|
Chapter Four (THEORY): Jokes
Exist In The Ether!
Where the ideas come from I don’t know...
it was inspiration, but I know not from where.
Spike Milligan
You’ve got your dream job. Brilliant! You’re a writer on a topical comedy show
when a big, huge, you can’t avoid it news story breaks. Say a politician has
resigned. You think it’s a shame as you were hoping to lead on a celebrity boob
job story. However you can’t tell your team there are no jokes on the politician
resigning. They wouldn’t believe you anyway. Within minutes of any news story
breaking jokes start flying round the internet. You can’t nick jokes from the
internet though. Your jokes have to be original and acceptable to a mainstream
audience.
But in reality this wouldn’t happen. If you really were a writer on a topical show
you’d already know that no matter what the story, you can find jokes on it and
you would have ways of tracking them down.
In Chapters One and Three you saw that it’s not genius to realise that something
can have a double meaning but it is clever to link words that haven’t been linked
before to make a new joke from them.
I think those links exist already: they are Jokes in the Ether. Others have called it
other things. It’s not a new concept. But to those who don’t know, it does sound
a bit kooky, as if you need to go to a séance to get new jokes. Let’s try it.
“Are there any jokes out there? Knock once for yes, twice for no...”
“Oh no, I don’t want ‘Knock Knock’ jokes!”
This cartoon is literally a joke in the ether because it takes two normally
unconnected subjects (séances and joke writing), and finds a link (knock knock)
and turns it into a joke. That link existed before we came along – it was there
waiting to be found.
(P)eople say they write songs, but in a way you're more the medium. I feel
like all the songs in the world are just floating around, it's just a matter of
like an antenna, of whatever you pick up
Keith Richard
Even surreal jokes are based on unusual angles or twists on subjects - you just
have to find them. You don’t need sinewy brain power, you just have to know
how and where to look, and keep at it. In 1998 I did a writing audition for a TV
company making the 11 O’clock Show for Channel 4. I was given the task of
writing as many jokes as possible over three days, but only on subjects that were
in the newspapers on those days.
This was mid-August.
It was hot, everyone exciting was abroad, and nothing much was happening in
the world. I discussed it with a fellow comic who was doing the same audition.
He agreed –there was nothing in the news. I spoke to friends about it who also
told me there was nothing in the news. But there was. Newspapers were still
being printed every day. They still had the same number of pages. Topical radio
and telly programmes were still going ahead. They would have to work with
what was there. I decided to do the same.
If you do not seek you will not find.
Sophocles
I flicked a paper open. There was a story about purpose-built offices for
politicians being built next to the House of Commons, another one about new
trading standards rules, and then, hidden away in the corner, a couple of lines
about Prince William taking driving lessons. For the next three days I pored over
every line of every newspaper, over and over again. I hunted in the subtext, in
the picture headings, in the last line of the longest paragraph, and I knew that, no
matter how dull the story, I could find links, angles and juxtapositions to make it
more interesting
xi
.
I did joke-webs.
I broke words apart and put them back together in new ways.
Eventually I wrote jokes about special alterations being made to the building for
politicians to make it easier for them to sleep with their secretaries. I then
applied the new trading standards rules to things they normally don’t regulate,
such as bra sizes, and wrote a visual joke (it was for telly after all) about Prince
William driving as part of a royal cavalcade, with all 30 cars reversing at once. I
got the job.
My friend didn’t send anything in. When I saw him, he mimed flicking through
the newspapers.
‘There was nothing in them,’ he said.
The truth was he hadn’t looked properly in the papers or in the ether. He thought
that a good joke comes from a good news story.
This experience taught me that there exists somewhere, a joke on every subject
in the world, even dull news stories. You just have to put the effort in to find it.
It seems to me that most of the jokes I make already exist Out There in some
strange realm of ideas, and that the comedian travels towards them.
Logan Murray
Also, once you really understand that jokes exist in the ether, you can stop
beating yourself up when you find corny jokes, rude jokes or rubbish jokes. You
just found those jokes there. You don’t have to use them.
In fact when I start writing on any subject I get the puns out of the way first.
Puns exist, words have double meanings, and they are bound to be my first port
of call on the search for jokes. Sometimes I can use them as a basis for a better
joke. Sometimes I tell them to a friend just to hear them groan.
Which brings me to my final point.
Just trusting jokes are there and not putting any effort in, doesn’t work I’m
afraid.
Pray to catch the bus but run like hell for it anyway.
Anon
I’ve tried it. You’ve tried it. You have to put the time in. Believe me at my joke
writing courses I don’t just teach them that jokes exist in the ether and tell them
to sit and wait for them to turn up. Oh, how great that would be! We get busy
with the exercises, crank up our brains and
then
they really do appear...
Summary
• You don’t have to be a genius to write jokes, they exist in the ether!
• You just need to spend time looking for them! Why not start now?
Do'stlaringiz bilan baham: |
