The Comedy Bible:-

A brief:-

For people who want to make a life of being a comic. Most people were doing something else before hand, it is possible to make it. Jay Leno was an auto mechanic. Barry Kempt (writer for Taxi, and Newhart and Coach) was a taxi. Rodney Dangerfield was selling house paint beforehand.

• The warm-up – is there any hope for you?

If you have opinions about the service in a restaurant, the new TV season, interest rates, you have a topic. Funny people are a strange lot. We like laughs, even at our own expense .Most people hide their defects, but comics show the world. The more people who know how bald, insecure – the better we feel as long as we get the laugh.

“I have low self-esteem. When we were in bed together, I would fantasize I was someone else”

Starting with your ideas 

Pay attention to things and write your ideas down

Jerry Seinfeld says 

I get my ideas from life. I was out at dinner and ordered a bottle of wine and the waiter gave me the cork to smell, I felt stupid sniffing it. ‘Yeah that is a cork’ and the waiter laughed, so I wrote down and put it in my act.The more darts you throw, the more likely you hit something – a bit like Amway

For the free form writing – don’t try and be funny, messy, or judge it, need to re- read it every month.

Comedy – be afraid, be very afraid 

Does the thought of doing stand up make you scared? Number one fear of people is public speaking.

Some of us have creativity beaten down by others.Like when you build a sandcastle as a child, then your dad comes along and tells you that you are doing it wrong .Take those experiences and multiply them times a million.It becomes safer not doing. You become another person sitting on the couch drinking beer and saying things like “this guy sucks. I could do better than him” – but you do not do it at all.

Fear it is a good thing 

Fear is not the problem – it is how you deal with it – or how you do not deal with it. Brave people are not unafraid. What distinguishes them is they act despite of fear. And funny people do not find it easy to do a gig in front of 2000.

• Comedy Workshop:-

26 days to killer comedy material 

Joke Structure:-ATTITUDE + TOPIC + PREMISE + ACT OUT + MIX + ACT OUT

Attitude, Topic, and Premise – the set up (serious). Act out and mix (funny).

Set up

 It is not the funny part of the joke, but not the most important.If you can not get the audience interested at the beginning of a joke?  They are not going to be there at the end of the joke. The audience makes up their minds very quickly so every joke is very important to capture their attention, then make them laugh. Setups are usually very serious and authentic -meaning they have a ring of truth and honesty.

E.g. Richard Lewis

[I hope you are in love and I hope you feel good about yourself because I am not in love and do not feel good about myself. I recently broke up with a woman]

e.g Julia Sweeney

[My doctor told me that I had cancer and I was going to have a hysterectomy].

Comedy structure – the attitude 

Jokes without attitude can end up sounding too literary, perhaps humorous, but not funny enough to get laughs big.

Four basic attitudes for writing jokes

1. ‘weird’
2. ‘scary’
3. ‘hard’
4. ‘stupid’

Memorize these words, elongate them as you say them . These words are the tools to get really big laughs . You might have a funny attitude for a joke, a great topic, a funny character, but without attitude, but would not be good without attitude.

E.g.  Dom Irrera

“Is not dating haaaaard? I asked one girl out and she said, you got a friend? I said yes, and she said then go hang out with him”

• Why use such negative words? What about love?
• Nobody in their right mind will pay cover and inflated drink prices, hear about what they love.
• Professional comics, do not need to use the literal words but act it out.

[ATTITUDE + TOPIC + PREMISE + ACT OUT  + MIX + ACT OUT ]

Premise 

A premise is the opinion, a slant, a spin, or point of view on the topic

E.g. Robin Williams

[You know what is hard about having kids?] Is the attitude

[When you have a baby, you have to clean up your act] is the premise

A good premise is very specific about what exactly is hard, weird, stupid or scary.

Hack Attack – Common premise mistakes:-

It does not answer the attitude + topic question [Do you know what is hard about relationships? I was online and after 5 minutes in a chat room, a woman thought we were married. One that has been done to death – is not it weird how cats and dogs are really different? Something untrue.Something that tries to be funny, rather than genuine

Something that is about you – rather than an insight about others  is not  it weird how my girlfriend does not want to have sex?’ 

Steps for writing 

• Directly answer the attitude + topic question
• Keep it in the present tense
• Do not try and be funny
• Avoid using words like I, me
• Come up with a strong opinion, an insight, an original observation.

Comedy structure: the act out:-

ATTITUDE + TOPIC + PREMISE + ACT OUT  + MIX + ACT OUT

Set up (unfunny) – Act out (funny part)

Here the comic acts out the situation of the joke and scores the big laughs . Instead of talking about something, you perform it . You turn into the people or things that you mention in the setup, you literally act them out . Act outs give comics the chance to show off their ability to do voices and characters

Act outs can be long or short .

Wrong  way

[it was hard having dad as a lawyer. I had to motion for a puppy]

Right way

[it was hard having a dad as a lawyer. When I wanted a puppy, I had to go [act out], dad, motion for a puppy. [Act out dad’s voice] ‘Motion for puppy denied’

• Act outs are not meant to be written on paper, they are funny the way they are performed
• They do not have to be people; they can be vegetables, animals, minerals or even GOD.

• Fine-tune your topics – relatable topics:-

Your personal world, topics of the world, something in the middle

Out of these

1. Your bald spot – relatable
2. alcoholic mother – not relatable
3.  By Your name – not relatable

Any joke based on something that is physically obvious is an authentic topic. Many comics turn their defects as their tickets to fame and fortune.

Next steps:-

Step 1 – write a premise for your buddy.

Step 2 – walking and ranting. Shift from thinking about the premise to act out and ranting around.

Your opening:-

A good opening gets the audience’s attention, defines your persona and let them know that a pro is on stage e.g George Wallace says

[Take command as you walk on stage. Your attitude should say, ‘this is my show. I do not know what happened before, but I am here, and this is what I do, and I hope you like it. Just as a salesperson, you have an opening then you present the item you hope they buy it, they laugh, and then you sell the second joke. Whatever your opening is, be willing to toss it if it conflicts with the mood of the room, get on the same wavelength. Get to your first joke in a natural way – audiences take time to warm up to someone. Do not throw one at them from a clear blue sky.

Hacks are” so let me tell you a bit about myself” – hack! Do not assume the audience is interested in you. They are not

“I know what you are thinking” – been done to death, it is a cliché

“How are you all doing?” shows that you are not original. It is inauthentic because the audience knows that the comic does not really care about what they are doing. “so raise your hands if you are …” – the audience has paid for inflated beers, that is enough.

Comedy disconnect 

When the comic tries to be funny, rather than communicate ideas or a desperate attempt to get laughs at any cost.

What if I forget my act? :-

Fear can cause the disconnection to lose your act. The moment you admit it in your act, it is a real moment, and make you likable human and funny

• Do not be obsessed with perfection
• If you go blank, have a sense of humor about it

Stories 

Something that describes rather than gives insight ( like a story) – stories are too long. Get to the point. The hardest part about writing comedy is that what works at a party, with friends, is not what works on stage. Stand up comedy is premise-based and not story-based. If you tell your funny stories you will bomb. Skilled comedians can do it, as the story is broken up into a series of premises

e.g Jerry Seinfeld

“do not like other people’s shows because you can never adjust the air temperature right. I do not know the ratio on the dials. Sometimes a sixteenth of an inch in a thousand degree. Got to get out of the way of the water.

“There is always that little hair stuck on the wall of someone else’s shower, you want to get rid of it, but you do not want to touch it. I do not know how it got up there in the first place. Maybe it has a life of its own and I do not want to get involved. Cull your stories and break them into jokes

How to pick current event topics:–

Do not pick one because you think it is funny and Pick it because:

1. You have an interesting opinion about it
2. You have a personal experience with it
3. They have a passionate attitude about it.