honest, it confused me. Cohan went on way too much about camp and gave so many different definitions that I'm only really guessing at what it means. It reminded me of a terrible math teacher I once had that un-tought me what a function was by explaining it too rigorously. Lay off the camp is all I have to say.

The rest of the book looks promising, but probably boring. I will probably just use one or two chapters to focus on. I'm assuming they'll all be as redundant as the introduction, but I'm hoping they won't be.

Irregardless (which is not a word, but it is used cleverly in Mean Girls and I can't stop saying), I'm looking forward to looking at gay influence and presence in MGM musicals. So this was a good lead for me.

Research Update

I've officially decided, after much deliberation, that I want to research the great movie musicals of the thirties, forties, and fifties and their representations of different groups of people. Or something like that.


The first article I read compared and contrasted MGM's musicals with those of Fox. I always forget about Fox. It brought up a lot of interesting points. For instance, MGM appears to be less stereotypical of African Americans, but that's because they don't have many African American roles in their movies. While Fox did use African Americans, although in more stereotypical ways, they were at least being used. 


I personally like the MGM style of integrated musicals more than Fox's vaudeville-esque musicals.


Another interesting point, racial integration didn't really kick off until after World War II. I suppose the genocide of six million people can really make you think about how you treat your neighbor.

Griffin, Sean. “The Gang's All Here: Generic versus Racial Integration in the 1940s Musical.” Cinema Journal 42.1 (2002): 21-45. Academic Search Premier. Web. 23 February    2011.

Griffin explores the connection between integrated musicals, or musicals where the music is integrated into the storyline, and racial integration in musicals. MGM quickly adopted the integrated musical after the immense popularity of Oklahoma! on Broadway (24). However, Fox tried its best to resist the integrated musical and instead chose to produce musicals in the vaudeville fashion. In Fox’s musicals, any musical numbers were performed in nightclubs and on various stages to create variety in the plot line rather than accompany it and reveal character (29). In MGM musicals, black performers were almost completely excluded to promote the utopian feel. When black performers were included in MGM musicals, they were in limited and stereotypical roles (26). Conversely, in Fox musicals, black performers had more say in their performances. While roles were still minimal, blacks were able to work on their own terms. Although they were in very stereotypical roles, they were able to negotiate into roles that demanded attention rather than be forgotten and bossed around (35).

Chosen

Today I set up my blog in my CWRR II class. A lot of people seem to be having problems. I suppose I am one of the chosen ones.