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You might want to try and find some notes from Second City's sketch comedy class and learn what they teach. I have some incomplete notes from a friend who went there and it's really helped me rethink my approach to comedy. It allowed me to be more methodical and calculating about it, rather than trying to catch lightning in a jar.
The biggest help for me, though, was learning about the comic perspective. This is when a character believes themselves to be the best at something when, actually, they're the worst. One example my buddy used was Chris Farley's Matt Foley from SNL. He's a motivational speaker and thinks he's super good at it, but he's lousy at it and he could use the help of a motivational speaker himself. That's his comic perspective. When you come up with that, you develop it further by giving the character flaws and endearing qualities. Flaws to alienate the character from the audience, but endearment so they can still relate and sympathize. Even if you're writing a serious story, developing a small CP still gives your character some depth and more material to play with.
This sounds like a lot more work than "injecting" should require, but if you're going to do it right you should know what you're doing. If this isn't directly helpful toward "injecting" humor, at least you'll know you can apply it by writing a comedy-only script.
"I remember a time of chaos. Ruined dreams. This wasted land. But most of all, I remember The Road Warrior. The man we called 'Max'."
That's something I really need to work on, comedy. I sometimes worry when I write something that it's going to just depress the hell out of people. But, I don't understand comedy when it comes to specifics. There's really no secret to "getting" comedy, though, is there? It's more that, once you get it, then you can build and expand upon it.
You might want to try and find some notes from Second City's sketch comedy class and learn what they teach. I have some incomplete notes from a friend who went there and it's really helped me rethink my approach to comedy. It allowed me to be more methodical and calculating about it, rather than trying to catch lightning in a jar.
The biggest help for me, though, was learning about the comic perspective. This is when a character believes themselves to be the best at something when, actually, they're the worst. One example my buddy used was Chris Farley's Matt Foley from SNL. He's a motivational speaker and thinks he's super good at it, but he's lousy at it and he could use the help of a motivational speaker himself. That's his comic perspective. When you come up with that, you develop it further by giving the character flaws and endearing qualities. Flaws to alienate the character from the audience, but endearment so they can still relate and sympathize. Even if you're writing a serious story, developing a small CP still gives your character some depth and more material to play with.
This sounds like a lot more work than "injecting" should require, but if you're going to do it right you should know what you're doing. If this isn't directly helpful toward "injecting" humor, at least you'll know you can apply it by writing a comedy-only script.
That's something I really need to work on, comedy. I sometimes worry when I write something that it's going to just depress the hell out of people. But, I don't understand comedy when it comes to specifics. There's really no secret to "getting" comedy, though, is there? It's more that, once you get it, then you can build and expand upon it.
Depending on far you've gotten with your script, Chris, it may be easier to start over. Throwing jokes in to an already written script will ruin the pacing of the story and the story.
If you still want to do it, I can only suggest that you keep it to a minimum. Maybe have one of the characters throw the occasional sarcastic/humorous remarks.
I think it was Phil who told me one time in a post...writing funny is easy...if you just inject real things from real life that were funny.
If you try to 'create funny' it feels often forced. I've never felt I was good at writing comedy of any sort...but after thinking about what Phil said, I can come up with some really funny shit I lived through or seen happen in real life.
Thanks Phil, I'm just going to start it over. I'm stuck halfway through the story anyway! I didn't realize writing was so hard, lol.
Quoted from dogglebe
Depending on far you've gotten with your script, Chris, it may be easier to start over. Throwing jokes in to an already written script will ruin the pacing of the story and the story.
If you still want to do it, I can only suggest that you keep it to a minimum. Maybe have one of the characters throw the occasional sarcastic/humorous remarks.
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Injecting Humor into a Story
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Party on, man!
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