Weimar Slapstick and Hollywood Comedy Transformed

Bridging two crucial sites of global, interwar modernity, Hollywood and Weimar Slapstick provides a fundamental reassessment of Weimar culture, Hollywood comedy and their respective, intertwined legacies. Paul Flaig reexamines a wide range of comedy films featuring and directed by figures including Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton, Harold Lloyd, Mickey Mouse, Felix the Cat, the Marx Brothers, and Frank Capra in light of their circulation and citation among German filmmakers, philosophers, advertisers, politicians, artists, playwrights and poets. Drawing on a diverse range of German-language sources, including avant-garde manifestoes, arts journals, feuilletons, trade press reports and academic studies, Flaig investigates the historical context, intellectual foundations, and cultural and political underpinnings that contributed to the fascination with American comic cinema in Weimar Germany. In doing so, he highlights the invaluable insights and imagery of American-obsessed German thinkers and artists, such as Hannah Arendt, George Grosz, and Theodor Adorno, who played a pivotal role in shaping the perception and exploration of slapstick's entanglement with modernity. Highlighting the captivating powers of slapstick, cartoon, and screwball comedies, Hollywood and Weimar Slapstick offers an alternative history and analysis of European and American film cultures, revealing the cultural exchange and impact of comedy in this pivotal period.