How (and why) to write new jokes onstage
Advice on "spontaneous combustion" from Dave Attell, Marc Maron, Chris Rock, and Louis CK.
Dave Attell explains how the asides are actually the mains.
The best jokes are never the ones you write but the ones you think up onstage. The little asides. That's what makes it all worthwhile: The "chase." You're out there trying a new bit and you didn't know it was going to go the way it did and then you love it. That rarely happens. For me it's the spontaneous combustion. I'm always chasing that.
Years ago, Nick Griffin and Marc Maron talked about writing bits onstage vs. off:
Nick Griffin: I'm so married to the words, I can't go up there with an idea. I need to go up there with an end line, a touchdown.
Marc Maron: I tend to find that stuff onstage because part of the vitality of doing standup for me is discovery onstage because that's when I really feel the connection. I think that I'm sort of addicted to that, to putting myself out there and seeing where it goes even if it goes into the crapper.
'Cuz I find that the jokes that I find onstage will stay with me. Like, I can write jokes but when I do them onstage as they're written, I feel detached from them and that it's something separate from me whereas if I really actually engage with an audience and drag them through whatever emotional shit that I'm going through that there's a type of mutual discovery that goes on that resonates with me and I kinda stick with that stuff.
But I've always envied guys like you who can write jokes and just do the jokes. I figure out what my jokes are but it's not an easy process.
Louis CK on writing onstage:
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