The Government Inspector: Comparison Of Comedy And Drama

When talking about films or plays there are many words to describe them. Two of the most popular are comedy and drama, and both are on opposite ends of the spectrum. While comedy is made to make you laugh, drama pulls on a totally different emotion. What makes one better than the other? Answers will vary person to person, but one thing is for sure, they both are a crucial part of acting.

Drama is made “to pull on your heart strings,” as my mother says. It can make you sad or often times, even angry. It draws from a more personal emotional state then comedy. Most people when watching a dramatic movie or television show start to relate to the characters in that movie or show; making it really difficult not to be sad for a character and sometimes even angry at the same character. Scandal on ABC is the perfect example. It makes you sad, angry, and even excited. Drama isn’t always putting you into a sad or angry

In some comedies, it’s not the characters that are funny, but the situations in which they find themselves. Dark comedy is funny but it is a heavy humor. A perfect example of this is the play The Government Inspector. This play, set in the 1860’s, is about a conman who goes to a Russian village. The people in the village think he is the inspector general they have been expecting and he willingly goes along with it. (Spoiler Alert) The conman begins making requests of the people and out of fear they give him everything they have. By the end of the play, they are left with nothing and the actual inspector general arrives. At that moment, the play ends. We all know what will happen to all of those villagers when the real inspector general shows up. We all have read what Russia was like at that time, government controlled, almost like North Korea. This is a dark comedy because throughout the entire play you know those villagers are going to be executed, but it is still