One of my favourite seminars was hosted by Dale Brown and involved writing comedy and ventriloquism. Dale is a tall, well-dressed man who earns his living doing comedy/vent at well paying corporate events.
He and his writer have developed a series of steps and templates and they presented a seminar at Vent Haven.I shall not repeat the process since it is available at www.dale-brown.com.
I loved his style of teaching and his detailled process as well as his asides.
One was that being a vent means being funny..if you're not you're just a person with a doll.
Ron-I don't quite agree ,yet Dale is also a skilled non-comic corporate message entertainer so my disagreement is situational.
Now Dale added comedy in the U.S. is usually joke -punchline..not satires or political/religious skits since America is now afraid to offend anyone.He once had a potential contract for a huge company in California which listed 21 topics he could not mention..he turned down the gig and lots of money. He said a 45 minute routine should contain at least 200 jokes of 5 to 7 a minute. It was clear that some of the young vents and many of the international vents instead told stories, taught messages and were not stand up comedians with a puppet. Later.
The stand-up comedy formula is relayed in several books. The best I've seen is by a comedian named Judy. I apologize for not knowing her last name. You're right about the set-up, punchline. The set-up is a matter of fact statement.
"My wife is gutsy. She likes to bring her own food to the movie theater." That is a matter of fact statement...a set-up. Then come the punchlines.
"She brings in her own popcorn. She stops at the counter and asks them to pop it for her."
Many comedians start off by taking something that is physically obvious about them (looks, ethnicity, gender, physical prowess, etc.) and making fun of themselves.
"I flew here on Wandering Airlines. They charged me for two extra bags! I said, Where? They said, Under your eyes!"
"My doctor said that I need to lose fifty pounds. He's British so that translated to 100 dollars."
"I'm on two diets. I found I just couldn't get enough on one."
Personally, I don't know how people can keep track of 200 jokes for one show! Wow! I find about 1 in ten of the jokes to be funny, but that still makes for an enjoyable evening. I also know that the ones I think are funny are not the same as what others in the audience find as funny. Example: Here is my favorite stand-up comedian joke, told by a super skinny comic.
"I wanted to be a professional athlete, but I'm afraid of needles."
Doing stand-up with a vent figure allows the vent figure to make fun of itself as well.
Can I be a stand-up comic? NO! I have no memory and I enjoy puns.
Tony, you've entered into a discussion which ebbed and flowed in the halls of the Drawbridge Inn. Some of the talented teenagers and oldsters were angry that the setup-punchline system is the standard of the older vents. I agree, yet American Dale Brown in his seminar highlighted the problem when he said America is afraid to offend anyone and thus US mainline humour does not go near parody, satire(political, religious, sexual). Now my comedy of choice is based on the sly,Irish/Newfoundland variety. I stood up at the International Panel workshop and said I disliked the set up-punchline system and prefer the edgy Canadian variety. Comrade Canadian, Neale Bacon(in the front row!) wisely argued that I was immersed in eastern humour while,in his opinion ,West Coast Canadian comedy is closer to that of the Excited States. Neale seems to be right as I once worked for a huge Toronto-based communications company which got whacked when it tried to impose a Trawna rock radio play list on Vancouver. However, the Japanese vents, New Zealander,Elgregoe; and Canadian Val Hilliker didn't blow the place out with wild laughter because they were teaching values or illuminating human situations with skilled vent. However, Vent Haven does not feature the religious vents who certainly do not stick only to setup-punchlines and do a great job of teaching values they cherish.. Again, I would stand up at the Christian convention and say I like their stuff yet my preference for a window on world religions. Certainly some would say like it or leave it yet I believe vent should combine entertainment and teaching which is what I tried to do on-air for 22 years. Anyway, Tony, I enjoyed your note.
By "on air" I take it you mean during your radio period. Did you also do vent for radio or were you a solo act? My favorite line on radio is when Gracie Allen tells George Burns that "You'll do great on the radio! Everyone says you have a face for radio!"
Perhaps Eastern Canada is "closer" to Britain in humor as well as proximity. I have always listed the term "British humor" as an oxymoron, but I was informed by someone from Washington (state) that I needed to get to know the characters first. I haven't been able to watch their programs long enough, but I can assume from Winnie the Pooh that they do an excellent job of keeping in character and keeping temperaments straight.
In America we have definitely gone for the quick laugh instead of the complex character. That's why our tv shows have children acting like adults and parents acting like children. Quick laugh. Who cares whether it lasts.
The director of Mash was told to put a character in a situation they would hate to be in and you have a story. This is evident with Hawkeye Pierce, but was also the reasoning behind Charles Winchester III. The result was consistent comedy that was only funny because THEY said it.
I've been told that my own brand of comedy is Occidental. (I think I may have misunderstood a vowel.)
As I had mentioned to Ron, I do think Western humour is much more like American, but that being said, I still like a story structure rather than rapid fire jokes. I like the humour to come out of the situation, or being told in a humourous story fashion.
Watch Ken Groves. His puppets talk about what happened on the way there, or other situational humour rather than just set up and punchline.
What I really got out of Dale's lecture was the system (as much as I hate that word) of using charts to plot out characteristics of your puppet that could lead to humour, either directly or by opposites. A short jockey leads to short jokes, but it could be a fat jockey never gets to ride because the horses run off when they see him coming.
With my characters all being "Critters", I will be using that method to see what in the puppets background lends to humour. A couple of examples are that we talk about Castor;s family - he calls his brother an idiot and states examples of why, or the fact that my pig Horton is the opposite of what you think of as a pig. He is very clean, hates to get dirty and is fussy about his food.
I added a new character when I was down there - Jay Jay the Rednecked Bluebird and have started to apply that method for him too.
Always remember taht at any lecture, listen and learn and later sift and either keep what works or toss what doesn't.
neal, i am sorry we never did get together for that discussion about walk a round we were supposed to do over lunch. i was really looking forward to it. i think it was a combination of my being overwelmed by all the info coming out of the session rooms and your being pulled by so many of your friends and assoc.
i have to agree with your last statement, take it all in, then sift, and then sift some more. there were a lot of gems there, but some of it was covered with chocolate or in some cases, dust.
i almost followed you out of val's lecture but stayed hoping to hear ways and hows. in the end, i learned about a way to approach the subject and will apply what i learned.
I love Val's work and respect her as a vent, but that workshop was not what I "signed up" for and so decided , fo me anyway, my time would better invested in another workshop.
Glad to hear you were able to gain from it.
It was interesting this year. I had so many people stop and want to talk to me about my postings to various sites (here, Magic Cafe, Worldvents) that I felt like I was one of the lecturers. It was kind of nice actually.
Who knows, maybe one year I will be asked to represent Canada at the International Show and panel.
Neale, are you going to take Horn's advice that Castor should be decapitated? (so a swivel neck can be added?
Sounds a bit drastic. Yet Vent Haven and Horn's workshop(the face manipulation exercises) also proved my vinyl chimp is more toy than vent figure such as the great latex chimp. Actually, I brought Vinyl because I feared the heat on my latex figures on the drive down to Kentucky.
Neale, have you ever thought of a routine in which castor oil(yuk!)is compared with the tar sands oil of Alberta as a remedy for the American oil shortage? Gotta go beddy bye..The Argos just lost the football game to The Roughriders in Regina so I'm now devoid of any more creative ideas.
As much as I respect Dan's expertise, I am not prepared to perform surgery on Castor. I have just worked more on the manipulation and it seems to be OK for me.
The Castor Oil idea has been presented before, but no, I don't think I will be doing Castor Oil jokes. Castor just happens to be his name and the little joke there is that Castor is French for Beaver.
Which is why in your performance I answered Castor's French question in French.We met in France. Actually you met the Tour Director when we were in the pool..she's an academically trained (Cambridge) translator. As she was leaving the pool she felt a funny feeling in her right eye and saw spots. On Sunday we drove towards home..got to Windsor..crossed The Ambassador Bridge and only one mile past the checkpoint her eye went weird. Neale..as a Canadian you know the fear of getting unhealthy in the States. Anyway, at Hotel Dieu Hospital the Emerg doctor paled and said he thought her retina had become detached. So we got a motel in Windsor..saw an internationally -rated opthamologist (US folks we did not have to pay for any of this)were allowed to drive all Monday back to Victoria County..and then two days with local opthamologists. At present, she's treading water but any flashes of light means an immediate trip to emergency in the nearby town. Prayers are accepted.