The article regards the evolution of English comedy in the first half of the XVII century. The crisis of humanistic attitude to the world by the XVII century radically changed the picture of reality for the English society. This caused the transformation of English drama, in particular, social Comedy. At the heart of the change was the " theory of humour" put forward by Ben Jonson. All components of Comedy underwent reformation: its essence, task, place of actions, characters. The task of Comedy was to portray a truthful of reality with all its flaws and vices, the sight of which was to cause their rejection. In order to make the vice look more repulsive, the dominant traits, temper in the characters were to be highlighted, presenting thus the vice in a grotesque way. Innovative Comedy of the first half of the XVII century created the basis for the Comedy of Restoration born at the end of the XVII century.