Rogen Rant

This entry may not be particularly scholarly in nature. However, I want to get this off my chest: Seth Rogen is getting on my nerves. When he was on Freaks and Geeks, his offbeat, one-line sarcastic observations were endearing; they made his "freak" character likeable. I think, though, that my problem with Rogen began after Knocked Up.

And I'm pretty sure I now know why. We've spent a lot of time in class talking about how many successful stage comedians adopt a role; the audience begins to have certain expectations of their stage presence, which we've assumed is likely an exaggeration of their true personalities (and personality quirks). In terms of Rogen, he too has adopted a "stage presence." The same one line witticisms that rendered him endearing about 10 years ago on Freaks and Geeks now make him redundant. He plays the chubby, cynical, but generally good-hearted twenty-something in pretty much every film he's in: Knocked Up, Zack and Miri Make a Porno, 40 Year Old Virgin, Superbad, Pineapple Express... (you get the idea). Okay, so Knocked Up was pretty funny; still, the situation the character was in made the film humorous--not the character himself. And Superbad and 40 Year Old Virgin were hysterical only because Rogen was a supporting character instead of a lead.

Okay, so I'm getting to a point here: stand up comedians' success in self-caricaturization (is that a real term?) fails to translate to the same success for actors in comedic roles. There's a lack of novelty when this happens across film roles. And, at least when caricatured comedians are on stage, they can tailor their quirks toward the audience in front of them; film actors perform for an imagined audience and for screenwriters and directors. In the case of Rogen (and Apatow), I think their audiences may be ready for something different...