comedy

noun

KAH-muh-dee/ˈkɑ.mə.di/UKKOM-uh-dee/ˈkɒm.ə.di/

Pluralcomedies (some meanings)

8 meanings of comedy

1
noununcountable
Funny shows, jokes, and acts that are made to make people laugh.
Like a tickle for your funny bone: it is made to get you laughing.
She loves comedy and watches a funny show almost every night.
Good comedy can make a whole room laugh at once.
Similarhumor
2
nouncountable or uncountable
The kind of movies, plays, and shows made mainly to be funny.
Like a shelf in a store where all the funny films sit together.
Comedy is her favorite genre, so she skips the scary films.
The streaming service has a whole section just for comedy.
Oppositetragedy, drama
Note
3
nouncountable
A play, movie, or TV show that is light and funny, or that makes fun of people or ideas.
She stars in a new TV comedy about a family that runs a small hotel.
Dad likes action movies, but Mom always picks a comedy on movie night.
Oppositetragedy
Note
4
nouncountable
A funny play for the stage that ends happily.
Like a story where things go wrong but turn out fine in the end.
The students put on a short comedy at the end of the term.
We saw a comedy where the lovers finally got married.
Oppositetragedy
5
nouncountable or uncountable
The skill of writing comedy that makes people laugh.
Like learning to cook: making people laugh takes practice to get right.
She studied comedy for years before writing her first script.
Writing good comedy takes a lot of practice and good timing.
6
nouncountable
A funny thing that happens, often by accident.
Like when everything goes wrong in such a funny way that you can't stop laughing.
Their attempt to put up the tent turned into a real comedy.
The school play became a comedy when the set fell over.
Similarfarce, circus, fiasco
Oppositetragedy
7
noundialectalEuropeMedievalcountable
A long poem that tells a story and ends happily.
Like a long story-poem that, after dark times, finishes with a happy ending.
Dante wrote a famous comedy about a journey through the afterlife.
The comedy ends with the hero reaching paradise.
Note
8
nounhistoricalcountable
A happy group song, sung by people long ago in Ancient Greece.
Like a loud, happy song a crowd sings together at a party.
The villagers sang a comedy as they marched through the streets at the festival.
At the harvest feast, the chorus broke into a joyful comedy.
Note

Practice

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Origin

It comes from Latin "cōmoedia," which came from Ancient Greek. The Greek word joined "kômos" (revel, partying) with a word for "song" or "singer."