How to Write Funny: Your Serious, Step-By-Step Blueprint For Creating Incredibly, Irresistibly, Successfully Hilarious Writing

by Scott Dikkers

Funny-Writing Tip #8: Know What Joke You’re Telling, and Be Sure Your Reader Knows What Joke You’re Telling Always be in control of your message by using clear, intentional Subtext. Never leave a joke open to interpretation. When you ask yourself, “What is my joke really saying?” you need to have a specific answer. You need to know what your Subtext is, and how you’re revealing it to your readers. If you don’t know what you’re saying, or why you think it should be funny, you have no control over what Subtext your readers might discover, no control over how they discover it, and therefore almost no chance they’ll laugh at it.

Humor-writing Subtext does not need to be funny. In fact, it usually isn’t. “People are cruel,” is a subtextual message that’s been used to great

effect by many Satirists. “Racism is wrong” worked well for Mark Twain. “Totalitarian government is dehumanizing” and “Power corrupts” worked very well for George Orwell. Subtext that’s worked well for other satirists over the years: “Relationships are not special”; “People who have kids are selfish”; “Governments are incompetent”; “We’re all slaves.” Not only are some of these not funny—many are downright sad, even scary! This kind of dark Subtext can make for extremely powerful and memorable humor writing. Steve Allen said, “Comedy equals tragedy plus time.” In fact, he believed the source of all comedy was tragedy.

Don’t discount the power of tragedy, either in your own life or in the collective life of humanity,

to make for powerful Subtext that can lead to some of the most richly satisfying humor.

HOW TO CONJURE IT FROM NOTHING Do you have any opinions? Do you feel passionately about anything? Do you have ideas about life, people, the world, and what’s wrong with everything? Of course you do. We...

Funny-Writing Tip #9: Comfort the Afflicted, Afflict the Comfortable

This tip comes from journalism, but it works for Satire, too. If the target of your Satire is the downtrodden, such as the homeless, or victims of a tragedy, it will come across as mean-spirited, and audiences won’t find it funny. You can make a joke about anything you want, but the target must deserve ridicule. The best targets are usually “the comfortable”: the status quo, an entrenched power, or any authority, no matter how low-level.

If you detect an interesting and unique opinion or value judgment, there’s a good possibility you have a joke that could work, and you should consider refining it.

The 11 Funny Filters

The Subtext of any joke must be thinly veiled, and there are 11 different ways to veil it. By filtering your Subtext though one of these 11 Funny Filters, you create a barrier between your reader and you—more specifically, between your reader and your intended Subtext—allowing the reader to add two and two to discover your hidden message. That discovery results in a laugh. This is how all jokes work.

They’re called Funny Filters because the humor writer starts with Subtext, which is not usually very humorous, then filters it through one or more Funny Filters so it comes out the other end as a joke.

IRONY

Irony happens when the literal meaning of what you write is the opposite of the intended meaning. “Opposite” is the key word. Irony is all about opposites. If the Subtext you want to communicate is “nuns are weird,” you would use Irony to create a joke by expressing the opposite opinion: “Nuns are perfectly sane,” or “There’s nothing strange about dressing in a cumbersome headdress, locking yourself in a church and avoiding sex for the rest of your life.”

Funny-Writing Tip #10: Heighten Contrast Humor often involves the contrasting of two things, whether it’s the straight character and jokester, two opposing ends of an ironic situation, or a fake world and the real world. A common flaw in a lot of unsuccessful humor is that the contrast inherent in the joke is not heightened enough. By simply heightening the contrast to its greatest possible extreme, a lot of comedy writing is made instantly funnier.

Sarcasm isn’t all that funny because it’s not believable. Sarcasm isn’t trying very hard to fool anyone. By contrast, when you use Irony as a literary device in Satire, you pretend to adopt the opposite

of your true message with absolute conviction, and you play it straight.

IRONY SUMMARY: WHAT IT IS: Extreme Opposites HOW TO USE IT: Write the polar opposite of your Subtext.

CHARACTER

It’s the great engine behind virtually all performance-based comedy.

The idea behind Character is simple: When a comedic character acts on his, her or its clearly defined traits, a joke results.

The key is that the character must be comedic. A comedic character is a simply drawn, two-dimensional character who has no more than 1–3 traits, which the reader is made aware of through the character’s actions or simple exposition.

Comedic characters aren’t meant to seem real. They’re merely meant to represent a fundamental flaw that all human beings share.

We can all relate to a comedic character who symbolizes one of our core weaknesses.

Even a dramatic lead character can be made comedic during a short sequence or scene—as long as one or two traits of the character that are more comedic than dramatic (simple traits that reveal a relatable flaw) are brought to the fore during that scene, and the character acts on those simple traits.

Funny-Writing Tip #11: Use Verisimilitude

All comedians have these 1–3 unique traits and often open their acts by defining their traits so they can get laughs acting accordingly.

They include the Dummy, the Slob, the Snob, the Know-It-All, the Everyperson, the Grown-up Child, the Klutz, the Lothario, the Nerd, the Robot (or straight person), the Naif, the Bumbling Authority, and the Trickster. There are many others.

The only justifiable reason to use stereotypes in comedy is when you’re making fun of them, or the people who use them, or otherwise deconstructing or commenting on them in an enlightened way.

When selecting a main character, it’s often a good idea to use an Archetype. Archetypes are a proven success that have been beloved for eons. Secondary and tertiary characters are less critical, and can get by as quirky, non-Archetypes. In any case, we needn’t limit ourselves to stock characters in prose. And we may not want to. Archetypes can have a tendency to come off as clichés because they’ve been used so often, especially if no effort is made to distinguish them from similar Archetypes of the past. Comedy always works better when characters sparkle with originality.

To create original comedic characters, you can use one of two methods: One, you can think up someone with a nice mix of 1–3 traits. A nice mix of traits in comedy often involves some Irony. For example, an insurance actuary who wishes he were a football

player, yet is a weakling constantly stricken with illness. This method of character creation is perfectly acceptable. However, unless your character fits an established Archetype, it may not resonate with audiences. Two, you can use one of the Archetypes, but reinvent it. You can make Archetypes feel fresh by doing one of three things: (1) give them a job or station that we’ve never seen before, (Example: Ace Ventura is the Bumbling Authority, but he’s a pet detective); (2) make them a race, creed, species or thing we’ve never seen before (Example: Mr. Peabody is the Know-It-All, but he’s a dog); or (3) put them in an environment we’ve never seen them in before...

Philandering String Theorist Can Explain Everything —The Onion This a textbook Character joke. It establishes two traits: (1) he’s a philanderer and (2) he’s a string theorist. Then it shows him acting on both

those traits at the same time in a double entendre (a product of Wordplay, Funny Filter 5).

CHARACTER SUMMARY: WHAT IT IS: A comedic character or character Archetype with 1–3 clear traits. HOW TO USE IT: Show the character act in accordance with one of the traits.

SHOCK

Shock startles readers into laughter, and shakes them out of the polite, civilized box society tends to squeeze us into without our realizing it. And it works wonders. It loosens people up and gets them laughing.

In most instances, Shock is best used as a garnish, not the main course. As a main course, its audience is limited. Just about everyone enjoys a little Shock in their humor. Humor, after all, comes from surprise, and shock is simply an amped-up kind of surprise.

Shock is best used in service of good Subtext.

Quality edgy humor is achieved in one of three ways: 1. Using the Shock Funny Filter in moderation and with astute Subtext. 2. Decreasing the amount of time in the equation “comedy equals tragedy plus time.” 3. Appearing to violate the first half of Funny-Writing Tip #9 (“Comfort the Afflicted, Afflict the

Comfortable”). By appearing to go after the wrong target (the afflicted), or getting tantalizingly close to hitting it, all while being very careful to hit the right target (the comfortable), you will create edgy comedy. This is a tricky move, because if you don’t manage this illusion skillfully, and instead are perceived by audiences as hitting the wrong target, your humor will not only be unfunny, it will be reviled.

I like to think of Shock as a dash of cayenne pepper in humor. It’s usually best when there’s only a hint of it. It takes an experienced chef to

know the right amount, but with practice, you’ll find it. And when you do, you’ll be creating some deliciously spicy comedy. SHOCK SUMMARY: WHAT IT IS: Anything shocking (sex, violence, swearing, or a gross-out). HOW TO USE IT: In moderation, and always with Subtext. The more shocking the humor, the more astute the Subtext needs to be.

HYPE...

To make readers laugh with Hyperbole, the writer needs to exaggerate so greatly that the laws of science or reason are violated.

Hyperbole allows you to get to ridiculous extremes by exaggerating so far beyond reality that you’re suddenly in a different, impossible reality.

HYPERBOLE SUMMARY: WHAT IT IS: Exaggeration so absurd it goes beyond the bounds of science or reason. HOW TO USE IT: Exaggerate your Subtext.

WORDPLAY