Comedy Technique Quotes

Comedy is all about the pause.

I tried to make the punchline as close to the setup as I could. And I thought that was the perfect thing. If I could make the setup and the punchline identical to each other, I would create a different kind of joke.

I think the more the actor lets you know what he thinks of the character, the less the audience cares - like a comedian who laughs at his own jokes.

There's this little recipe that you have to hit pretty well to get somebody to laugh. And it's a combination of the way in which you say something, with the facial expression that you have, married with the body language that you have, etc.

I never really write the jokes. I just sit down over a week or two and try to figure out what I want to talk about. Once I narrow that down, then I start working on the material, like "How do I make this stuff funny?"

I was taught by a lot of great comedy writers to go for the reality in a role, and the comedy will come through.

I remember I used to go to The Laugh Factory and just goof off onstage, and then I'd see Dane Cook. He did a bit about his Mom making the bed in the summertime when he was a kid. He just said "Vroom!" and threw the sheet up in the air and the sheet would just stay over the bed for like a minute and a half. All he had were his arms out, but I could see the sheet. And he didn't do anything. He just kept it there. And I went, "I have to write more."

What's nice about a lot of Wes Anderson's films is that there's a patience to it. I think that patience brings out a lot more funny things that you would miss otherwise if you just had to make quick cuts and keep the pace, whatever that pace is that bigger budget comedies have to have.

It's much easier for me to do an impression of someone real, because you and the audience begin with a baseline understanding of this person's life. And then if you subvert that in any way, it's a little comedy surprise.

Sometimes you'll see people give performances in comedy with an ironic detachment where they'll sort of be remarking on the character from outside of it. They're sort of commenting as they're playing the character. I think it's hard not to do that. I've certainly done that.

I am always a great fan of keeping things on an eye level for comedy because it plays better.

Robin Williams learned technique. He has the technique of being funny.

Sight gags had to be planned; they required timing and mechanics. Occasionally, spontaneity would arise in the shooting of the scenes.

Today's comics use four-letter words as a shortcut to thinking. They're shooting for that big laugh and it becomes a panic thing, using four-letter words to shock people.

Jacques Tati is the great philosophical tinkerer of comedy, taking meticulous care to arrange his films so that they unfold in a series of revelations and effortless delights.

Situation comedy on television has thrived for years on 'canned' laughter, grafted by gaglines by technicians using records of guffawing audiences that have been dead for years.

If you want to make people laugh, your face must remain serious.

With comedy, don't try to be funny. That's really helped me. Just say the lines as you would say them, interact with other characters, and try to make it as real as possible. It will come out funny.

As far as outlining is concerned, I don't outline humor. I might right down a word or two to remind myself of a punch line I thought of, but the actual structure of a piece I really don't. I don't think it would really help me because for me the process is joke, joke, joke, joke.

I learned that comedy is born out of strong characters. I won't begin writing a character until I have a clear take on them.

Sometimes an actor will stumble on the joke, and I'm right on them. Back it up before the audience hears the bad version of the joke, because humor is 90% surprise. If they know what's coming, they won't laugh as hard.

I'm not a naturally funny man. I find that I can only be funny, if I become someone else.

I think multicamera comedy is a much-maligned American art form.

Most of my comedy is accidental, I would say. If I don't know what the joke is, I'm going to play it better than if I do.

[Malipiero's advice to Casanova.] If you wish your audience to cry, you must shed tears yourself, but if you wish to make them laugh you must contrive to look as serious as a judge.