Monthly Archives: December 2019

Joke About the Founder of QVC

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The joke:

The founder of the television shopping network QVC died. He was 88, marked down from his regular age of 152.

How I wrote it:

This news item caught my eye because the QVC network and death each have a lot of potentially useful associations.

But “death jokes,” although they’re a familiar format, can be tricky. When are they acceptable?

The formula “Comedy equals tragedy plus time” means that even somebody’s death can be an acceptable joke topic if enough time has passed. But the founder of QVC died very recently. Does that mean the news item is off-limits?

Not necessarily, because I also consult another formula that I devised: “Comedy equals tragedy minus emotional connection.” Although people close to the QVC founder wouldn’t be amused by a joke about his passing, most people have little emotional connection to him. That means they would probably allow themselves to laugh, especially because the founder died a natural death.

Once I decided that a joke about that news item would probably be acceptable to a mass audience, I turned to my Punch Line Maker #1: Link two associations of the topic.

One handle of the topic, “died,” has the association “age of the deceased.” The other topic handle, “QVC,” has the association “marked down from regular price.”

My punch line links those two associations by stating that the age of the deceased had been marked down from his unrealistically-high “regular age.”

Joke About the Articles of Impeachment

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The joke:

House Democrats haven’t sent the two articles of impeachment to the Senate yet. They say they’re waiting to add a third article so they can get free shipping.

How I wrote it:

This news item was one of the top stories of the day, so I wanted to write a joke about it. The nature of the story pointed me towards Punch Line Maker #3: Ask a question about the topic.

The obvious question to me was, “Why haven’t they sent the two articles yet?” To create a punch line, I answered that question using associations of handles of the topic.

One topic handle, “sent,” has the association “mailed,” which has the sub-association “free shipping.” That sub-association was particularly top-of-mind when I wrote the joke, during the heart of the Christmas shopping season.

A second topic handle, “two articles,” has the association “three articles.” So I was able to link “free shipping” and “three articles” to create a punch line that answered my original question about why House Democrats are waiting to send the articles.

My experience writing for broadcast network TV shows has instilled in me a desire to entertain as large an audience as possible; ratings are very important. That means crafting political jokes that are unlikely to “split the room.” This joke is a good example of that.

Whatever you feel about President Trump and the Democrats, you’d have to agree with the facts that the joke needs you to accept as true, like the fact that the Democrats delayed sending the articles to the Senate and the fact that they did consider adding more articles of impeachment.

Joke About Stolen Money

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The joke:

A man was arrested for allegedly stealing $88,000 from a bank after he posted photos of the stolen cash on social media. He posted the photos on Facecrook and YouBoob.

How I wrote it:

When I read this news item I thought, “What an idiot.” Because the item provoked that emotional reaction from me I thought it might also interest an audience, which made it a promising topic for a joke.

To me the topic invited the question, “What social media did he post the photos on?” so I used my Punch Line Maker #3: Ask a question about the topic. To get a punch line, I answered that question using associations of the topic.

One obvious handle of the topic, “social media,” has the association “Facebook.” Another handle, “stealing,” has the association “crook.” Linking those two associations to form a fake website gave me a laugh trigger.

Because the handle “social media” seemed fertile, I tried to generate a second laugh trigger. The handle “What an idiot” has the association “boob,” which I blended with a second social media website, “YouTube.”

I considered adding a third laugh trigger combining “nitwit” and “Twitter,” but I thought “Nitwitter” wouldn’t be immediately clear.

Once I had the laugh triggers I went back to the topic and applied my Joke Maximizer #1: Shorten as much as possible. I shortened the original CNN news item, which had the headline “Prosecutors say a man stole $88,000 from a bank vault. The FBI caught him after he flashed stacks of bills on social media.”

Joke About the House Report on Trump

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The joke:

Next week Random House is publishing the House Intelligence Committee’s report on President Trump. They’ll even have a children’s edition entitled “James and the Giant Impeachment.”

How I wrote it:

The House Intelligence Committee’s report was a top story so I wanted to write a joke about it. And this particular news item about its publication promised to have enough associations that writing a joke wouldn’t be too hard.

I turned to my Punch Line Maker #1: Link two associations of the topic. One handle of the topic, “House Intelligence Committee’s report,” has the association “impeachment.” Another topic handle, “publishing,” has the association “book.”

To link those two associations in a surprising way and come up with a punch line, I brainstormed titles of books that sound like “impeachment.” “Impeachment” sounds kind of like the last word in the title of the children’s book “James and the Giant Peach.” So performing the word substitution gave me my laugh trigger.

Finally, to set up my punch line by getting the audience thinking in the right direction, I wrote an angle that mentioned children’s books.

After I posted this joke on Facebook and Twitter, a friend of mine mentioned that late-night TV’s Stephen Colbert does a comedy segment entitled “Don and the Giant Impeach.” But I’ve never seen it.

Writers of topical jokes often come up with the same or similar jokes independent of one another. Here’s an article I wrote about that phenomenon.

Seth Meyers Did Not Steal My Joke

Joke About a Naked Man

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The joke:

In NC, police at a shopping center arrested a man on Black Friday who was sitting in a car naked. Police said the naked man reminded them of Small Business Saturday.

How I wrote it:

When I read this fertile news item I thought, “There has to be a joke in there somewhere.” The reason I thought that is because the handles “Black Friday” and “naked man” each have a lot of associations.

To write the joke I started with Punch Line Maker #1: Link two associations of the topic. The handle “Black Friday” has as one association “Small Business Saturday.”

As I brainstormed associations of the other handle, “naked man,” I borrowed a technique from my Punch Line Maker #5 and visualized the topic. I formed a mental picture of a naked man sitting in a car, noticed his penis, and imagined it as exaggeratedly, humorously, small.

I got lucky that not only “small,” but also “business” could refer to the man’s penis. So “Small Business Saturday” made a strong laugh trigger to link the two topic handles.

To make the joke as funny as possible, I used my Joke Maximizer #3: Backload the topic. Specifically, I worded the topic so that the elements that the punch line depends on the most–“Black Friday” and “naked”–came as close to the end of the topic as possible.

I also used my Joke Maximizer #11: Don’t be too on-the-nose. An on-the-nose version of the joke would have ended something like, “Police said the man’s penis reminded them of Small Business Saturday”; not as funny.