A longread on writing comedy
This is what I do to research writing comedy:
What helped me most was analyzing a lot of jokes: "It's funny. Why is it funny? How does this joke work?" Usually it's something that subverses the expectations in a specific way or an unexpected collision of two things. (Like a pun is a collision of sound and meaning.) For my analysis, I wonder: "What is the expectation after the set-up? Why do I have this expectation? How does the pay-off subverse the expectation? Why does it still make sense in relation to the set-up?"
For example: I unleashed this kind of analysis on the movie George of the Jungle. It has a surprisingly high hit rate, I think around three jokes per minute in the first one third of the movie, and it still manages to get the story going and the characters introduced. I’ve mentioned this before, but I don’t think I gave examples, and you know I’m all about the teaching.
I found at least 17 types. Heads up, this is going to be a longread.
Type 1: Puns
Narrator: “When they finally beheld the mighty Ape Mountain…”
[They see a mountain shaped like a gorilla head.]
Narrator, cont’d: “… they reacted with awe.”
All: “Aww.”
Narrator: “I said ‘awe”. A-W-E.”
All: “Ooh!”
Narrator: “That’s better.”
- The pun lies in the fact that “awe” and “aww” sound the same.
- There is a visual type of comedy as well that we can’t effectively reproduce in writing: the mountain is shaped like a gorilla head.
- BTW: the narrator defies genre expectations by interacting with the characters, and the characters defy genre expectations by being able to hear the narrator.
Type 2: Tone of voice
Narrator, about the main characters: “Scraped and boo-booed, they searched high and low.
“Boo-booed” is a children’s word, not the tone you would use for a hero. Compare “tummy” and “stomach”.
Type 3: Defying genre expectations
[The guide falls off a rope bridge into a deep chasm.]
Narrator: “Don’t worry—nobody dies in this story. They just get really big boo-boos.”
- The narrator is breaking the fourth wall.
- Again: tone of voice with the “boo-boos”.
- Contrast between the boo-boo and the injuries one usually suffers after falling into a deep chasm.
Type 4: Not defying genre expectations
[A lion appears from the bushes. A baby monkey makes a sound like “uh-oh”.]
[The baby monkey does the Tarzan call and bangs its chest.]
[The lion flees.]
[The monkey giggles.]
[The monkey gives George a thumbs up.]
[From the bushes, the lion winks at George. George winks back.]
- Expectation: the lion is a danger to the baby monkey and George will need to fight it to save the monkey.
- Defying expectations: the monkey and the lion are in on the plan.
- Not defying genre expectations: George of the Jungle is clearly based on Tarzan. George doesn’t refer to that fact, but the monkey does, by doing the Tarzan call and banging its chest.
- Improbable: monkeys who giggle and give thumbs up.
- Impossible: lions who wink.
Type 5: Contrast
Narrator: “Meanwhile, 43 vines away, George’s kingdom is being threatened by a terrifying intruder.”
[We see the adorable Leslie Mann, who plays Ursula, smiling and talking to the camera.]
Ursula: “Hi! It’s me again!”
- Contrast between what the narrator says and what we see.
- The narrator isn’t lying. He refers to Lyle and the poachers who will be introduced in this scene.
- There’s also humor in the phrase “43 vines away”, because of the overt specificity and because a vine is not a measure of distance.
Type 6: Oblivious character
[Lyle takes a Polaroid picture of one of the guides.]
Lyle: “Do you like it? Magic picture. Yet another gift from America. Here you go. You’re welcome.”
[The guide replies in Swahili. There is no translation in the subtitles.]
[All the guides laugh.]
[The guide continues in Swahili. Only the last few words are in English: “35 mm.” The guide takes his own camera and snaps a picture of Lyle.]
[All the guides and Ursula laugh.]
Lyle, not amused: “Translation, please.”
Other guide: “He says he likes your magic pictures, but he prefers the resolution of the Leica 35 mm transparencies.”
[Everyone but Lyle laughs.]
Other guide, cont'd: “He also says your lens is dirty, but he has the equipment to clean it for you.”
- Lyle doesn’t understand Swahili, while the guides understand everything Lyle says to them in English.
- The fact that Ursula, Lyle's fianceé, understands Swahili and laughs along with the guides, is adds contrast to his obliviousness.
- Lyle is the butt of the joke. He humiliates the guides and now he’s humiliated on his own turf while the guides don’t stoop down to his level.
- This joke is threefold: 1. The set-up: Lyle is the arrogant asshole who thinks he’ll show the locals about technological development. 2. The guide is not only not impressed, he knows Polaroid and has a camera of his own, and is knowledgeable. 3. And he demonstrates his superiority in a (more or less) polite way.
Type 7: Slapstick
[George is swinging on the vines.]
Narrator: “He is swift. He is strong. He is sure. He is smart.”
[George hits a tree and falls.]
Narrator, deadpan: “He is unconscious.”
Slapstick is another type of humor that barely translates to written fiction, when the actors behave silly, for example by falling over, hurting themselves, or others. It's often over the top. Laurel & Hardy is a well-known example of slapstick.
Type 8: Alliteration
Narrator: “The tired trekkers trudged on feverish footsies over perilous paths.”
- If several words in each other’s vicinity start with the same letter, it’s called alliteration.
- Note that "footsies" is another example of a contrast in tone of voice—it’s another children’s word.
Type 9: Improbable things
[George spins a lion over his head.]
George: “George not even trying hard.”
While not impossible, spinning an actual lion over one’s head is improbable and thus goes against real-world expectations.
Type 10: Impossible things
[A gorilla called Ape enters George’s tree house and scares Ursula.]
Ursula: “What does it want? What does it want?”
Ape: [points at a big book] “It wants its Physician’s Desk Reference, if you don’t mind, unless you’d rather die of dengue fever, of course.”
[Ursula faints again.]
Gorillas can’t talk, can’t read, and aren’t usually well-versed in curing tropical diseases.
Type 11: Breaking social norms
[Ursula is unconscious. George licks her face, clearly meaning well.]
In our society, it is not only considered impolite but also gross to lick the face of a stranger. The fact that George does this anyway, clearly not realizing he does something wrong, is a subversion of what we’d expect of social norms and behavior.
Type 12 and 13: Hyperbole and understatement
[Earlier, Ursula fainted when she saw Ape talk and do human things.]
[Ape is reading when he sees Ursula look at him. He panics, throws the book away, starts grunting, and bangs his chest.]
[Ursula faints again.]
Ape: “Eh.”
- Ursula fainting again is a hyperbole: a reaction that is stronger than expected.
- Ape saying “Eh.” is an understatement: a reaction less strong than expected.
Type 14: Obvious repetitions
Ursula: “… And I didn’t want my fianc—Um, this guy I was with, to worry.”
Narrator, a few moments later: “George and Ursula set out on a desperate search to find her fianc—Uh, that guy she was with.”
Type 15: Stating the obvious
[We see the guide’s hand, pointing at a really big footprint in the mud.]
Narrator: “Meanwhile, back at the really big footprint in the mud, (...)”
Stating the obvious can be funny because the audience doesn’t expect you to do or say this because it is so very obvious.
Type 16: Adult humor
[George watches Ursula sleep.]
George: “George having stirrings of special feelings right now.”
Ape, drily: “I see.”
George: “Good thing she same species, huh?”
- Ape’s reply, “I see”, could be an innuendo, but it doesn’t come across as a joke (to me at least). Maybe it’s downplayed because it’s a children’s movie.
- If this is an innuendo, it’s a play on words. “I see”, figuratively, for “I understand”, or literally for “Yes, I can tell from your erection.”
- “Good thing she same species” because George shouldn’t have stirrings of special feelings for animals.
Type 17: Rhyme
[George is swinging on a vine.]
George: “Look, like this!”
Song: “He flies through the air with the greatest ease.”
Song, cont’d: “Our daring young man on the flying trapeze.”
[George hangs upside down from a vine.]
George: “Look, no hands.”
Song, cont’d: “His movements so grateful, all girls he could please.”
Song, cont’d: “And with love he is swinging away…”
[On the ground, gorillas frantically run back and forth with a safety net.]
Song, cont’d: “He flies through the air with the greatest of ease.”
Ursula: “George, watch out for that—”
Song, cont’d while George yelps: “Our daring young man on the—” [Song stops abruptly.]
[Thud]
[George grunts.]
Ursula: “… tree.”
- When words end in the same sounds, we call it rhyme.
- It’s physically impossible to hang from a vine with no hands.
- The gorillas with the safety net imply that they expect George to fall.
- Also, it’s improbable that gorillas would do this.
- Slapstick: George hitting the tree.
- Comedic timing: Ursula being just too late to warn George about the tree.
- Song + Ursula: “Our daring young man on the—tree.” Because by then he is literally stuck to the tree.
Or throw everything at the audience, whatever.
[George has a pet elephant, Shep, who behaves like a happy doggy.]
[Shep is chewing a humongous bone.]
Narrator: “Later, they rested, while the tired tusker teethed on a… Wait a second, the dog bone is too much. Lose it.”
[The dog bone disappears.]
Narrator: “That’s better.”
[Shep whines.]
- Improbable: Pet elephant who behaves like a doggy.
- Alliteration: “tired tusker teethed”
- Fourth wall: the narrator comments on the story while it is going on, and edits it.
***
Here are some other funny situations from the movie. Try to analyze what’s going on. Usually you can spot several types.
Narrator: “Meanwhile, at a very big and expensive waterfall set, Ursula was amazed that she was lost in the wilderness with a jungle man.”
Ursula: “And here I am, lost in the wilderness with a jungle man.”
Narrator: “The guides came dangerously close—”
Narrator: “That is, dangerously close to shove a coconut up in Kyle’s—”
Narrator: “Sleeping bag.”
Lyle: “I am the richest, handsomest, smartest guy here, so I get to go first!”
[Lyle pushes past everyone, trips over a tree stump and lands face first in a steaming pile of elephant poop.]
Lyle: “There’s an elephant here.”
Guide, while looking straight into the camera: “Bad guy falls into poop. Classical element of physical comedy.”
Guide, cont’d: “Now comes the element where we throw our heads back and laugh.”
Guide, cont’d: “Ready?”
Other guides, while also looking straight into the camera: “Ready!”
[All the guides throw their heads back and laugh.]
[Monkey laughs and points at Lyle.]
[Off-screen, other animals make laughing sounds.]
Lyle, spitting out poop: “Those are nowhere near properly digested.”
Lyle, cont’d: “In case anyone is wondering, I’m okay.”
[Cliffhanger: it looks like Lyle has shot George from up close.]
Narrator: “Whew! Okay kids, let’s settle down and review the important information. Lyle is a big doofus. Poor George was actually shot but can’t die because, let’s face it, he’s the hero. So, the naturally concerned and preternaturally wealthy Ursula Stanhope whisked George away on a private jet bound for the country of his birth—”
[George has a tiny band-aid on his forehead.]
Narrator, cont’d: “—where he’s gonna get the finest medical treatment available!”
Ursula: “I’m gonna get you the finest medical treatment available.”
Narrator: “Well, Ursula […] could use a best friend now.”
Best friend: “Hi!”
Ursula: “He’s in the shower.”
Best friend, distracted: “Not anymore.”
George, naked: “Bad waterfall. First, water get hot—”
[A sexy saxophone plays]
George, cont’d: “Then George slips on this strange yellow rock.”
[Perspective: the camera looks at the two women, seen from between George’s legs. They are clearly ogling his crotch.]
[Ursula swoons.]
George, noticing the friend: “Hi! George of jungle.”
Friend, eager: “Charmed, I’m sure.”
[Ursula hands George objects that barely cover his crotch. The camera switches back to a frontal view of George. The friend is still ogling George.]
Best friend, mumbling appreciatively: “I see why they made him king of the jungle.”
***
I hope this was helpful. Don’t hesitate to ask me any questions, and happy writing!
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