Make Those Lists!
I am often asked by newer comics how I write jokes and how I figured out my process. I usually give them an answer they don’t want to hear - comedy takes work. Like Dolly Parton famously said “It takes a lot of time and money to look this cheap,” in a similar vein for comedy, it takes a lot of time and energy to look like you have come up with your jokes naturally and on the spot.
One of the best tools you can have in your toolbox is making those lists. This is a very simple task that can really help strengthen a joke. It works like this. You take the topic you want to write about and write it on the top of a page. Then you start writing down every single word that pops in your head, even if it seems like something that would only make sense to you. Then you do that for other words on the page. You keep doing this until two words connect in a way that makes a joke. And voila! It helps find connections between two seemingly unrelated things. Like if I am thinking about rugs I may write the words fabric, floor, toupee, matching drapes, patterns, etc. Then I look at those words and think a rug is a floor toupee and there’s a joke right there. Keep going and you might find more word connections.
Lists are also a great way to explore a certain topic. If you are telling a joke about a topic, you want to make sure you cover all angles of that topic, so that when your audience thinks well what about this, you’ve already answered it. For example, if you say I was hit on at a bar and then went to play pool, people would want to know more about you being hit on -by who, what kind of bar, what did you say yes or not, did you have a response at all? You shouldn’t introduce this information if it doesn’t have a purpose or if you can’t link it to a punchline. So bring your lists back out and find the connection. Maybe you told the guy to get in the cue? Or you told him he better stick to pool sticks and not pick-up lines. Have some fun with it.
Even if your lists don’t immediately yield results, keep making them. Sometimes just by writing things down your brain processes them differently and the connection will come to you later. And I hope they do!
