Beauty and schlub

If what Carina Chocano says about funny actresses being relegated to the roles of “scolds, nags or ciphers” is true [“Where Have All the Funny Girls Gone?” Oct. 21], then my short-term future as a screenwriter is dead at the door. Neither the male lead nor the female lead of the romantic comedy I just handed into my agent at Preferred Artists fits into the male-schlub-immature, female-beautiful-but-conventional-and-dull pattern that she describes.

Then again, she could be right. The college media students I teach complain that the current crop of comedies is formulaic and lackluster. Like Chocano, they don’t understand what the gorgeous female sees in the dweeb lead guy. And the plots are too simplistic. But, my students say, they go to comedies because they can at least be guaranteed a few laughs because the lead male is a comedian.

Skye Dent

Leimert Park