Writing comedy

Writing Comedy

How to be funny
Although comedy is a distinct art, there are certain rules to stick to in order to be funny. Jim Richardson explains some of these on his website. But successful comedy requires another ingredient, an intangible quirk possessed by only some people. It makes them zany or quick witted or cleverly sarcastic. No one is born like that so it can be developed in anyone, but if you've never spoken ironically before then it will take you years to create a sense of humour that works quickly and well enough to be useful. Many comedians we see on television have some kind of minor physical issue that made them insecure at school, and they learned to be popular (and avoid bullying) by being funny and entertaining their classmates. That's humour as a survival technique, and it's created some of our best comedians.

The market for comedy writing
If you can be funny, these are some of the main writing options open to you:

Stand-up comedy routines (for yourself)
Stand-up comedy routines and jokes for others
One-liners
Sketches for live shows, radio and television
Sitcoms for radio and television
Humorous articles
Letters to Viz and Private Eye
Joke books
Humorous books (including satire, spoof guides and travel writing)
Children's humour (books, animation, shows, pantomimes etc)
Animation for adults
Stage plays
Feature films

More information on all of these aspects of comedy writing are coming to this site early in 2005.

Comedy script writing
The BBC website has some useful guidelines on writing comedy scripts for television, and there's some advice on writing comedy for TV and radio.

Screenwriter David Zucker (writer of The Naked Gun 2.5) gives his top tips on writing screen comedy.

Read the excellent quirky comedy screenplay Being John Malkovich by Charlie Kaufman. It's a great example of the creation of unique characters and fresh, original dialogue.