What you never want to do is have a story that doesn't track emotionally, because then you're going joke to joke and you're going to fatigue the audience. The only thing that's going to string them to the next joke is how successful the previous joke is.
The U.K. and Europe in general seem to be a lot more patient. The U.S. are expecting 'joke joke joke joke joke joke joke.' They don't actually sit and listen to you.
Twitter is a good medium to lean how to write jokes. It pushes you to write a better joke in that, on Twitter, the first joke about something has already happened. You need to think of the second joke and the third joke.
I don't know how to tell a joke. I never tell jokes. I can tell stories that happened to me... anecdotes. But never a joke.
If you tell a joke in the forest, but nobody laughs, was it a joke?
When I'm writing columns, it's - all I'm thinking about is jokes, joke, joke, joke, setup, punch line, joke, joke, joke. And I really don't care where it goes.
If I tell a joke on stage and the crowd laughs for a minute, I stand there for a minute and enjoy them laughing before I go on to the next joke. On TV, if I stand there for a minute while they laugh, I look like an idiot who can't remember the next joke.
You learn what can become a good joke and can be repeatable. You have a shorthand about how to introduce a joke to someone.
There are certain jokes that indicate how mainstream a comic is. If you're talking about how the side effects of drugs that they advertise on TV are worse than the actual illness they're supposed to prevent, that's like the hackiest joke out there now. If you're still doing that joke, that usually is an indicator of being mainstream, in a bad way.
There's a joke that I do where I make fun of myself for being bow-legged, and I compare myself to a camel and how a camel walks and sits, and that has become a joke that people - when I deliver that joke, people are in tears.
I wanted to be clever, but being funny came first. That's how you know someone is clever. They don't come out and tell you pi to 13 places - they tell you a joke.
A fire broke out backstage in a theatre. The clown came out to warn the public; they thought it was a joke and applauded. He repeated it; the acclaim was even greater. I think that's just how the world will come to an end: to the general applause of wits who believe it's a joke.
How about this John Kerry controversy? So he's out there in California, tells some kind of joke and it backfires. He's saying he botched the joke. ... This guy can lose elections he's not even in.
I'm not allowed to make a joke. It is a bit unfair how I'm treated. I thought it was a joke. I got calls and messages. I would rather not to have to worry about things like that. It is disappointing.
Some street jokes are just timeless. There's an old street joke about comedians. The joke is that a beautiful girl comes up to a comedian at the end of the night and says, "I saw your show tonight, and I just loved it. I want to go home with you, and I'll do anything you want." And the comedian says, "Were you at the 7 or the 9?" That's just a perfect joke, because it points out how egomaniacal and obsessive comedians are. Even though I'm not waiting for a groupie, I can completely understand it. It just defines how comedians are driven.
A lot of new signings find it difficult to settle because they don't realise how fast and how physical it is and how fast the games come round.