What Makes Comedy Writing Funny? It’s More Than The Jokes

Writing successful comedy is serious business. Your jokes can live or die by the sword. Audiences are fickle. Comedy is neither inherently good nor bad – it’s only effective or not. The difference between a joke landing or falling flat depends on many factors such as the audience, the context, the way the joke is delivered, and timeliness. These are moving parts, so film and television writers need to cast a “specifically broad” net to boost the likelihood of comedy success. Course correction is easier in stand up comedy on the fly, but more difficult in film and television.

So, hone your powers of observing people, their lives, and what gets them riled up, and decide what topics people find funny today. Avoid clichés at all costs – unless you have a unique spin on airline food, mothers-in-law, or boyfriends who don’t clean up after themselves.

Know your lane and the types of jokes (and their limits) you want to tell. Are they observational or character-based? Is your style raunchy, deadpan, culturally-specific, over-the-top, foul-mouthed, full of double entendres, cerebral, or simply silly? Stay consistent with your creative choices to keep your audience tuned in and invested in your story.

Let your comedy breathe. Don’t force your characters to say jokes they wouldn’t normally say, and never repeat the same joke to make sure that the audience got it. They have!

Know if your joke has gone too far or if you’re trying to squeeze too much mileage from it. Tell your joke and move onto the next one. Let the audience acquire a taste for your comedy and hopefully they’ll want more. They won’t appreciate you telling them something’s funny and they should laugh.

Although comedy is a genre and adheres to regular screenwriting principles, it is a stylistic literary device whose goal is to amuse your audience and make them laugh at the absurdity of a character or a situation.

 - Jokes are building blocks rather than the comedy themselves

Joke Density

Many comedies (particularly sitcoms) rely on a certain number of jokes per page (joke density). A broad tried and tested rule of thumb is three jokes per page. Recently, this joke density has increased so that every line of dialogue is either setting up, paying off, or extending a gag. This includes visual/ sight gags and non-verbal responses. Not every step requires uproarious laughter.

Many comedy film and TV writers aren’t so prescriptive in their writing. They don’t strictly adhere to these rules because they realize that a deviation will not derail their story. They feel their way through their scripts to decide if a joke is required.

Sometimes a moment of levity is required to diffuse a moment of earnestness or allow the audience to process exposition or a deeper character moment such as a death.

Comedy also requires a degree of groundedness (even the zany ones) to keep your audience invested. Endless jokes bouncing off the walls is a sure way to exhaust them and leave them unsatisfied.

Jokes must be borne from character and must ultimately serve your story and its character arcs to land properly. Your audience will notice a writer’s thumb on the scale when you insert a joke because it’s funny rather than it being organic to the story.

Every joke should be specific to a character. Although you should try to evenly distribute the joke load, decide what version of a joke best suits them, or if it belongs to them at all. Never leave the audience thinking that a character wouldn’t say or do something.

Be sure your jokes are connected no matter how outrageous your comedy is. Take the film  Joy Ride as an example. Despite it being a “disgusting and gross R-rated comedy” it always honors the emotional through line of the coming of age story and the jokes are purposefully laid out.

Many jokes in the film come from your characters’ internal and external pain – in this case, being stranded in Asia, their awkwardness, forging their identities and paths in life.

Beyond The Punchline

The longevity of comedy relies on its aftermath. A joke ends after the audience stops laughing, but comedy lingers because of its consequences until the end of the show.

The best comedy comes from personal pain and conflict in the main character when bad things happen to them – whether it’s the comedy of disguise, misunderstanding, self-deprecation, deceit or farce. It’s all derived from a character experiencing inner turmoil and desperately trying to solve their problem – usually unsuccessfully until the final act.

The actual situation doesn’t need to be complicated. It could be a simple case of running out of regular shampoo in the shower as they’re getting ready for a date and using dog shampoo instead – with comically disastrous results. Every remedy they attempt makes things worse. But they’re running late and must leave for their date at the restaurant.

The comedy should be boosted by internal and external complications on the screen. What are some potential scenes for the shampoo scenario described? The character receives unwelcome canine attention, their hair becomes more unruly, it starts to fall out, or they wear a funny hat to cover it up during their date, only to bring more attention to the problem.

This is where the writer’s artistry is needed to show the underlying issue of the character anxiously wanting to make a good impression on the first date only to achieve the exact opposite.

Make the character a victim of their choices to make it funnier. Perhaps the person uses hand soap in the restroom to fix their unruly hair, or tries to cut it, only to make matters progressively worse. Escalate the problem. How does the date react? What if the character returns and drips water over their date because they couldn’t dry their hair? Do they leave or do they stay? Will there be a second date?

More importantly, how does the character resolve the problem? Do they lie and blame their hairdresser, do they come clean, or do they invent some outlandish story to justify the state of their hair? The answer lies in the way the character has beed defined and their emotional trajectory. Are they feeling embarrassed, ashamed? Perhaps they’re calm and composed and hope their date won’t notice – despite the raised eyebrows.

Writers should be mindful of the shifts in both the character interactions and the situation. Examine the tone. What else is revealed about the characters, how are they both vulnerably and authentic, how does their attitude and perception of the problem change? Perhaps they could both go back to the date’s place and try their new salon grade shampoo?

Silences, innuendos, subtext, and metaphors can also elevate your comedy. Look for the space between the lines. What’s implied by the characters. What’s left unsaid?

Screenwriters should find the heart in their comedy. The jokes will follow. Punching up those jokes comes at a later stage in the writing process.