Writ with Wit

Q: What do you call it when a woman in labor yells, "Couldn't, wouldn't, shouldn't, didn't, can't!"?

A: Having contractions.

(Ba-dump-bump.)

I consider humor to be a vital part of writing. And I consider food to be a vittle part of writing. Anyway, there are very few types of prose, poetry, drama, or nonfiction that couldn't be improved by a little funniness, in my opinion. (Why there's funniness in my opinion, I'll never know.) Don't misunderstand me: I'm not the kind of person who sees humor in everything under the sun. Some things should never be made fun of, though they often have been. But life is naturally rather comical, and it's healthier to laugh than to cry, so it's only natural that the laughs sneak their way into my work. Sneaky little buggers.

When I was really young--I mean so young I could've voiced Mister Ed--I wasn't funny. I laughed plenty, but the only times people laughed at me were when I was just being my cute widdle self (my light-hearted Memaw found me quite amusing). Even up through middle school, my sense of humor did not make itself known to my peers; I too often tried to force jokes, even to the point of ripping off Bill Cosby (who would do that today?). Ironically, I always entered talent shows with some sort of comical skit, but since I was as funny as a four-alarm fire I inevitably went down in flames. That's so much irony, I need no supplements. In high school, I impulsively wrote a comedy script based on my Composition & Lit class, but the jokes quickly devolved to insults aimed at one oversized girl. I ended up apologizing to the real person. Not a bright, shining moment pour moi.

Eventually, I became more comfortable with myself and my natural sense of humor, and I naturally said, "Self, you've got a sense of humor!" I learned to relax. And the wit came, C.O.D. I didn't land zingers 100% of the time--the rest of the time they were cupcakes--but I had a good average at making people chuckle. It was a good feeling, even though my brand of humor was based on a cynical outlook. But, then, professional comedians are famously hard to live with because they're so cynical and mean in real life. I would fit in perfectly. (Famous comedians: Dang it, stop trying to fit in! We're perfectly cozy!)

The funny thing is that I'm not naturally drawn to outright comedy in the arts. I don't generally read humorous books, I hate TV sitcoms, and comedy is among my least-favorite film genres. Yet my #1 movie, Casablanca, is full of famous, witty one-liners, and my favorite book of all time, Dave Berry Slept Here, still makes me laugh like a drain no matter how many times I've read it. I consider myself to have a sharp and well-refined comical palette, but I can still fall victim to low-brow bits like this from Facebook:

Yes, that one actually got me.

In an interview back in 1989, Michael J. Fox said it was difficult for him to act in Casualties of War, a totally humorless Brian DePalma film about rape and murder in Vietnam, because he considers life to be naturally funny, which is why he finds comedy easy. As I mentioned before, some topics should never be used to get laughs--rape, the death of a child, the torture of animals, etc. But I'll agree with Fox that there's a lot of humor in life, and it should be highlighted through the arts. ("Oh, honey, those highlights are just not you!")

Most of my writing has some degree of humor in it. When I adapted the first quarto of Hamlet for a stage production, I made sure to play up all the comedy that was already in it, but I also added bits through my direction. During the exciting, climactic swordfight, which always drew kids in the park to watch our show (the adults came for the skimpy clothes), Hamlet is chasing Leartes around the stage, and suddenly Leartes shoves the foppish gentleman between them. The audience got a big kick out of watching both Leartes and the gentleman avoid Hamlet's sword-swipes before Hamlet finally punched the poor gentleman out. Zing!

For my next show, I made an old dream come true by turning Macbeth into a 40-minute farce. I wrote jokes and gags by playing off the lines and actions in Shakespeare's text, and then my actors took it to town (off the rails!), creating something I believe even the Bard would've appreciated. If he weren't, y'know, dead. But that production really got started because I saw something inherently funny in the original drama. It was the word "Exeunt." No, not really.

While directing Macbeth, I also dashed off a children's play script from a couple of Grimm Brothers' fairy tales. I intended to write that one totally straight (Don't go there!), but the ingrained absurdity of the stories just came to the fore, and I found myself inserting gentle one-liners into the script. ("You silly goose, Lamb can't talk because he's not educated.") Even though my involvement with the production of that play was minimal, it's still one of my favorite things to have been involved in.

When I began writing comic-book scripts, I was quickly inspired to create an anthology series called Tome of Terror. You'd think that penning horror stories would be totally serious work, right? But it's really not. Some of the best horror tales are funny by nature or at least have inherent humor, and that tradition has made its way into my scripts. For one thing, I invented a wordplay-loving host character in the mould of those who introduced and narrated horror comics from the 50s through the 80s, and he has a habit of seeing the light in the darkest places (which keeps him from serious injury). And would you believe that my absolute favorite script of the dozens I've written has been a funny one, about a disembodied talking head? It still makes me laugh when I read it.

Life can be dull, dangerous, and depressing, but it has the potential to be quite delightful, if you let it. So, gather up your pens, paper, and punny buns and get to writing some weely witty wubbish. And, if all else fails, remember this famous motto: "Ocean Breeze Soap--for people who don't want to stink!"

#humor #comics #drama