  Comedy
This week: Random Comedy Edited by: Robert Waltz  
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Life is a dream for the wise, a game for the fool, a comedy for the rich, a tragedy for the poor.
-Sholom Aleichem
Tragedy is when I cut my finger. Comedy is when you fall into an open sewer and die.
-Mel Brooks
Comedy is simply a funny way of being serious.
-Peter Ustinov |
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One of the primary essences of comedy, its blood if you will (or even if you won't), is subverting expectations.
Take, for example, the one-liner:
This guy walks into a bar. "Ouch," he says.
The listener is expecting a joke in the "guy walks into a bar" genre, and it takes a moment to figure out that the teller of the joke was using "bar" in the sense of "a hard rail, especially one exactly at forehead height." Expectation is subverted, and the listener reacts accordingly (which is not necessarily by laughing).
Not going to get any belly laughs out of that one (belly punches, maybe) because it's a pun, but it's just an example.
Comedy writers - and writers in general, really - need to subvert expectations to be successful. The following is not funny:
A cat stalked a bird in my backyard. She pounced and ate it.
Poor bird. Not funny. Funny:
A cat stalked a bird in my backyard. A dog pounced and ate her.
Okay, that would not be funny if it really happened. Unless it happened to someone else. Someone else whose cat I hate, and it's my bird. Anyway, the dog, not set up in the story, came out of nowhere, but once she appears, it makes perfect sense because of the long-standing comedic idiom of cats and dogs being ever at odds.
One of my favorite tricks in writing is to take two disparate ideas and combine them. Like, I dunno: bicycles and gambling. So I'd write about gambling on a bicycle race, or about a bicyclist rolling the dice by ignoring speed limits and riding naked (come on, don't tell me you've never done that).
But there's another side to this too, and it's one of the great secrets of comedy. Well, no, not really, but few people can use it to its full potential (and I don't claim to be one of them). This other side is probably best exemplified by the following riddle:
Q: How many surrealists does it take to change a lightbulb?
A: Rubber duck.
A warning, though: I've told that joke in front of people, and inevitably, someone will go "I thought the answer was 'bird feeder,'" or something similar. Those people should never be invited to another party, because they don't get it. It doesn't matter what the answer is, as long as there are no integers involved whatsoever.
This is not to be confused with a math joke, of which an example may be:
Q: How many mathematicians does it take to change a lightbulb?
A: Pi.
(um, because pi is not an integer, but it still wouldn't work for the... oh, never mind)
Anyway, I don't know what the official name for this wordplay is. I variously call it "surrealist comedy" or "Dave." But sometimes, you can introduce something completely off the wall, absolutely unrelated to anything one expects to hear, and their expectations are subverted.
Another, perhaps more subtle, variant of this technique is what I call "innuendo comedy" or, sometimes, "Karen." In this type of thing, implication is everything. And I don't have jokes set up for this; it's more of a situational thing. Example:
Not-me: "Hey, are you coming to the party?"
Me: "Sure. I'll bring the elephant-foot umbrella stand and the lox."
Or:
Not-me: "Hey, baby, I really need you. Can you come over tonight?"
Me: "Why? Are you out of graham crackers?"
What? Don't tell me that's never happened to you. |
Some tales of the subversive:
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Last time, in "Ah, Spring" , I talked about how I'm (almost) not allergic to anything.
Mumsy  : While reading this newsletter, I decided to make it my life goal to find something that you are allergic to. Thank you for providing me with the answer. I will make sure that a baby drools into the latkes this year. 
Also . . . pollen joint!!!!  I may or may not have snorted when reading that.
Well, if I can't get a laugh, I'll settle for a snort. Or even a flying tomato.
speidoman  : I, like you, am also not allergic to anything. I am however addicted to 12-step programs... I go to Anonymous Anonymous meetings. I used to go to Anonymous Anonymous Anonymous meetings too, but stopped as I didn't know who anyone was there and they didn't know who I was.
Does everyone there have to wear a Guy Fawkes mask over a Guy Fawkes mask?
brom21  : Unfortunately I am allergic to animal dander. The dogs we have at my house do not shed. It’s a shame because I love birds and some dogs; not so much cast though. Cats are servants of evil. I feel sorry for those people who are allergic to everything. I‘d hate to be allergic to dairy because that means no ice-cream or chocolate. What Horror! I just might be allergic to meatloaf though; it literally makes me gag. Anywho, I have to count myself lucky to have minimal allergies. Thanks for the newsletter!
Oh, yeah, I'll just send my unholy army of feline minions to take over the world by purring at it.
And that's it for me for now - see you in July! Until then,
LAUGH ON!!! |
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Comedy: June 04, 2014 Issue [#6357]
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