Deadline's Drawing Nigh

[Birol]

And so far only 25% of the remaining contestants of posted.

[firehorse]

I wrote a stage sketch, but the landscape setting of the posts makes scripts difficult to read (and to post). So I went with my other idea.

Not gonna post it yet ;). Still have miles to go...

[William Haskins]

my copy of "5 days to a funnier you" arrived yesterday.

[BlueTexas]

I'm still waiting on you to name your price, Birol. How much chocolate liquer?

[firehorse]

I just realized the deadline is *tomorrow* (Monday) night. I thought it was tonight. Whew!

[Cassie88]

Will's post made me think of ALL the books I've bought on writing comedy...oy....
One of my favorites is The Comic Toolbox by John Vorhaus. Here are a few excerpts:


Comedy is truth and pain. ........................even greeting cards boil down to truth and pain. ..cover of a card reads, (I'll bet you think this envelope is too small for a present) Inside reads, (We'll you're right.) (doing some paraphrasing here.... I'm cheap - the truth You lose - the pain....

What do you get when you cross a Jehovah's Witness with an agnostic?
Someone who rings your doorbell for no apparent reason.

The truth is that some people strive for faith. The pain is that not everybody gets there. And ...people who don't get a joke or who take offense to it, often feel that way because they don't accept the truth that the joke presents.

You can also find truth and pain in small events: Why does the dieting man never get around to changing a lightbulb? Because he's always going to start tomorrow. The truth is that the human will has limits, and the pain is that we can't always transcend those limits. ......We know from the communative property of addition that if comedy = truth + pain, the truth + pain = comedy as well. So, if you're dying to be funny and you're not, simply pick a situation and seek to sum up it's truth and pain.

Any situation will work ...a trip to the dentist, a family vacation, getting money from an ATM, doing your taxes......anything, anything. Because every situation has at least some implied truth and pain.


The comic premise is the gap between reality and real reality. Any time you have a comic voice or character or world or attitude that looks at things from a skewed point of view, you have a gap between realities. Comedy lives in this gap.

Some tools:
The comic perspective .The heart and soul of any comic character is his strong comic perspective. ...his unique way at looking at his world. ...Gracie Allen's comic perspective was innocence. Jack Benny, tightwad.
Exaggeration - The tool of exaggeration ...simply takes the comic perspective and pushes and stretches and accelerates it until it's sufficiently far from our perspective that it starts to be funny.
Flaws...A comic character is funny as a function of his flaws. In P.G. Wodehouse's works, Bertie Wooster's fecklessness ia a flaw. Hamlet's indecision is a flaw.
Humanity...In some way, all comic characters have humanity. If they don't, we don't care.
Clash of context. ..takes something from its usual place and sticks it where it doesn't fit in. A hooker in a convent... an elephant in a bathtub.
Clash of context isn't always a physical juxtapostion; it can also be emotional or attitudinal juxtapostion, also known as ...The Wildly Inappropriate Response........

....silent respect, for example, is appropriate to a funeral, so we go looking for noisy disrespect...Give the mourners kazoos or tubas or automatic weapons...

Suppose you wrote a love scene where a man asks the woman if it was good for her, too. If you wanted the woman to answer in a comic way, you could have her hold up a card with the number 10 on it. She would be using both an inappropriate response and a physical clash of context.
---------------------------------------------------

Interesting stuff, huh?
Well, sorry to go on so.....I'm doing anything to keep from doing what I should be doing....

Cassie

[William Haskins]

the one i ordered just berates the reader:

chapter 1: you're not funny
chapter 2: you'll never be funny
chapter 3: coping with the reality that you're not funny
chapter 4: that last paragraph you wrote was dumb
chapter 5: bet the next one's dumb, too

...and so on.

[rhymegirl]

the one i ordered just berates the reader:

chapter 1: you're not funny
chapter 2: you'll never be funny
chapter 3: coping with the reality that you're not funny
chapter 4: that last paragraph you wrote was dumb
chapter 5: bet the next one's dumb, too

...and so on.

Is the title of the book "Trying To Be Funny Is Not Funny"?

[Cassie88]

Will, you're a perfect example of a character with a unique way of looking at the world... That's why I laugh when I read your posts... I'd love to read a "essay" on funerals/cemeteries from your comic perspective. ....hell, I've been waiting for you to do a humor piece since this contest began....just what you need to hear one day from deadline. No pressure.

[William Haskins]

Will, you're a perfect example of a character with a unique way of looking at the world...

total confusion is not really that unique.

[Cassie88]

There's your comic perspective again... makes me laugh every time!

[Unique]

total confusion is not really that unique.

Confusion may not be unique....but Unique is often confused. Run with it.

[jdkiggins]

Six hours and fifty-seven minutes and counting. :)

[awatkins]

Oh, contesssstants.....where arrrrrrre you??

[astonwest]

the one i ordered just berates the reader:

chapter 1: you're not funny
chapter 2: you'll never be funny
chapter 3: coping with the reality that you're not funny
chapter 4: that last paragraph you wrote was dumb
chapter 5: bet the next one's dumb, too

...and so on.

Okay, who the hell is reading my mind and selling it as a book?

[BlueTexas]

Oh, contesssstants.....where arrrrrrre you??

We're not funny yet. But we're working on it!

[maestrowork]

The one I got:



You will never be funny, even when you're dead.




Perfect for this week's theme...

[firehorse]

As I attempt to polish a purely silly piece, the voice in my head says, "Why can't you write something more sophisticated?"

[Birol]

Sophisticated. Schmisticated. We want your entry.


*Patience is a virtue and Lori has none.*

[Sarita]

*Patience is a virtue and Lori has none.*
*neither does Sara...*

[maestrowork]

I love this place and its virtueless women...

[rhymegirl]

Boy, it would be nice to have something to read. Tick tock, tick tock.

[mkcbunny]

I love this place and its virtueless women...
One more reason to think that you're VOTE_BOT.

[rhymegirl]

One more reason to think that you're VOTE_BOT.

Did you notice Vote Bot has disappeared lately? Maybe he's got a headache.

[arainsb123]

Less than 2 hours until the deadline's arrival.

[VOTE_BOT]

Did you notice Vote Bot has disappeared lately? Maybe he's got a headache.

VOTE_BOT is resting, as once the voting is open, he will be a busy little beaver, what with his work as a freelance ambassador of goodwill and vote mobilizer.

[jdkiggins]

One hour and eighteen minutes and counting. :D

[awatkins]

Got my readin' glasses on and everything. Now if only I had something to read....hmmm......

[dragonjax]

Ah, I'd been hoping to read the entries before going to bed tonight. Alas, I'm about to bamf into a pumpkin. I'll have a steaming cup of coffee with me in the morning as I open my browser, ready to read three more funny tales!

Best of luck to the Final Four!

:popcorn:

[BlueTexas]

Looks like we're just waiting on Haskins, now. Firehorse and I took the plunge.

[brokenfingers]

VOTE_BOT is resting, as once the voting is open, he will be a busy little beaver, what with his work as a freelance ambassador of goodwill and vote mobilizer.Hmmm.... so are you saying that you're a beaver, Votebot?

Another piece to the puzzle: VoteBot is animal, not mineral....

[mkcbunny]

Did you notice Vote Bot has disappeared lately? Maybe he's got a headache.
I was thinking that earlier this evening. Also, he was online pretty much all day Saturday, whatever that might mean.

Now, off to read entries.

[mkcbunny]

Hmmmm. Entries are in. Voting has commenced. And where is VOTE_BOT?