Joe Toplyn – Page 39

Why the Internet Hasn’t Changed Late Night

Posted on July 30, 2014 by Joe Toplyn

A lot of people think the Internet has fundamentally altered the nature of late-night comedy/talk shows. But I don’t.

Take the article by Jason Lynch in The Daily Beast last April that sports this headline and subhead:

For one thing, “that time slot after the local news” does matter. It matters a lot. Only people who watch a show on TV get counted in the ratings. People who only watch clips online don’t.

High TV ratings result in big money from TV advertising. But even millions of views online don’t result in much money at all.

So “that time slot after the local news” is vitally important.

For another thing, late night is not “all about YouTube, Twitter, and engaging with audiences on the Internet.” That’s the same as saying late night is “all about getting audiences to watch your promotional comedy clips on the Internet.”

But late night has never been “all about” getting audiences to watch your promotional clips.

Instead, late night is, and always has been, “all about” having great short-form comedy pieces on your show in the first place.

The fact that you can use those great comedy pieces to create great promotional videos for your show is secondary.

And the the fact that audiences can now watch those promotional videos on the Internet in addition to watching them on primetime TV doesn’t qualify as a hijacking.

Here’s an example of how late-night TV worked before the Internet. When I was co-head writer of The Chevy Chase Show our main goal was not to create viral videos—a good thing, because the Internet as we know it didn’t exist.

Our main goal was to create funny comedy pieces under about five minutes long–Internet-sized, as it turns out–to fit between commercial breaks.

That’s why we aired this hidden camera prank involving Chevy at the Hollywood Wax Museum.

Even if we had had the Internet, we would have shot the same comedy piece.

Sure, if the Internet had been available that video probably would have gone viral online and given the show a nice promotional boost.

But the promotional effect would have been a side benefit, not the main reason for doing the piece.

The main reason was to put on a good show.

Learn how to create short-form–Internet-sized–comedy pieces in my book Comedy Writing for Late-Night TV.

How to Write a Joke

Posted on July 15, 2014 by Joe Toplyn

There are formulas for writing jokes. Experienced joke writers go through a systematic process to turn something like a news item into a sentence or two that will make people laugh.

You may have heard that “Writing is rewriting.” That describes only part of the process. Writing a joke is first thinking of what to write, then slapping together a rough draft, and only then rewriting to maximize the laugh.

Here’s the process I went through to write a joke for Twitter using the techniques in my book Comedy Writing for Late-Night TV.

The idea for the joke starts with this news headline:

“Giant African Snails Seized at Los Angeles Airport”

I have an emotional reaction to the headline—“That’s weird”—which alerts me that the news item might be of general interest and worth exploring as a joke Topic.

The news item also feels promising because it has two handles–“snail” and “Los Angeles”—each of which has several well-known associations. That means there’s a great chance I can create a solid Punch Line from the associations. “Snail” has associations like “slimy,” “slow,” and “French people eat them.” “Los Angeles” has associations like “smog,” “traffic,” and all the individual celebrities there.

To generate a Punch Line, I focus first on the well-known “snail” association “slow” and ask myself which slow people are commonly associated with Los Angeles. I can’t think of any only-in-LA slowpokes, so I expand my list of associations to include workers in general.

To spark ideas I Google “slow workers,” which reminds me of the DMV. Ah-ha! Now I have the basis of my Punch Line: I’ll link snails with DMV employees using their shared association “slow.” The result is this:

Partial Rough Draft: “Giant African snails were seized at Los Angeles Airport…workers at the DMV.”

To complete my rough draft I need an Angle that connects my Topic and Punch Line smoothly and efficiently. So I add an Angle that explains how the snails became workers at the DMV and get this:

Rough Draft: “Giant African snails were seized at Los Angeles Airport. Instead of destroying them, officials gave them jobs at the DMV.”

I use the word “officials” a lot in topical jokes. It suggests authority figures but isn’t specific enough to be distracting.

So that’s my rough draft. That was writing, wasn’t it? So much for writing being rewriting. Now comes the rewriting.

I add “live shipment” to clarify that these creatures are animate and could conceivably perform some kind of work. I add “67” because that detail from the news story subtly reinforces that this incident actually occurred. I remove “African” because it’s distractingly specific and unnecessary for the joke. I repeat “snails” in the Angle because it’s so crucial to making the Punch Line work. And this version results:

Version #2: “A live shipment of 67 giant snails was seized at Los Angeles Airport. Instead of destroying the snails, officials gave them jobs at the DMV.”

That version could still use a little tweaking. I backload the Topic, moving the most important elements closer to the Punch Line. I add “customs inspectors” to get rid of the passive voice and to clarify why the snails were seized and might be destroyed. And I get this final version:

Abbreviating the name of the airport took the joke down to exactly 140 characters, Twitter’s limit at the time. That meant I didn’t have to waste more time, and possibly weaken the joke, trimming it to fit.

Before posting the joke I subject it to some Comedy Quality Tests. One of the tests gives me pause: Is the joke too familiar? Is making fun of slow DMV employees similar to making fun of airline food–too hacky? I decide that the joke is so effective that the laugh will blow away any possible whiff of hackiness. Copy and paste to Twitter.

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How the Two Jimmies Can Prepare for Colbert

Posted on July 4, 2014 by Joe Toplyn

As I write this, The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon is dominating its competition. Since its premiere on February 17, 2014, Tonight has earned a 1.28 rating in Adults 18-49, compared to a .65 for Jimmy Kimmel Live and a .51 for Late Show with David Letterman.

But the game is changing. Sometime in 2015 Stephen Colbert will take over Late Show and he’ll be a formidable opponent. Here’s why:

Colbert is versatile. He’s done stand-up and improv. He’s a sketch performer and a writer. He’s a savvy and quick-witted interviewer. That means he can do whatever it takes to keep his show entertaining month after month.

Colbert is hard-working. He’s been doing The Colbert Report for almost nine years, so he’s proven he can handle the demands of a late-night comedy/talk show.

Colbert is smart. He and his team know how to turn out a quality show. Last year The Colbert Report won two Primetime Emmys.

So what should the two Jimmies and their staffs do to get ready for Colbert? Here are a couple of suggestions:

Don’t coast on what’s working now. Over the next six months, develop lots of new comedy pieces. You want your show to be as fresh as possible when Colbert gives viewers another option. For example, when I was co-head writer of The Tonight Show with Jay Leno I spearheaded the addition of characters like Mr. Brain. That new, popular comedy material helped Tonight catch up with Late Show.

Shoot lots of taped pieces, particularly field pieces, in the weeks leading up Colbert’s premiere. Then air those taped pieces during the first couple of weeks after the premiere. Field pieces tend to score big with audiences; learn why in my post “5 Reasons to Do Field Pieces.” Late Show with David Letterman used this tactic very successfully to launch itself against The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. Tonight took months to recover from the prerecorded onslaught, as described in my book Comedy Writing for Late-Night TV.

So those are some ways the two Jimmies can prepare for the premiere of Colbert’s Late Show: develop lots of new comedy pieces and air a lot of taped pieces.

And, by the way, I’d make the same suggestions to Colbert and his team.

How Jerry Seinfeld Writes a Joke, Revealed

Posted on June 27, 2014 by Joe Toplyn

Jerry Seinfeld appears in this frustrating New York Times video teasingly entitled “How to Write a Joke.” In the video he calls comedy writing “a secretive thing.” He also says about his handwritten draft of a bit revolving around Pop Tarts, “I’ve never shown anybody this stuff.” Jerry then proves how secretive he is by hinting at, but never actually spelling out, some key techniques for writing jokes.

As one example, at 2:23 Jerry tells a joke that ends with the line “and we were like chimps in the dirt playing with sticks.” He explains, “What makes that joke is you got ‘chimps,’ ‘dirt,’ ‘playing,’ and ‘sticks.’ Seven words; four of them are funny.” But he never tells you what makes those words funny. So I will. There are two reasons:

1) Shorter words are funnier than longer words. One of Jerry’s four funny words has only two syllables. The other three words have only one. The four words are short.

Diagram of the larynx 2) Words with stop (or “hard”) consonants are funnier than words without them. The stop consonants, in which the flow of air through the vocal cords stops completely, include B, D, G, K, P, and T. Jerry’s four short words contain a high concentration of stop consonants: six. Why are stop consonants funnier? My theory is that the sudden change in air flow they cause is a little surprise, and surprise is one of the keys to generating laughter.

Those two comedy principles also explain why the words “Pop Tart” themselves are funny. Each of those two words is short–one syllable. And each word has two stop consonants. At :56 Jerry says, “It’s a fun thing to say…Pop Tart.” And now you know why that is.

Why didn’t Jerry explain those comedy principles to us? Maybe he thought that viewers of a New York Times video, even one entitled, “How to Write a Joke,” wouldn’t be interested in the nuts and bolts of how to write a joke.

The cast of "Seinfeld" Or maybe Jerry thinks that comedy writing really should be a secretive thing. In the documentary film Dying Laughing, Jerry says that comedy is “beyond art–it’s magic.”

So maybe he feels that if he reveals the techniques that he uses he’ll be like a magician who reveals how he works his illusions and he’ll lose the admiration of the audience.

But Jerry, with his stand-up comedy and his brilliant show Seinfeld, has already more than earned our admiration.

Whatever Jerry’s reasoning, people who want to learn how to write a joke will not find that video illuminating. For more techniques that Jerry doesn’t want you to know, buy my book Comedy Writing for Late Night TV.

Postscript added May 12, 2020

In his new Netflix special, “Jerry Seinfeld: 23 Hours To Kill,” Jerry reprises his Pop Tarts bit and adds one about texting in which he says this:

We like that word, don’t we? “Text!” It’s fun to say. It’s got that short, tight, got the X in there, a little bite to it. “Text it! Text!”

In saying that, Jerry comes a little closer to sharing the comedy principles that words are funnier if they are shorter and contain stop consonants.

As Jerry points out, “text” is short–only one syllable. And “text” contains a K sound, along with another stop consonant, T, which occurs twice, the same way it does in “Tart.”

Three stop consonant sounds in only one syllable–that’s why “text” is “fun to say,” and funnier in a joke than, for example, “email.”

The Hugh Grant Fallacy

Posted on June 20, 2014 by Joe Toplyn

Hugh Grant's mug shot This week, on June 18, Access Hollywood perpetuated a longstanding misconception about The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. A voiceover referred to “the game changer, when in 1995 Hugh Grant came on shortly after his dalliance with a prostitute. Jay beat Letterman in the ratings that night and stayed number one for nineteen years.”

Game-changer? So Hugh Grant’s appearance on Tonight was solely responsible for the show’s ratings dominance for almost two decades? Ridiculous.

In fact, the night Grant appeared (July 10, 1995) wasn’t even the first night that Tonight topped Late Show in the ratings. By that time Tonight had been routinely beating Late Show every single Thursday night for months thanks to the huge lead-in provided by the hit show ER. And many weeks the ratings gap between Tonight and Late Show was only a tenth of a point.

So why do the media keep trotting out Hugh Grant? Because he makes for a fun, easy-to-follow story: “Ain’t life crazy? The only reason Jay got to number one is because some dumb Hollywood actor got caught with a hooker.” And Grant did play a role in a ratings milestone: the week he appeared on Tonight was the first week that the show beat Late Show when measured over an entire week of head-to-head original episodes. But Tonight won three nights that week, not just the night that Grant guested.

The truth is, Access Hollywood, that no one single “game changer” led to Tonight taking the late-night crown from Late Show. Many factors changed the game. I describe one of those factors in my post “When O. J. Simpson Killed, So Did Jay Leno.” For more, read my book, Comedy Writing for Late-Night TV.

When O. J. Simpson Killed, So Did Jay Leno

Posted on June 12, 2014 by Joe Toplyn

As a host of the Tonight show, Jay Leno was typically regarded by the media as dull, not edgy. For example, a February 2014 article by Daniel D’Addario on the website Salon bears the headlines: “Jay Leno thrived by being America’s dullest man. With less edge than David Letterman or Conan O’Brien, Leno was the perfect host for one of the last huge franchises.”

I never understood that “dull” assessment of Jay. One reason is that the main job of the host of the Tonight show is to keep the show number one in the timeslot. And that means appealing to as many American television viewers as possible. And that means performing comedy that most viewers want to watch, comedy that most viewers find interesting, the opposite of dull. A Tonight show host who most viewers actually found dull would soon be out of a job. And Jay realized that. So he put on a show that, as the ratings prove, wasn’t dull. Year after year, it attracted the most viewers. Jay did his job.

I also never understood how the media could claim that Jay wasn’t “edgy.” Jay did a lot of risky comedy. For example, back in 1994 and 1995 he and his writers (myself included) regularly mined a grisly double homicide for jokes. I’m referring, of course, to the O. J. Simpson murder case.

Think about that. Every night for months Jay invited the audience to laugh about aspects of a tragic, bloody act of butchery. Does that mean that Jay was “America’s dullest man”? Not when one of the Tonight show’s signature bits, the Dancing Itos, lookalikes for the trial’s Judge Ito, made it into People magazine. Does it mean that Jay had “less edge” than the other late-night hosts? Not when Jay was the only one of them routinely wading into the dark and treacherous waters of homicide humor.

Jay’s show even included several parody videos that treated the O.J. murder trial as a sitcom. See one here, followed by a look at the Dancing Itos in action.

The fact is, the O.J. comedy on the Tonight show killed, in the “got huge laughs” sense of the word. It killed because it was edgy and the late-night audience at the time craved edgy. Jay gave most late-night viewers what they wanted to see. Jay did his job.

And now O. J. Simpson is back in the news because this week is the 20^th anniversary of that heinous crime, the prelude to The Trial of the Century. So, for old times’ sake, I wrote this new O.J. joke:

“According to a friend, O.J. Simpson has gained a lot of weight in prison. The good news is O. J. finally found the real killer…and ate him.”

That was the job.

For more on how the Tonight show handled O. J. comedy, read my new book, Comedy Writing for Late-Night TV.

Seth Meyers Did Not Steal My Joke

Posted on June 5, 2014 by Joe Toplyn

Ideas get stolen in show business all the time but less often than you might think.

I teach a class in comedy writing for late-night TV. A couple of nights ago I was giving my students some practice in turning newspaper articles into monologue jokes. Toward the end of the session I mentioned an article with the headline “Ladykillers: Hurricanes with female names may be deadlier.” I suggested that a joke based on that story might go something like this:

“Researchers at the University of Illinois say that hurricanes with female names may be deadlier. The researchers are particularly worried about the next hurricane, Solange.”

The next day I Googled “late night jokes” to see a sampling from the previous night’s monologues. Here’s a joke that Seth Meyers told on “Late Night” the same night I taught my class:

“A new study shows hurricanes with female names are more fatal because people subconsciously assume that they are less dangerous. Though I’d bet people would evacuate pretty quickly for Hurricane Solange.”

If I were a freelance writer who had emailed my hurricane joke to “Late Night” and then watched that night’s monologue, I might have been outraged. The show stole my joke! But the fact is, professional monologue writers on different shows inadvertently write similar jokes all the time. But given all the thousands of possible topical jokes that can be written each day, how can that happen?

It can happen because all the writers on staff at all these shows use the same formulas to write their jokes. In the case of the hurricane joke, that news story had all the characteristics that a professional writer wants to see in a joke topic. For example, the story was likely to capture most people’s interest and nobody died.

And the punch line involving Solange was created using a proven pro writing technique: linking an association of the topic—“dangerous females”—with a high-profile event in pop culture—Beyonce’s sister assaulting Jay Z in an elevator.

So just because two late-night hosts deliver similar jokes doesn’t mean that some writer is a thief. It means that both shows’ writers are working from the same playbook.

For more about that playbook read my new book Comedy Writing for Late-Night TV.

Postscript added October 4, 2014

Here’s more evidence that professional comedy writers use the same playbook. Yesterday afternoon, October 3, 2014, I posted this joke on Facebook and Twitter:

“Teresa and Joe Giudice of Real Housewives of New Jersey are going to prison. So now Mr. Giudice will also have a chance to be a housewife.”

Later that evening, Jimmy Fallon told a few monologue jokes on Tonight that culminated with this one:

“And Teresa’s husband, Joe, was actually sentenced to forty-one months in prison. But on the bright side, now he’ll get to be someone’s housewife.”

Those virtually identical jokes were written using my book’s Punch Line Maker #1: Link two associations of the topic.

Post-Postscript added January 20, 2015

Here’s even more evidence that professional comedy writers all use the same techniques for writing jokes. Yesterday I posted this joke on Twitter and Facebook :

“The NE Patriots are accused of using deflated footballs in a game. But the Patriots insist that their only deflated balls came from steroids.”

A few hours later, Jimmy Fallon delivered a joke on Tonight about the same topic that ended with basically the same punch line:

“The first time there’s been a sports controversy about deflated balls that doesn’t involve steroids.”

Both of those punch lines sprang from my book’s Punch Line Maker #4: Find a play on words in the topic.

But notice that my version of the punch line takes a shot at the Patriots. The Tonight version not only doesn’t refer to the Patriots, it doesn’t even refer to professional football, despite past scandals involving steroid use by NFL players.

Why did Tonight take that more conservative approach to the joke? Possibly because the writer and producers heeded my book’s Comedy Quality Test #2, which states: “Imagine the host delivering the joke.” A Patriots version of the punch line may have seemed too mean, and therefore out of character, for Jimmy Fallon.

And any NFL punch line may have made it tougher to book NFL players on Tonight. Comedy/talk shows need comedy, but they also need high-profile guests for the “talk” part.

Post-Postscript added March 8, 2018

And this article describes a particularly extreme example of the phenomenon I’m talking about. On March 7, 2018, five late-night hosts told essentially the same joke about President Trump and porn star Stormy Daniels.

Article about five hosts telling the same joke

How to Create Funny Products

Posted on April 27, 2014 by Joe Toplyn

Short-form comedy, the kind on comedy/talk shows, often turns up in consumer products. That’s why the same writing techniques used on late-night shows can also be used to create funny products like tee-shirts, bumper stickers, and novelty gifts.

For example, here’s how I used late-night comedy writing techniques to create two greeting cards that the staffers of Late Night with David Letterman sent out to their holiday mailing lists.

1986 holiday card from "Late Night with David Letterman" promotes General Electric products

“Late Night with David Letterman” holiday card, 1986

In both cases I started with the joke topic “Late Night holiday card.” The two handles—the distinctive elements—of that topic are “Late Night” and “holiday card.”

One association of the handle “Late Night” is “General Electric,” the show’s new corporate parent at the time; a sub-association of General Electric is “stuff for sale.”

And one association of the handle “holiday card” is “gifts”, which also has the sub-association “stuff for sale.” Linking those two sub-associations together gave birth to the official Late Night holiday card of 1986.

1989 holiday card from "Late Night with David Letterman" features Dan Rather's credit card

“Late Night” holiday card, 1989

For the 1989 holiday season I started with the same joke topic: “Late Night holiday card.” This time I linked the “Late Night” association “Dan Rather” (a CBS newsman and friend of the show) to the “holiday card” association “buying gifts” by using the shared sub-association “credit card.” Here’s the greeting card that resulted.

Headline of 1989 "New York Times" item reads "'Late Night' Makes Santa of Dan Rather"

“New York Times” item, December 15, 1989

That holiday card generated some nice publicity for the show, including a mention in The New York Times.

Writing techniques like these are used to craft Monologue jokes, Desk Pieces, Joke Basket Sketches, and a lot of the other comedy on comedy/talk shows. Learn these techniques by reading my book Comedy Writing for Late-Night TV.

5 Reasons To Do Field Pieces

Posted on April 10, 2014 by Joe Toplyn

Why aren’t Jimmy Fallon and Seth Meyers doing more field pieces on their shows?

Field pieces, or “remotes,” are comedy pieces that are shot outside the studio. They’re great for comedy/talk shows. Here are 5 reasons why.

1) It’s fun to see the host out in the real world for a change. Watching the same guy behind the same desk on the same set night after night can be boring. Getting the camera out of the studio breaks that visual monotony.

Joe Toplyn, Jay Leno, and Charlie Sheen's trainer, Kim, make their way down the hill to the Hollywood Sign.

I help Charlie Sheen’s “athletic trainer,” Kim, down the hill to the Hollywood Sign.

2) Shooting only in the studio building limits your comedy options. Sure, you can produce a lot of fun comedy pieces indoors. I was once responsible for Dave Letterman and Paul Shaffer racing down a hallway inside 30 Rockefeller Plaza on dogsleds. But I also persuaded Dave to drive a rental convertible through a carwash with the top down. The world is your playground. Why stay cooped up in the clubhouse?

3) Field pieces don’t have to be expensive. To produce most field pieces all you need is a camera operator, maybe an audio technician, maybe a director, and your on-camera talent. And you’re already paying those people.

4) Field pieces don’t have to be time consuming. Jay Leno and his staffers could shoot a semi-scripted remote involving civilians, like “Jaywalking,” in an hour-and-a-half. Even a more elaborate remote is often producible in a couple of hours.

Joe Toplyn, Jay Leno, and Charlie Sheen discuss a stunt at the foot of the Hollywood Sign.

I discuss the proposed stunt with Jay and Charlie “Major League” Sheen.

For example, one time I took Jay and Charlie Sheen up to the Hollywood Sign, where Charlie threw a baseball through the D; the Olympics were underway and we made that Charlie’s event. We shot the piece in the morning, edited it that afternoon, and rolled it into the show that evening during Charlie’s interview.

5) Field pieces can be edited. If, say, the piece involves the host using unpredictable civilians for comedy, all the weak material can be cut out before the piece airs. That’s why finished field pieces tend to have a high laugh density.

Jay Leno did field pieces often. Dave Letterman, Conan O’Brien, and Jimmy Kimmel (or one of their correspondents) do field pieces. The streets of Manhattan are certainly a convenient and target-rich environment for comedy.

So here’s hoping that Jimmy Fallon and Seth Meyers take advantage of the pleasant weather and get out more often.

Jay Leno watches Charlie Sheen hurl a baseball through the D in the Hollywood Sign.

Jay watches Charlie hurl a baseball through the D. Success!

With their improv skills I think they’d be terrific at field pieces. Feeding the late-night beast every day is harder than it has to be if you’re only ordering off one side of the comedy menu.

Learn more about how to create successful field pieces in my book Comedy Writing for Late-Night TV.

Comedy Writing Is Not Rocket Science

Posted on March 4, 2014 by Joe Toplyn

If you know the techniques, tricks, and rules, comedy writing isn’t as hard as it looks. When I was co-head writer of The Tonight Show with Jay Leno I directed a sketch featuring Jay and astronaut Story Musgrave. The sketch was a comedy tour of Space Center Houston, the official visitor center of the Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center. (In the photo, that’s Story in the NASA jumpsuit and me with the microphone boom on my face.) We finished taping around lunchtime and I found myself in the cafeteria with Story. As a kid I wanted to be an astronaut so I was thrilled when he invited me to bring my plastic tray over and join him. What a gracious, smart, impressive guy. We chatted about the taping and then he observed, “It must be really hard to come up with comedy every night, week after week.”

This STS-61 crew portrait includes astronauts (top row, l to r) Richard O. Covey, Jeffrey A. Hoffman, and Thomas D. Akers and (bottom row, l to r) Kenneth D. Bowersox, Kathryn C. Thornton, F. Story Musgrave, and Claude Nicollier.

Story Musgrave and part of the team that repaired the Hubble Space Telescope

I was almost struck speechless. Here was an astronaut, a crew member on one of the most complex missions in the history of the Space Shuttle, a veteran spacewalker who had helped repair the incredibly intricate Hubble Space Telescope so scientists could use it to unravel the secrets of the universe. Here was this guy telling me that my job seemed hard. I replied to Story that my job had to be much easier than his. I pointed out that, as with any job, you get better at comedy writing the more you do it, and I had been doing it for years. And I explained that a show like Tonight has a large staff of writers so even if a few of them are off their game on any given day there are plenty of others around who can pick up the slack. But years later I realized that part of the reason comedy writing seems so difficult to Story, and to so many other people, is that the process is so mysterious. To me, repairing the Hubble Space Telescope seems mind-bendingly difficult because I have absolutely no idea how I would go about doing it. To Story, the same task is relatively easy because he knows all the steps involved and has practiced them over and over.

Joe Toplyn and other writers of "The Tonight Show with Jay Leno" in Las Vegas, November 1995.

Joe Toplyn and part of the team that wrote “The Tonight Show with Jay Leno”

The process of writing comedy was a little mysterious to me, too, until recently. I had created thousands of jokes and bits for the four late-night comedy/talk shows I’ve worked on but at the time I didn’t completely understand how I was doing it. The idea of understanding how, and of setting down the techniques, tricks, and rules for creating short-form comedy, began to appeal to me. I thought writers could use a book that would help them unravel the secrets of the comedy universe. So I wrote Comedy Writing for Late-Night TV. Story, if you ever read the book you’ll understand better than ever why I said comedy writing is way easier than your job.

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Want help writing jokes? Make AI write jokes for you with my AI-powered joke writer app, Witscript. Explore Witscript here.

Want help writing jokes?
Make AI write jokes for you with
my AI-powered joke writer app, Witscript.
Explore Witscript here.