Acknowledgments

The Strange Case of the Backflipping Senators

``How Is It Possible for a Civilized Man to Live Among People Who Are Always Joking?'' Class, Comedy, and Cultural Change in Turn-of-the-Century America

``A Regular Mine, a Reservoir, a Proving Ground'': Reconstructing the Vaudeville Aesthetic

``Assorted Lunacy ... with No Beginning and No End'': Gag, Performance, and Narrative in Early Sound Comedy

``A High-Class Job of Carpentry'': Toward a Typography of Early Sound Comedy

``Shall We Make It for New York or for Distribution?'' Eddie Cantor, Whoopee, and Regional Resistance to the Talkies

``Fifi Was My Mother's Name!'' Anarchistic Comedy, the Vaudeville Aesthetic, and Diplomaniacs

``If the Whole World Were Created for Our Pleasure'': Order and Disorder in Anarchistic Comedy

``Don't Become Too Intimate with That Terrible Woman!'' Unruly Wives, Female Performance, and Gendered Laughter in Early Sound Comedy

Conclusion: The Return of the Backflipping Senators

Notes

Index