Is Charlie Day funny? The sitcom writer and star is obviously successful, having anchored the cast of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia for 16 squirm-inducing seasons. Yet even that achievement offers little in the way of proof of concept. IASIP, as its frat boy and nihilist fans have come to know it, is a tribute to human depravity in which laughs are an occasional byproduct. (Sample episode title: “The Gang Finds a Dumpster Baby.”) I won’t say the show has never made me smile, but it’s been an expression of astonishment, not pleasure. Perhaps God chuckled as he destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah.

Of course, there’s no accounting for taste, and IASIP has clearly accumulated a loyal audience. The more germane question, then, may be whether devotees to Day’s coal-black humor will thrill to his latest effort, a far broader affair that salutes Charlie Chaplin rather than, say, the Prince of Darkness. That project, the feature-length comedy Fool’s Paradise, enjoyed a brief theatrical release in May and is now available for streaming. Does it bring the laughs? Only sometimes. Nevertheless, it cracks a door through which Day may profitably slip in the future.