{"id":272,"date":"2020-05-20T13:00:00","date_gmt":"2020-05-20T13:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/katrina.effexhost.com\/index.php\/2020\/05\/20\/wordsmith-wednesday-what-little-i-know-about-comedy\/"},"modified":"2020-05-20T13:00:00","modified_gmt":"2020-05-20T13:00:00","slug":"wordsmith-wednesday-what-little-i-know-about-comedy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifewithkatie.com\/index.php\/2020\/05\/20\/wordsmith-wednesday-what-little-i-know-about-comedy\/","title":{"rendered":"Wordsmith Wednesday: What Little I Know About Comedy"},"content":{"rendered":"
\nSo I said I’d write about what I know about humor.  But then I realized I couldn’t just write
\ndown the word nothing a thousand times or so. 
\nSo I feel I should come with a disclaimer. This is how I work humor.
\nSome of these tricks are universal. But the real challenge of humor is that
\nit’s a matter of taste. You have to accept that you aren’t always going to be
\nfunny, no matter how amazing your dad joke is. Or mine in this case. <\/o:p><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nReady?<\/o:p><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nSo my novel is apparently pretty funny, quirky for sure. So
\nhow did I do it? Since \u201cI have no idea\u201d is the kind of answer that you didn’t
\ncome to read, I’ll give this a shot.<\/o:p><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nComedy is hard<\/u><\/b><\/o:p><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nGroucho Marx wasn’t kidding. Drama is easy.  We all understand pain. We all feel pain.
\nHumor is a more fickle beast. Jokes that may crack you up. They may not. Comedy
\nis very subjective. So with this great truth, how do we approach humor then?<\/o:p><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nIt’s okay for jokes
\nto be bad <\/u><\/b><\/o:p><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nSo let’s look at Peter Parker. Peter cracks jokes all the time
\nas Spider man. I find Spidey is written best when some of his jokes aren’t
\nfunny. Peter David in particular is great at this technique. He will make
\nSpider man drop some stinkers. Don’t get me wrong, David definitely puts a few
\nextra bit of punch in his zingers too. But part of how that works is the fact
\nthat some of the jokes are bad.<\/o:p><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nThere are a few lessons to take from this approach. Comedy
\nisn’t a steady line of laughter. It’s about taking your reader or listener on a
\njourney. Sometimes you go up with the laughter, and sometimes you go down with
\nthe groans. Good comedians sprinkle their A material with some not quite so
\nnice stuff. It accentuates the zingers and the A material when it comes out of
\nnowhere.  We can’t all be funny like
\nRobin Williams. We just don’t have that gift, but we can use technique, and
\nthis is a good one.<\/o:p><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nDirty your jokes a little bit with some bad ones. They are the
\nones you tell that you think are funny but aren’t. I recently wrote an
\ninterview with a zombie. My beta reader for said jokes didn’t understand one of
\nthem. It wasn’t that the joke couldn’t work, but the joke didn’t work as it
\nwas. I modified it to add a layer.<\/o:p><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nIs it my best joke? Nope. But it sets up my best jokes.<\/o:p><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nFun is contagious<\/u><\/b><\/o:p><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nNow, there’s a point where the quality of jokes don’t matter
\nanymore. Comedy and music are similar that once the song is fully in motion it
\ndoesn’t matter what the tune is, people will dance to it. Finding that balance
\nis tricky.  That all said, another great
\ntechnique is to have fun with it. Enjoy your own material. Be okay that it
\nwon’t all hit (it won’t, no matter how good you think you are) , but that your
\nauthenticity will carry you through the routine.<\/o:p><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nHere’s the thing about fun. 
\nFun and play are contagious. If you are having fun, and people catch on,
\nthey will start to too. Without much in the way of actual nuance, you will
\nconvince your audience that you’re having a good time. Once they are convinced
\nof this, you will find they will be with you.<\/o:p><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nShow me a person who doesn’t like to play and I will show you
\na liar. Everyone wants to play. Give them that excuse and more often than not
\nthey will do the work for you.  This is
\ntrue in fiction as well. If the reader can pick up that you are having fun,
\nthey will too. They’ll want to interact with this experience the same way.<\/o:p><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nSurprise!<\/u><\/b><\/o:p><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nGreat humor must include a surprise. One of the great joys of
\ncomedy is how they bend the expectations of the reader or listener. Comedy more
\nthan anything else, challenges expectations. If anything, expectations motivate
\ncomedy to distract you with those very things you come to expect.<\/o:p><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nSurprise is the true goal of comedy. The outcome will make you
\nlaugh, and if the comedian is great, they will make you think. Terry Pratchett
\nis one of my favorite comedians. I remember Eric in particular is where
\nPratchett eviscerated expectations. There was a reference to a great and noble
\nknight that was going to slay the dragon. Everyone knew it. They talked about
\nit. It was all over but the shouting they’d say.<\/o:p><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nBut the dragon won. That was funny. And then Pratchett took it
\none step further. The dragon, now in charge was requiring sacrifices and people
\nwere doing it. Because they were afraid of the dragon and the dragon would
\nspare their lives for these people being killed.  Comedy turned into deep thought. <\/o:p><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nThere was a famous line in watchmen that shows how a comedic
\nline changed everything. Great comedy challenges convention. The great ones not
\nonly make you laugh, but consider the world around you in a new light.<\/o:p><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nThere is more but…<\/u><\/b><\/o:p><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nI don’t know much more than this actually. I hope if you read
\nthe Cloud Diver that you will be pleasantly surprised, and maybe laugh at some
\nof my terrible jokes. That all said, my real hope is that I make people think
\nwhile enjoying themselves.<\/o:p><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nMaybe. Or maybe I’m like Peter Parker. Only I laugh at my
\njokes.<\/o:p><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n

\nI’m okay with that.<\/o:p><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\n——————<\/div>\n
\n<\/a><\/div>\n
\nJoshua Pantalleresco writes stuff and podcasts too.  His forthcoming book, the Cloud Diver<\/a> is his
\nfirst novel, and fourth book.  Joshua
\nalways has written poetry for Mirror World Publishing, and has been published
\nin magazines such as Onspec.  He writes a
\ncolumn for First Comics and has made the leap into the freelance world.<\/o:p><\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\n<\/div>\n
\nHis podcast Just Joshing<\/a> is fast approaching 400 episodes. He
\nhas interviewed debut novelists, New York Times Bestselling Authors, musicians,
\nillustrators, pro wrestlers, politicians, comedians and other creative people
\ntwice a week, and reads from his work, along with other authors every weekend.
\nHe has won the Aurora for his podcast, and has been finalist for that award
\ntwice.  He lives in Windsor currently,
\nbut has been known to wander at a moment’s notice.<\/o:p><\/div>\n

\nIf you like what you’ve read here, please share it with others using these buttons:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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