Mar 10 2009
Some Suggestions for Humor-Writers
Comedy and humor are notoriously hard to teach, but here are some tips.
1. Conciseness is essential. Cutting out empty lines in a joke usually makes it funnier.
2. Exaggeration is usually helpful. It makes the exchanges more memorable and helps keep readers on your page. For example, if I want Agent Orange to come off as comically paranoid, I might have him do a rant about the critical danger presented by squirrels, those sinister vagrant rodents. In contrast, if his bogeyman was something like terrorists or global warming, it wouldn’t be as clear that I was trying to make him seem ridiculous.
3. The most successful comedians vary their levels of wackiness. Unwacky humor is usually more dry/wry and more subtle. Wackier comedy is usually in your face. For example, Dave Chapelle’s wackiest humor is best when it comes out of nowhere. Check out his Sesame Street sketch. He talks soberly about how Sesame Street is teaching kids bad things. “It teaches kids how to judge people, how to label people. They judge Oscar right in his face. ‘Oscar, you’re so mean. You are such a grouch.’ ‘Bitch, I live in a f***ing trash can!’ ”
4. Jokes that are hard to follow are awful. Jokes that disrupt the flow of the story are also usually awful.
5. The best kind of humor advances the story, develops the cast and entertains readers. As a rule, I recommend staying away from comic tangents. If you absolutely have to take us on a comic tangent, try to keep it as connected to the here-and-now of the story as possible. For example, if we had a mad scientist character reminiscing about one of his spectacularly bizarre experiments, he might say at one point in the story “This reminds me of my hybrid elephant-jellyfish. I miss Sparky.” Please don’t go off on Family Guy-style tangents that derail the story. Novel readers (and even comic book readers) tend to expect more cohesion than the typical sit-com viewer does.
6. Two main skills distinguish good comedians from the rest: delivery and material. First is delivery. A good writer will pace out a joke well, in a way that’s easy to follow. Give the readers pauses as necessary. Second is the quality of the material. A good comedian can look at scenes and figure out some funny situations that might arise. The best way to learn this skill (besides practicing) is to watch/read a lot of skillful comedy. What sort of situations did these other writers use for comic effect?
SUPERHERO AND SUPERHERO-LIKE SHOWS:
–Kim Possible, all seasons
–Justice League/JLU, particularly the episode with Booster Gold.
–Jackie Chan Adventures, particularly season 1
–Lois and Clark: The New Adventures of Superman, particularly seasons 1-2.
–Heroes, season 1.
–Maybe the later seasons of Teen Titans. I don’t think it works particularly well for older watchers, but I’ve noticed that kids seem to like it a lot.
CARTOON STRIPS
–Calvin and Hobbes
–The Boondocks
–Dilbert
TV
–Chapelle Show, particularly seasons 1-2. Also, his stand-up stuff’s pretty good.
–Frasier
–Futurama
–Black Adder
–The Office
MOVIES
–Austin Powers 1 and 2
–Office Space
–The Big Lebowski
–Clerks
–Thank You for Smoking. It’s not as good as the book, though.
–Monty Python, particularly the Holy Grail.
–American Pie
–Men in Black
–My Fellow Americans
–Monsters, Inc. and maybe the Toy Story movies
–Lilo & Stitch, particularly the Man in Black social worker character.
–Harold and Maude
–Hot Fuzz
–The 40 Year-Old Virgin
–The Hudsucker Proxy
–Clueless
–Caddyshack
–Princess Bride (both the book and movie)
–Liar, Liar
I’d like to add something to this if I may.
One of the most consistent and effective tools in comedy is something I call ‘The Garden Path Routine.’
You lead the reader/viewer down a path, then just as they think they know where they’re going, you switch it. The suprise generally makes them laugh.
An example:
Brad: Hey Jim, fancy some popcorn?
Jim: Nah, I’m cool, I really gotta keep away from that stuff.
Brad: Aww, c’mon man, just one bag of popcorn!
Jim: Seriously, I can’t. It’s bad for my health, all that oil messes with my cholesterol levels, it’s salty, it’s–
Brad: C’mon Jim, I’m paying.
Jim: Get me a large bag.
Hopefully you got my point!
Hmm. One comic routine is to list a few items, one of which is clearly not like the others. For example, a character’s three rottweilers are named Brute, Mangler and Sparky.
Indeed. In a way, that’s actually a variation of the Garden Path.
Wild incomptence can also work . . . or just plain wacky/random things (see: nobody expects the spanish inquisition!)
@ Hollie
I only have one sentence for you: Donuts and bagels are remarkably similar. Bonus points for me actually saying this in real life. In the middle of math class.
- Wings
“For example, a character’s three rottweilers are named Brute, Mangler and Sparky”.
I’ve thought about that before. If I were to get three bulldogs (not likely, they scare me) I would name them Ripper, Shredder and Princess.
“…actually saying this in real life. In the middle of math class”.
I’ve done stuff like that before. In English I once remarked on the possibility that the whole universe is just a piece of lint in God’s pocket.
I’m also fairly observant. In my Earth Science class we were using foam cups to make artificial fossils, and we’d just finished a unit about the ecosystem. I pointed out that using non-biodegradable things to do our experiment defeated the purpose of learning that the greenhouse buildup is bad.
@ RW – You are an excellent person. I can feel it!
- Wings
Haha, thanks.
My philosophy is to make comedy that is funny because it’s true. That’s why I find Dane Cook or Dave Chapelle or The Office hilarious because it makes those references, ya know? Also pop culture references are hilarious. One time, I had to make a speech and as an opening I yelled at the top of my lungs, “I wish I was Ryan Seacrest!”
I’m slightly insane in a nice way.
-*i88*
I would like to make a suggestion- Supernatural. While it’s mainly a horror show, it blends humour in nicely to nearly every episode [well, i've only seen the first three seaseons so I can't really speak for season four].
Supernatural, good show, good show.
Sometimes the Wangst does pile on a bit think though, but yeah, pretty darn awesome.
Season three kinda lagged a bit, but dear God did season 4 make up for that. Holy crap, it was awesome.
I don’t know how good its humour is, though. Most of its humour seems to come from obscure references to 80s movies and rock bands and the like. Most of the references fly right past me. Granted though, the occasional few I do get are hilarious.
Fun fact: The first episode I watched was the first episode of season 4. I went through about 6 episodes more before my friend gave me season 1-3 on DVD so I could catch up.
And in season 4, a whole new layer is added to the show, religious themes. This is because the entire season is centered around the Winchester’s efforts to stop demons freeing Lucifer from Hell and starting the apocalypse, whilst being aided by angelic forces with questionable morality. I’m so happy I’m not making that up. They handle that well. They make some demons likable characters and some angels assholes.
also i recommend watching the orinal animated version of batman. Harly quinn and joker in Mad Love and Beware the Creeper are really funny:)