How To Be Hilarious.
Even if you’re not.
“It’s always funny until someone gets hurt. Then it’s hilarious.” Bill Hicks
At a corporate event a few years back, I witnessed a bad speech. The speaker was a ham. Here’s the difference between a ham and a funny person. The ham thinks he’s funny, a funny person doesn’t. You’re really only funny when you doubt you’re funny. Doubt is the true road to funniness.
It’s the same with karaoke. The person who’s up there wailing away is usually terrible. It’s the quiet girl forced to get up on stage by her friends. After a few awkward moments, she suddenly belts it out, sounding like Annie Hall on steroids. Nobody’s more surprised than the hams. They’ll even tell her they’re shocked and amazed, as they get up to have another go at “Wonderwall.”
Like all hams and wailers, public speaking and karaoke offer up what some might call “unearned opportunity.” I don’t know what this guy did to get this speech gig, but I’m pretty sure he didn’t earn it — unless his company was made up of hams who no doubt turned into wailers at the first sign of karaoke.
He shrugged so much, everyone in the audience started shrugging. It was like a football wave done by people who couldn’t be bothered — or were too drunk — to stand up.
The only thing worse than his attempts at humour were his shrugs. He must have thought he was Rodney Dangerfield or something. He even pulled at his collar (and he wasn’t even wearing a tie!). He shrugged so much, everyone in the audience started shrugging. It was like a football wave done by people who couldn’t be bothered — or were too drunk — to stand up.
In any case, this guy, this ham, was terrible. He walked off the stage waving away like a man surrounded by gnats, and we had to applaud. That’s what you do at these corporate soirees. If you don’t, you get the skunk eye from management, something that will come up at your yearly review.
So how can you be funny without being a ham? This has been discussed by many, usually with no more understanding of humour than the average bee. We’re essentially clueless. Carol Burnett said you have to be born with it. Jim Carrey said, “Behind every great man is a woman rolling her eyes.”
I always imagined this was how Billy Connolly started, until he was interviewed, confessing that each routine comes with a certain amount of angst.
What they don’t mention is doubt, the key to everything funny. We think of British comedians starting out in pubs, making all their mates laugh. I always imagined this was how Billy Connolly started, until he was interviewed, confessing that each routine comes with a certain amount of angst. “I literally have to convince myself I’m funny before I go up on stage,” he said, “otherwise I’d just as soon be at home watching the telly.”
Doubt crosses the minds of every comedian. Even at the height of his career, Robin Williams would still show up at comedy venues. He’d claim he was polishing his material. What he was really doing was assuring himself. Connecting with a small audience was a way of judging his humour.
Billie Crystal said you can’t find that on talk shows or doing movies. It has to come from the people who accepted you in the first place at live forums.
“That acceptance, that thrill, is hard to replace with anything else,” he said.
I have a personal dislike of hams. I’ve been one, it’s, well, hammy.
In other words, you’re not testing material. You’re testing you. Comedians need to know they’re not a fake — not a ham. Some remain hams throughout their entire careers (i.e. Carrot Top). Nothing can be done for them — certainly not here. I have a personal dislike of hams. I’ve been one, it’s, well, hammy.
Yes, I’ve been a ham, occasionally a hilarious one. You need a lot of drunk people around you to make this work. It doesn’t hurt with karaoke, either.
Unfortunately, you can’t hang around inebriated people all the time. Eventually, you have to be funny on your own. This is what separates un-funny people from funny ones. The trick is knowing how to doubt yourself.
Comedy requires enormous self-reflection. People don’t necessarily need your life story, but they do expect personal material. Hopefully, it’s funny.
If you’re saying, “Well, Mork wasn’t Robin Williams’ life,” you’d be surprised. Mork didn’t understand human behaviour. Neither did Williams. When asked what made up his comedy, he said, “Maybe it comes from anger, because I’m outraged by cruel absurdities, the hypocrisy that exists everywhere.”
In order to understand life, Williams — like Mork — had to make sense of it. In Williams’s case, it made more sense seeing it as hilarious. Mork did the same thing, only he used alien humour. Some of the best humour is alien.
What makes it all right is a comedian showing us it’s pretty amusing. Like Connolly saying, “My parents used to take me to the pet department and tell me it was a zoo.”
We’re all making sense of something. Usually this requires digging up the past, figuring out where we went wrong. We all went wrong, or our parents went wrong, or the priests definitely went wrong. What makes it all right is a comedian showing us it’s pretty amusing. Like Connolly saying, “My parents used to take me to the pet department and tell me it was a zoo.”
I got taken to the zoo and told it was the pet department. Imagine a crestfallen boy, balling his eyes out because he can’t have a giraffe. “It won’t fit in the garage,” my father told me, “not unless I saw it in half.”
That really made me crestfallen. I loved that giraffe, and I think she loved me, too. In my mind, I saved her from being an antelope.
“All comedians are crazy,” Tina Fey once told Howard Stern. Not that you have to be crazy, but it suits the discipline of comedy. You have to believe life’s absurdities are hilarious, otherwise you end up on a therapist’s couch for real. Therapy would go a lot better if psychiatrists broke into hysterics more often.
You get in a cab, the driver starts complaining about his wife. You want to say to the guy, “I’m paying alimony to three wives. I’m not even sure I can pay you. Carry on, though, I’m listening.”
Jerry Seinfeld spawned a whole generation of young comedians with his “Have you ever wondered why…?” You get in a cab, the driver starts complaining about his wife. You want to say to the guy, “I’m paying alimony to three wives. I’m not even sure I can pay you. Carry on, though, I’m listening.”
It worked for some, others it fell flat. You can certainly come up with life experiences, but if they ain’t yours, the audience will know. This is all part of the delivery, something like a singer “feeling.” Those who get it, get it because they’ve been there, and you’ve been there, and laugher is a way of sharing.
People who go to comedy clubs laugh a lot at themselves. People who shoot comedians afterwards obviously don’t. That may be the fault of the comedian, or it’s someone who should stay home more.
As Eric Idle said in his song for Life of Brian, “Always look on the sunny side of life.” Everything is funny if you stop thinking it’s not, and even if you think it’s not, there’s every chance it probably is—or could be.
Despite being banned in countries all over Europe, including thirty-nine authorities in Britain alone, Life of Brian was the fourth-highest-grossing film in 1979.
In the case of Life of Brian, EMI Films withdrew funding days before production was scheduled to begin. Who in their right mind would find a crucifixion funny? Fortunately, ex-Beatle, George Harrison did, arranging financing through his company Handmade Films. Despite being banned in countries all over Europe, including thirty-nine authorities in Britain alone, Life of Brian was the fourth-highest-grossing film in 1979.
“It made us rich,” John Cleese remarked, remembered when American authorities wanted a full ban. “We should send them champagne or something.”
The question remains, did doubt play a role in what’s been called “The most blasphemous movie ever made”? As far as Cleese is concerned, it hardly matters now. “I’m not nearly as worried about being liked as I was before Brian.”
Doubt is still the road to funniness. Otherwise you get more hams — or Monty Python — or possibly both.
For everyone but the hams, this is important. Doubt is still the road to funniness. Otherwise you get more hams — or Monty Python — or possibly both.
At least Monty Python is hilarious. Hams, not so much. They’re still waving like they’re surrounded by gnats. Meanwhile, John Cleese is rich, Robin Williams is a comedic martyr, and Billy Connolly leaves us with one parting thought: “An intellectual is someone who hears The William Tell Overture without thinking of The Lone Ranger.”
Now that’s hilarious.
Robert Cormack is a satirist, journalist, novelist and blogger. His first novel “You Can Lead a Horse to Water (But You Can’t Make It Scuba Dive)” is available online and at most major bookstores. For more details, check out Skyhorse Press or Simon and Schuster.
