Even in farce and in musical comedy, as well as in vaudeville, the once familiar green-whiskered Irishman, the Frenchman who is all shrugging shoulders and absurd gestures, the negro who walks as if he were trying to take two steps backward for every one forward, and whose most noticeable facial feature is an enormous mouth, and the “Busy Izzy” type of Jew, who when not getting robbed himself, or being otherwise abused, is doing his best to defraud others, are gradually going out of fashion.  And in the photoplay, which is now seen by all classes of people and is for all the people, racial characteristics must be treated in at least a fairly accurate manner, and always good-naturedly.  Six or seven years ago, more than half the comedies produced were based upon a chase, or else depended largely upon slap-stick humor to raise a laugh.  Not a few of them had as their chief comedy-incident an act of downright cruelty to some animal, or even to some human being.  Today, when manufacturers are vying with each other to produce better, cleaner, and more universally enjoyable pictures, the script that violates Censorship rules or studio ethics by including any of the foregoing undesirable subjects stands but little show of reaching the production stage, if, indeed—­which is extremely unlikely—­it is accepted at all.

“Good sense is at once the basis of and the limit to all humor.  He who lacks a fine perception of ’the difference between what things are and what they ought to be,’ as the always-to-be-quoted Hazlitt expressed it, can never write humor.  All the way through we shall find that mirth is a matter of relationships, of shift, of rigidity trying to be flexible, of something shocked into something else.

“Let us think of a circle on which four points have been marked: 

[Illustration: 

5 The Serious 1

4 The Contemptible 2 The Laughable

3 The Ridiculous]

“Beginning with a serious idea, we may swiftly step from point to point until we return to the serious, with only slight variations from the original conception.  Take the perennial comedy-theme of the impish collar, and visualize the scenes: 

“1.  A man starts to button his collar.  Nothing is less comical, as long as the operation proceeds normally.

“2.  But the button is too large and his efforts begin to exasperate him, with the result that his expression and movements become incongruous.  We see, and laugh—­though he does not.

“3.  He begins to hop around in a mad attempt to button the unbuttonable, and soon rips off the collar, addressing it in unparliamentary language.  He is ludicrous, ridiculous, absurd.

“4.  In his rage he violently kicks a pet dog that comes wagging up to him.  Our laughter subsides, for the fellow is more contemptible than amusing—­a deeper feeling has been born in us.

“5.  The little dog limps off with a broken leg—­we are no longer amused, we are indignant.  What is more, not only have we gotten back to the serious, but there is no amusement left in any of the previous scenes.