Menswear

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Herrenmoden (also buying suits ) is a sketch by the German humorist Loriot . It shows a married couple buying a suit for the man. The sketch first aired in 1976 on the second episode of the Loriot series. His text appeared in print in 1981. Due to the topics covered and the structure of the sketch, it is rated as pointing the way for Loriot's television work.

plot

A couple enters a men's clothing store. The woman approaches a customer who she mistakenly thinks is the seller and explains that her husband is "a bit full in the hips with rather short arms". The customer expresses his regret and leaves the store. The couple is now approached by a seller. The woman explains to him that she wanted to buy a suit for the man and repeats the description of his body.

The seller now shows the couple various suits that the man tries on. Meanwhile, the wife shares intimate details with him, such as her husband's underwear, which she sees as desolate. When the man tries on the first suit, the jacket is too small and the trousers too short. However, the seller explains that the pants are now being worn shorter. In addition, it still falls in use.

In order to better assess the suit, the woman asks her husband to put his keys and wallet in the pockets of the suit. As a result, the man forgets both in a checked suit when changing clothes. When he tried on a suit that was much too big, the salesman explained to the couple that the trousers were now being worn a little more heavily. You would also lift yourself up by inserting the seat fold in the knee. Only now does the man realize that he has lost his wallet and keys. He is now reaching into the pockets of various customers in checkered suits, including a customer who has just entered the shop with his wife.

Eventually his wife finds the suit in the hands of a salesman. The wife then ends the sales pitch and decides in favor of the oversized suit. When asked how exactly the pants lift, the seller crouches down to demonstrate. The woman then instructs her husband to do the same and crouch down to walk through the shop. The seller recommends that the couple should start the hour-long walk home in this position. The couple then leaves the shop, the man still crouching.

Production and publication

The sketch was created in 1976 for Loriot's telescopic sketches , the second episode of the Loriot series produced by Radio Bremen . It was broadcast on German television on October 18, 1976 . Loriot and Ingeborg Heydorn played the main roles of the couple , Edgar Hoppe played the salesman . The second couple played Evelyn Hamann and Claus Dieter Clausnitzer . In addition, several extras appeared whose names are not mentioned in the end credits of the episode.

In the 1997 re-cut version by Loriot , the sketch is part of the seventh episode, Fernsehwahn und Reality , which aired on June 3, 1997 on Das Erste . The sketch was also shown on Loriot's 65th birthday in 1988 .

The sketch first appeared in print in 1981 in the anthology Loriot's Dramatic Works . It is assigned to the chapter Scenes from a Marriage . Since then it has appeared in several other volumes by Loriot.

Analysis and classification

Until the airing of menswear , most of Loriot's skits centered on the parody of television. She shaped his first cartoon series and was still very present in the first episode of Loriot . In men's fashion , Loriot devoted himself for the first time in a sketch to married life and communication between men and women, a topic that he had already taken up several times in his graphic work, around 1956 in the Quick series Adam and Evchen . It now developed into the most important basic motif of his television work. So it was already in the center of attention in the next episode of Loriot with skits like Das Frühstücksei , Feierabend and Die Nudel .

The depiction of the spouses in men's fashion follows typical Loriot patterns. The woman is the dominant partner in the relationship. Although the couple want to buy a suit for the man, the woman takes over the communication with the seller, the man restricts himself to individual interjections and otherwise subordinates himself to his wife. This submissiveness to his wife and also to the seller is made clear at the end of the sketch by the stooped posture of the man with which he leaves the shop. The other customer, who calls his wife for help, behaves in a similar way when the man reaches into his suit pockets in search of his wallet.

The wife treats her husband like a toddler more often, for example when she tells him to stop touching his nose. In addition, she embarrasses him with the private details that she shares with the seller. Uwe Ehlert, who did his doctorate on communication disorders in Loriot's sketches, classifies the woman as a compulsive talker because of this behavior, i.e. as a person who cannot stand the silence of the pauses in conversation and therefore has to compulsively continue the conversation. The Germanist Stefan Neumann recognizes hatred and contempt for her husband in the woman's behavior, which reminds him of Loriot's poem Advent , in which a forester's wife kills her husband because he disturbs her cleaning.

In addition to the communication of the spouses, the portrayal of the seller and his communication with the customers is another important aspect of the comedy of the sketch. This theme was also shown in Loriot's telescopic sketches in the sketch The White Mouse , in which an animal dealer sells a dead mouse as a pet to a naive customer. It also developed into a recurring motif in Loriot's sketches, which was taken up when buying beds and visiting a sales representative .

In men's fashion , the salesperson dominates the conversation with his customers. His communication is fully geared towards the goal of selling. Instead of looking for a suitable suit for the customer, he tries to make the suit, which is much too short, attractive by flattering. The couple are largely devoted to the seller and usually accept his statements without contradiction. When the man asks doubtfully whether you really wear it like that in Paris, the seller replies with “Who can afford it”, thus appealing, as Uwe Ehlert states, to the monetary honor of the couple. The behavior of the seller, when shortly afterwards completely contradicting his previous statements and recommending a suit that is too long, becomes open fraud. Loriot had already used the same contradicting statements in 1959 in an edition of the Quick column The Quite Open Letter , in which he reported on his experiences buying trousers. Although the behavior of the seller is greatly exaggerated and increased to the point of absurdity, the type of seller who adjusts his statements in a way that promises the greatest success for him is still known to many from everyday life. This recognition of the situation contributes to the comedy of the sketch, according to Stefan Neumann.

In addition to the comical depictions of the married couple and the salesman, Stefan Neumann sees the sketch with the confusion about the lost wallet also containing the beginnings of slapstick . Overall, Neumann sees Herrenmoden "both in terms of the subject matter and the internal structure [as] pointing the way for large parts of the later television work by Loriot". For him, "[the sketch] finally heralds the phase of the mature comedian and author who knows how to artfully link different levels of action and comic elements in a very small space, linguistically and technically, so that a multilayered, profound and often comic work is created."

Audio-visual media

  • Loriot's library. Volume 6: The noodle or the woman as such. Warner Home Video, Hamburg 1984, VHS No. 6.
  • Loriot - his large sketch archive. Warner Home Video, Hamburg 2001, DVD No. 2 (as part of Loriot 7 ).
  • Loriot - The complete television edition. Warner Home Video, Hamburg 2007, DVD No. 3 (as part of Loriot II ).

Text publications (selection)

Web links

literature

  • Uwe Ehlert: "That is probably more of a communication disorder". The representation of misunderstandings in Loriot's work . ALDA! Der Verlag, Nottuln 2004, ISBN 3-937979-00-X , p. 260–275 (also dissertation at the University of Münster 2003).
  • Stefan Neumann: Loriot and the comedy. Life, work and work of Vicco von Bülow . Scientific publishing house Trier, Trier 2011, ISBN 978-3-86821-298-3 .
  • Felix Christian Reuter: Chaos, comedy, cooperation. Loriot's television sketches (=  Oliver Jahraus , Stefan Neuhaus [Hrsg.]: FILM - MEDIA - DISCOURSE . Volume 70 ). Königshausen & Neumann, Würzburg 2016, ISBN 978-3-8260-5898-1 (also dissertation at the University of Trier 2015).

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ In Loriot's library , Loriot - the complete television edition , the text publications and on the website loriot.de operated by Loriot's community of heirs, the sketch is called Herrenmoden . The Loriot DVD Collection - His Large Sketch Archive uses the title Suit Buying .
  2. ↑ Stefan Neumann: Loriot and the high comedy. 2011, p. 261.
  3. ↑ Stefan Neumann: Loriot and the high comedy. 2011, p. 416.
  4. ↑ Uwe Ehlert: "That is probably more of a communication disorder". 2003, p. 446.
  5. ↑ Stefan Neumann: Loriot and the high comedy. 2011, p. 264.
  6. ↑ Stefan Neumann: Loriot and the high comedy. 2011, p. 269.
  7. ↑ Stefan Neumann: Loriot and the high comedy. 2011, pp. 264, 277.
  8. ^ Felix Christian Reuter: Chaos, comedy, cooperation. 2016, pp. 127–128.
  9. ↑ Uwe Ehlert: "That is probably more of a communication disorder". 2003, p. 273.
  10. ↑ Stefan Neumann: Loriot and the high comedy. 2011, p. 265.
  11. ↑ Stefan Neumann: Loriot and the high comedy. 2011, pp. 264-265.
  12. ↑ Uwe Ehlert: "That is probably more of a communication disorder". 2003, pp. 265-266.
  13. ↑ Uwe Ehlert: "That is probably more of a communication disorder". 2003, p. 268.
  14. ↑ Stefan Neumann: Loriot and the high comedy. 2011, p. 191. Susanne von Bülow, Peter Geyer, OA Krimmel (ed.): The very open letter . Hoffmann and Campe, Hamburg 2014, ISBN 978-3-455-40514-9 , pp. 51 .
  15. ↑ Uwe Ehlert: "That is probably more of a communication disorder". 2003, p. 274. Stefan Neumann: Loriot and the high comedy. 2011, p. 266.
  16. ↑ Stefan Neumann: Loriot and the high comedy. 2011, pp. 266-267.