late-night Archives - Joe Toplyn

How to Write a Desk Piece

Posted on October 11, 2014 by Joe Toplyn

“Children grow up so fast these days. That’s the reasoning behind this latest addition to a beloved series of children’s books. It’s [HOLDS UP FAKE BOOK] Curious George and the hole in the wall of the girls’ locker room.”

That’s an example of a joke in a Desk Piece, a type of short-form comedy that’s popular on many comedy/talk shows. A Desk Piece is a segment of fully-scripted comedy that the host performs by himself while sitting at his desk.

Here’s how I wrote that joke. The process was very similar to that of writing a topical monologue joke, a process I cover in detail in my book Comedy Writing for Late-Night TV.

I started with the topic of the Desk Piece. The topic is typically a collection of things in a particular category, in this case “New Books.” Next I brainstormed a long list of angles off that topic, that is, types of real books. Here’s a partial list of those angles:

cookbooks * dictionaries * puzzle books * coffee table books * The Lord of the Rings * thesauruses * novels * atlases * children’s books * Mark Twain * celebrity memoirs * paperbacks * etiquette books * Curious George * biographies * encyclopedias * guidebooks * pop-up books * how-to books * photography books * manuals

To create the punch line I chose one angle–Curious George–and used my Punch Line Maker #3 on it, asking the question “What might a curious person do?” I answered that question using a surprisingly unwholesome association of “curious,” which is “spy on people.”

Finally I used my Joke Maximizer #9 (“Get specific”), devising a very specific Peeping George scenario, and arrived at the punch line: “Curious George and the hole in the wall of the girls’ locker room.”

“New Books” is what I call a Graphic/Prop Piece, one of the seven types of Desk Pieces I analyze in my own new book, Comedy Writing for Late-Night TV.

A footnote: I wrote that Curious George joke for Late Show with David Letterman in May 1998 but you’d never know it. It’s an example of evergreen comedy, comedy that has a long shelf life, usually because it’s not based on something topical but on a more lasting pop culture phenomenon.

If you’re preparing a writing sample to submit to a comedy/talk show, include a generous portion of evergreen comedy. That way your submission won’t seem too dated if it winds up sitting on the credenza of some head writer for months before it’s read.

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.

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.