A Funny Idea For You

It struck me the job of a comedian is an extremely difficult one.

A comedian crafts his skill for years. Comedians have the gift of naturally making people laugh but to create a 60 or 90 minute stand up show is cognitively challenging.

The brilliant Steve Martin -

“I did stand-up comedy for 18 years. Ten of those years were spent learning, four years were spent refining, and four years were spent in wild success. I was seeking comic originality, and fame fell on me as a byproduct. The course was more plodding than heroic.”

― Steve Martin, Born Standing Up: A Comic's Life

Steve Martin would do a 5, 10 minute set or whatever he was allowed and he would discard the whole set or 99% of the set and keep the consistently funny bits. He did this for ten years until he had an hour of quality comedy and he became an overnight success.

What about this concept then?

Let us part with reason for a minute and consider a philosophy account that can be funny or, I’m feeling frivolous, witty.

No one expects the Spanish Inquisition and no one expects a philosophy account to have humour. So I work at constructing sentences to amuse.

An X account which is not a comedy account is under no pressure to be funny so if you can inject humour you are on to a winning formula.

Jerry Seinfeld is a stupendous writer of comedy.

Where Seinfield places words and constructs sentences that are intelligent. 

Let me give you an example: I want to write about women painting lipstick all over their faces because they can’t see very well or want bigger lips.

A sentence could go: why do women not just put lipstick on their lips? It goes everywhere.

Seinfeld wrote: Where lipstick is concerned, the important thing is not color, but to accept God’s final word on where your lips end.

The structure of the sentence is vital and choosing funny words.

To me a chimp playing in the sand with sticks is a funny line because chimps, sticks, and sand are all funny words.

So how do I incorporate humour into my timeline? Through studying comedy writers and structuring sentences to make people smile or ultimately write LOL in comments when they have actually laughed rather than typing LOL whilst looking unquestionably sad.

Let’s take a situation where someone is commenting on a trout lake in a beautiful garden.

We can write about the amount of trout in the lake, the size of the lake, and how happy the trout are and it could be funny or tedious.

Let’s make it funny.

Another notable feature is the ornamental trout lake, built 150 yards long, but, sadly, only one inch wide. It currently houses one trout that is quite content provided it doesn’t want to turn around.

It’s funny and engaging.

Study the structure of comedic sentences and study deeply.

Post humourous posts every day that give your audience the chance to laugh.

Happy New Year,

Tony

Wise Philosophy