The Comedy Support Group

Two things are common ground in books that purport to teach you how to be a stand-up comic.

1. No-one can be taught to be funny, only how to turn their innate comedic sensibility into art.¹

On the received model, the spigot of humour is turned on or off by the time one hits the age of reason. Its setting can’t be changed—there are no comedic plumbers—but the flow can be redirected, a hose attached to the faucet, at its other end a sprinkler, or a fountain, or a disappointing trickle. To make the output nutritive, or beautiful, is the work of stand-up comedy. Done well, it can feed an audience and make it grow.

2. Stand-up today is about honesty, and insight, and storytelling: you have to speak the truth of your experience; it’s not about conventional jokes.

The best way to write stand-up comedy—according to the books—is to begin with what you care about, what you find hard, or weird, or scary, or stupid, and worry about punchlines later. Which sounds fair enough, though the philosopher within me…