tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6496460488742488789.post2095153236927903908..comments2024-03-18T10:29:46.055+00:00Comments on Ken Armstrong Writing Stuff: Stand Up To The PierKen Armstronghttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07775956557261111127noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6496460488742488789.post-89174391548108364192011-07-24T22:25:13.760+01:002011-07-24T22:25:13.760+01:00It's a weird thing, comedy. My friend Emma tol...It's a weird thing, comedy. My friend Emma told me she laughed out loud while reading my book, making her a social exile on the bus reading a book that wasn't even on the shelves. Clearly, the book is funny if it made her laugh out loud. But when it comes to speaking out loud, I tend to just blurt out words too quickly. Mostly people take my jokes as insults. Sometimes they're right to.<br /><br />I wouldn't manage stand-up, though. I can write funny material, but I can't write stand-up. It's not trying to remember the piece - I do drama in college, so scripts are okay for me. But I can't deliver the words well. Verbal diarrhoea doesn't work well for comedy, unless you're pretending to be insane. Of course, insanity only works so well for comedy. People eventually just leave when you start getting crazy.<br /><br />Very nice post, Ken, overall. Now I'm going to be overly conscious of being funny in my books...Paul Carrollhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04498209913967406314noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6496460488742488789.post-3415932675688194672011-07-24T13:41:18.052+01:002011-07-24T13:41:18.052+01:00This is a topic I have had in my things-to-maybe-t...This is a topic I have had in my things-to-maybe-think-writing-about-when-you’re-really-really-stuck folder. Not so much stand-up, although that would probably get covered, but more the mechanics of joke writing. It’s always interested me why jokes like, ‘Why did the chicken cross the road?’, stop being funny. It’s hard to imagine them ever being funny and yet I can listen to old Billy Connolly albums, and roar with laughter at stuff I probably know all the words to. Why? <br /><br />I like to write funny stuff. I find it very hard not to. My novel <i>Left</i> was hard work for me, keeping the humour on the back boiler. <i>Milligan and Murphy</i> was a joy to write. But I’ve never written a joke in my life. I’m actually not very good at remembering jokes either; I have a repertoire of about two. The thing is, where do jokes come from? I’ve never known anyone who wrote a joke. Or at least admitted to writing a joke. But all those tasteless Biafran jokes that were so popular in the school yard when I was a kid had to originate somewhere. There was a recent <i>Simpsons</i> episode where they end up on an island where there’s a secret organisation devoted to writing rude jokes. I like the idea of that. In <i>Nineteen Eighty-Four</i> Orwell could have included a joke machine churning out tasteless gags for the proles. That would have worked.<br /><br />I liked your little routine. I think you yourself have realised what the problem is with it. It needs tightening. Granted on a stage where you have the benefit of timing and gestures it would be funnier but it needs trimming. This is the best section:<br /><br /><i>It’s a dangerous pier, Dun Laoghaire pier. There’s two tiers on it. It’s a two tier pier. All the best people are on the top tier. Someday I’m going to make it up there. I won’t give up until I do. But there’s no railing or anything… you could fall from the top tier to the bottom pier and break something while simultaneously damaging your social standing.</i><br /><br />I ‘performed’ it for Carrie and she agrees it’s good. Short, punchy sentences. The kind of thing Ken Dodd does so well. You have the big joke and then the jokes-with-the-joke. On the whole though this whole routine is too long. The thing is I can imagine it being funny performed. Take this bit:<br /><br /><i>There was this guy with binoculars, out near the end of the pier, and I could see that he were watching some cool girls in a boat. I wished I had binoculars.</i><br /><br />There is nothing funny here in itself and yet Chic Murray would have had his audience in stitches by including long pauses during which he would communicate non-verbally to the audience. Here’s Chic telling the <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y82WdMot--U" rel="nofollow">Long Nose Story</a>. Wait for the ‘tiers’ bit.<br /><br>Jim Murdochhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12786388638146471193noreply@blogger.com