In this final part of my interview with Ian Varella, he shares comedy writing tips. The book he mentioned by Judy Carter is now available as The Comedy Bible
You can purchase Steve Axtell’s book – Joke Storming – here.
Don’t Forget To Enter The 2013 Clinton Detweiler Scholarship
Presented by Terry Fator & Taylor Makakoa,
with additional prizes by
The VentHaven ConVENTion, Steve Axtell and Learn-Ventriloquism.com!
ONLY 2 MORE DAYS TO ENTER!
If you’d like to learn how to be a ventriloquist go to: Learn-Ventriloquism.com
The Online Ventriloquism Course – Sign Up For Five Free Lessons Today!
Video Transcript:
you write a lot of uh funny material
Thank you I I uh you you were kind
enough to uh let me uh see one of your
DVDs a while back and I probably still
have it somewhere You wanted that back I
think I’m still copying the material
down off of it But uh because that’s why
I always fans buy DVDs
But uh anyway uh you write a lot of
material What’s your what’s your thought
process when you’re writing material
Um I do what’s called
joketorming and I got that
idea actually partially from Steve Axtel
My first convention I went to was 1987
He did a a lecture about joke storming and
also
um the Judy Carter book I think it’s
called Standup
101 Judy Carter is a touring uh female
magician and wrote a really good book I
guess she teachs a cordist at the
university and the finals are they all
go to open
mic and
um I take the puppet and look at it
and first of all write everything I can
think of about this puppet as fast as I
can for like five minutes just anything
I can possibly think of and then I take
each of those and make subcategories So
you know get the the duck in the
background duck bill
feathers nest water hunters rifle
anything And
um you know I think rifle Wouldn’t it be
funny if the duck was a lobbyist for the
NRA That just came up I just thought of
that That’s good That’s good Rifle was
fire
rifle you know How many how many kids do
you have None I’m like those the new
rifles I misfired I don’t know Something
you know just whatever Write it down And
so important to write it down I actually
found a joke that I wrote I forgot that
I wrote but it was in my handwriting so
it must have been me
who was a Lifetime channel and their
motto is Lifetime Television for women
which explains why their show Unsolved
Mysteries So you’re trying to think like
ask yourself what’s funny about this
What’s funny about this I was on the
road with a friend and
um there was a a a hair salon called the
Van Gogh Hair Salon
You don’t want them don’t want them near
your ear
So I told it to a friend He goes “Well
that’s not really a joke That’s a
premise That’s your premise Now let’s
work on the jokes Van Gogh Hair Salon.” Hm
I’d kind of like the Rosie O’Donald
weight loss
[Laughter]
center John Edwards Marriage Counseling
something you know just think of
um you
got
think probably a comedian I think most
magicians start out as straight standups
and then went into their their scale
their craft It would be a whole
different
act because the approach would be
different Um it’s like what the what
Terry Fator does You know an Elvis
impersonator that’s a really good Elvis
impersonator it’s fine but how long is
that going to be entertaining So he says
“All
right he he must have asked himself what
wouldn’t an Elvis impersonator do And
probably one of the things was how about
an Elvis impersonator They can’t do
Elvis
impersonation the Mayor Tomkins bit is
this funny the whole bit you know and
then he leads into the George Strait
song or something and Terry’s like
that’s that’s George Strait No that’s
George Strait That’s not that’s a George
Strait song It is Yeah Oh
okay So I think Howie Olsen
summed it up and he says funniest comedy
is situation comedy You’re trying to get
the puppet to do something or the puppet
has a problem
or you know
uh trying to get the trying to get the
puppet to say something nice to the
audience and you won’t do it without
saying something snide at the end
Next Post: Interview With Donald Woodford – Part 1
Previous Post: Ian Varella’s It’s Ball-Istic!
Start of Interview: An Interview With Ian Varella – Part 1
