Hitler Laughing: Comedy in the Third Reich

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Werner Maser, editor. Mein Schüler Hitler. Das Tagebuch seines Lehrers Paul Devrient, bearbeitet und herausgegeben von Werner Maser. Ilmgau Verlag, Paffenhofen 1975. That Hitler was coached in the art of speaking was also a topic in Bertolt Brecht’s drama about Chicago gangsters, Artuo Ui. Cited in Gustav Seibt, Süddeutsche Zeitung, 08.01.2007, available at http://www.filmportal.de. While many anti-fascists offered serious and potent arguments against Hitler, comedians like Charlie Chaplin responded to the mortal threat that the Nazis posed in a different way: They used humor to highlight the absurdity and hypocrisy of both the message and its notorious messenger. Chaplin homes in on his target It’s a late night in London in 1940, and Austrian exile Robert Lucas is writing at his desk. Bombs are raining down on the city every night, Hitler’s army is winning throughout Europe and the invasion of England has become a genuine prospect. In spite of the air-raid sirens and, as he put it “the hell’s noise of the war machinery" going off all around him, Lucas is focused on the job at hand: to “fight for the souls of the Germans”. He is composing a radio broadcast aimed at citizens of the Third Reich. But this is not a passionate plea for them to come to their senses. This is an attempt to make them laugh.

And yet there's no question that the novel has hit upon the key paradox of our modern obsession with Hitler. In spite of his current ubiquity – in the media, in advertising, in film and in comedy – we are perhaps further than ever from understanding what he was like as a real human being, or how he was able to lead the German people to participate in the historic crime of the Holocaust. Sao Paola Mostra de Cinema, 24 October 2001; Coachella Valley Festival of Festivals, 1 November 2001; Munich Film Festival, 29 June 2002 Perhaps those letters provide enough justification if you wonder – as Charlie Chaplin did after he learned about the atrocities of the Nazis – whether it was morally appropriate to ridicule them, as he did in The Great Dictator. Theodor Adorno insisted that anti-fascist satire fails to grasp or depict reality and, worse still, it ignores or trivialises the gravity of National Socialism. But did not laughter at least remind people of what it means to be human? Didn’t the mere existence of the satirical programmes display faith in the intellect and, above all, the humanity of the audience?In addition to the description by Schonwald, one can get an idea of Somuncu’s performance at YouTube.com, especially the routines, “Being Hitler,” “Hitler Sein,” and “Ich bin Adolf Hitler,” and also from his CD performances “Serdar Somuncu liest aus dem Tagebuch eines Massenmörders – Mein Kampf,” (2000) and “Serdar Somuncu liest Joseph Goebbels. Diese Stunde der Idiotie: Wollt Ihr den Totalen Krieg? Live-Lesung,” (2003). But this is difficult territory. Hitler as buffoon is a joke as old as Charlie Chaplin. But Hitler as human being also makes many uneasy. The reviewer, Cornelia Fiedler, of the Süddeutsche Zeitung, attributed the book’s success not to its literary quality but to an unsettling obsession with Hitler. “A very strange fixation on Hitler has developed in Germany and it has something of the manic about it. The focus on Hitler – be it as a comic figure or as the embodiment of evil – risks washing away the historical reality”. This year I can knit with finer wool, mum only helps me with the heel. They are going to be very warm, and where he always travels so much, his feet will not feel cold. Mummy also sends you greetings and many greetings and kisses from your Bernile!' Quoted in Shai Oster, “Holocaust Humor”, Utne Reader, 31 October 2007, available online at http://www.utne.com/1999-09-01/holocaust-humor.aspx.

For a discussion of these films and others see Georg Seeßlen, “Zu Hitler Muss Uns Immer Wieder Etwas Einfallen,” 179-199, in Mein Führer: Die Wirklich Wahrste Wahrheit über Adolf Hitler: Das Buch zum Film, Reinbek bei Hamburg: Rowohlt Taschenbuch Verlag, 2007. Grunbaum's eldest son and wife want Grunbaum to kill Hitler, which he tries but cannot bring himself to do. This is an important storyline, says Moritz Reininghaus, editor of a Jewish paper here, Juedische Zeitung. Roberto Benigni’s Italian Life is Beautiful preceded Mein Führer by 10 years and the East German dramatic comedy Jakob der Lügner, directed by Frank Beyer, was released in 1975. But both of these films mix drama with comedy, pathos with laughter. Mein Führer is pure farce. The film suggests Hitler became a brutal dictator because he was mistreated as a child. One Jewish community leader here says Hitler does not deserve any mitigating circumstances or pity. But director and screenplay author Dani Levy says he was tired of documentaries that insist on demonizing Nazi leaders without asking how they came to power. Levy is Jewish and was born in Switzerland, where his mother lived after fleeing Hitler's Third Reich.Schonwald, Josh, “The Rise of Hitler Humor,” in Otium, Vol 2 # 4, 13 January 2006. Available at http://otium.uchicago.edu/articles/hitler_humorist.html.