Taskmaster / Masktaster

In one episode of Taskmaster, where the contestants are invited to bring in the "most spectacular picture of themselves", Hugh Dennis wears a picture of his face, on his face. He says he wears it because Hugh Dennis would never wear a mask of himself - so people assume that it must be someone else behind the mask. Hugh Dennis's admittedly banal picture of himself turns out to be an effective demonstration of the difference between comedians and people: the Hugh Dennis out doing his shopping, wearing the mask of Hugh Dennis, actually isn't the same person as the person he's wearing a mask of. He's wearing a mask of Stage Dennis; he's wearing the mask of character comedy. Hugh Dennis came last in the round for most spectacular picture. But his mask is a perfect demonstration of the wider context.

Character comedy is very popular in the UK. The gist of the idea is that the comedian is playing a character that the comedian has created. Some of the most famous examples include David Brent, Ali G, or Alan Partridge: exaggerated personas aiming to make a statement about the nature of the people they parody. Of course, you could say that Ali G's exaggerated persona actually aims to parody those he interviews - but at the end of the day, Ali G is a voice of society - framing commonplace objections in comic terms. The most notable thing about these characters, though, is that they are diffuse, distinct from the people that play them. Instead, let's examine the stand-up comics that perform character comedy: the people who play distorted versions of themselves, on-stage.

I am not convinced that Tim Key is a man who covers himself in Kronenberg every time he opens one. But this is what happens to Key on stage, when he's wearing the mask. Key calls everything "the thorniest issue" and Key makes my knees weak. How much of this is matched by the unmasked Key is unclear, but suffice to say his insistence that he borked a Siberian waitress is clearly doohickey. Key on stage and Key off - masked Key and unmasked Key - are different.

Out there on the net, you can watch James Acaster's original stand-up routine on Russell Howard's Good News. He's completely different to the nasal, pedantic hothead that Acaster employs on comedy routines nowadays. The impression is that Acaster on Good News is delivering a stand-up routine as unmasked Acaster. In the present day, he is masked Acaster. What if unmasked Acaster has simply changed personality? I find this unlikely, in the same way that it is unlikely that Hammond, Clarkson and May appear to have mentally retroceded in their performances on The Grand Tour. They play lovable berks for the cameras, but the "three men bickering" must have more nuanced personalities when they step off the stage. The mask seems to come off in the video the trio recently produced on climate change, or in James May's more intellectually focused The Reassembler. Tangents aside, I don't believe Acaster has hardened in the same way as his on-stage persona. His candid conversations make him come across as vulnerable, addictive and, in some ways, a little sad. A very funny sad man who amps it up when he puts his mask on.

All this leads to Taskmaster, a programme that is really all about masks. I've explored previously how Taskmaster sits at the intersection between game shows and panel shows, including the comedy of the latter within the content of the former. Imagine a programme like The Chase: even though it takes place on a stage, all the contestants are unmasked. They are not playing someone else; their personality is barely different from if they were sat at home, eating a cheese toastie. But The Chase is a bad example - The Chasers themselves are masked, are amping up their personalities. Paul Sinha is probably the most famous example, a jovial sort with his own quiz-themed comedy programme and who, actually, appeared on Taskmaster. But on The Chase he is a hard-nosed quizzer with eyes on the prize. Regardless, the Chasers are not contestants; they are like the mock villains of camper game shows from years gone by. Like an evil Richard O'Brien / Richard Ayoade.

So where Taskmaster differs from the typical gameshow is that its participants are not members of the public; they are comedians (usually) with an incentive to create amusing situations. And it is just an incentive; the programme will attract more people if more amusing things happen. But a comedian could feasibly go on Taskmaster without looking to find the funny - i.e. they could go on unmasked, just like members of the public do when they appear on game shows. The fact that this is a choice means that Taskmaster contestants actually straddle the binary between being masked and unmasked on-stage.

In my post on notification fugue, I explored these masks with reference to communications - specifically, communications between businesses and people. A mask of personality enables a corporation to generate a degree of empathy with its subject, helping to create a relationship and blurring the line between communications with one's peers and with... Hovis. Any actor with a commercial interest can put on a mask to amplify their selling power. But what are the comedians selling? The product of their comedy persona. To appear with their mask on is a hook for their products. Hence the incentive to wear the mask, to treat their appearance as work rather than play... But isn't a large element of a comedian's work in the play? The hard graft is in the writing, the honing of a persona, the painting of the mask. Except Greg Davies. Greg Davies is just all man, all the time.

Back to Taskmaster. In the context of this commercial incentive, the masked / unmasked dichotomy defines the programme. Some comedians are more characterful than others: James Acaster or Sally Phillips wear thicker masks than, say, Richard Osman - neither actor nor comedian by trade. But regardless, a choice to embody one's on-stage persona as much as possible generates a greater pull for that contestant's other... products. If Hovis and Warburtons were contestants on a bread-centric Taskmaster, they would doubtless play up their social media game and turn on the charm, as opposed to loafing around, just to generate more interest in their bread. In the real, less yeasty Taskmaster, contestants lie across the binary, with some following the character line than others. Just like corporations, comedians mask up in proportion to the effort and investment they wish to put into boosting their product. The chaotic neutral is someone like Jo Brand, whose character is loafing around.

The harm in all this staging and masking is that it covers the real with the hyperreal. A dairy farm can mask their slaughter of calves with a canny Twitter campaign. An energy supplier can shrug off concerns about emissions from gas boilers with a swift "all renewable electricity" racket. An industrial baker can distract from the total nutritional blankness of their white bread with some ad campaign about a boy cycling loaves around. And it works; we forget the injustice, because it's injustice with a human face. A human mask. Like Hovis wearing Hugh Dennis: all corporations are character comedians now. The worst part is: the joke's on us.