Comic Drunks, Crazy Cults, and Lovable Monsters

David Scott Diffrient is professor of film and media studies at Colorado State University. His books include Screwball Television: Critical Perspectives on "Gilmore Girls" and Movie Migrations: Transnational Genre Flows and South Korean Cinema.

Demonstrating an almost encyclopedic knowledge of television history, Diffrient provides a captivating examination of our cultural fascination with comic drunks, cults, and monsters.-- "Amanda Konkle, Georgia Southern University" Diffrient's book demonstrates how television comedy defines and polices behavior within the culture. . . . A valuable work that ought to provide a model for the field.-- "Philip Scepanski, author of Tragedy Plus Time: National Trauma and Television Comedy" Meticulously researched and engagingly written, this book demonstrates how the history of TV comedy is also a history of stereotypes of bad behaviors and our changing understanding of their roles in our lives.-- "Amanda Ann Klein, East Carolina University" Such expansive close analysis rooted within rigorous historiography offers a refreshing read within television studies, impressive scholarship indeed.-- "Christine Becker, University of Notre Dame" This is the rare book that is both theoretically rich and thoroughly entertaining. . . . An original and groundbreaking study that shows us why comedy matters.-- "Joanne Morreale, Northeastern University" Comic Drunks, Crazy Cults, and Lovable Monsters is more than just an in-depth survey of television comedy and its preoccupation with the immoral, the unacceptable, and the inappropriate; it is a compelling history of the medium, an intriguing cultural study, and a thoughtful examination of just who and what we are. In short, his book about being bad is very, very good.-- "Douglas Howard, coeditor of Television Finales: From Howdy Doody to Girls" From The Honeymooners to It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, Diffrient's triumphantly wide-ranging analysis of television comedy delivers a sophisticated and decidedly fun take on the medium's longstanding reliance on 'bad' behavior.-- "Alice Leppert, Ursinus College"