WEBVTT

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You are listening to the IFH podcast
Network. For more amazing filmmaking and screenwriting

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00:00:08.800 --> 00:00:13.919
podcasts, just go to IFAH podcast
network dot com. Welcome to the Bulletproof

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00:00:13.919 --> 00:00:18.760
Screenwriting Podcast, Episode number two ninety
nine, except no one's definition of your

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life, Define it yourself. Harvey
Fierstea broadcasting from a dark, windowless room

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in Hollywood when we really should be
working on that next draft. It's the

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Bulletproof Screenwriting Podcast, showing you the
craft and business of screenwriting while teaching you

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how to make your screenplay bulletproof.
And here's your host, Alex Ferrari.

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Welcome, Welcome to another episode of
the Bulletproof Screenwriting Podcast. I am your

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humble host Alex Ferrari. Now,
today's show is sponsored by Bulletproof Script Coverage.

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Now. Unlike other script coverage services, Bulletproof Script Coverage actually focuses on

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Enjoy today's episode with guest host Jason
Buff. Today we are talking with

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Steve Kaplan, author of the book
The Hidden Tools of Comedy. He's also

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the creator of the HBO Workspace,
creator of the HBO New Writers Program.

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So we'll be talking to Steve in
just a second. I really had a

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great talk with him, and we
also add a lot of fun little clips

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and things in there so that you
can really get a feel for the topics

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we're talking about. Here's my interview
with Steve Kaplin. Did you immediately open

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up a theater company or how that
worked well? I actually came to Los

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Angeles first. Uh. We uh. In New York, we did.

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We were running this theater called Manhattan
Punchline, and we used to do a

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one act festival every year. So
a bunch of people wanted to bring a

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number of one ax out to Los
Angeles, and so that's what originally brought

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me out there. They I helped
them put up this evening of one Axe

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h and I knew I was going
to stay, so I came out.

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I did a little theater, but
then I tried to get a real,

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you know, big boy pants,
grown up job, and it took me

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a little bit of time, but
eventually I hooked up with Chris Albrecht at

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HBO. I pitched him an idea
and uh he he ran with it.

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And first we did the HBO New
I Just Project and that ran for a

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couple of years, and then he
started the Aspen Comedy Festival, and in

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support of that, with a couple
of other people, we opened up a

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performance space in Los Angeles called the
HBO Workspace. It's now being run by

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Comedy Central. And what we did
was we helped facilitate their search for comedians

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and comics, and at the same
time, we were producing shows and showcasing

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people both for HBO executives for them
to take a look at and also just

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uh to uh kind of be an
asset and a service to the community.

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So uh so that's what originally That's
what I originally did in Los Angeles,

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and then I got involved in management
um talent management, and I uh,

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after doing that for a couple of
years, I realized, Hey, I'm

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no good at this because did you
tell your clients that one day? Well,

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well, either eventually eventually the clients
that were left to me. Uh,

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you know, I I told.
But the terrible thing about I wasn't

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an ancient. I was a manager. And the terrible thing about being a

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manager, uh is that you're you
know, especially for me, because I

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took everything very personally. So if
somebody you said this person is not good

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for this job, um, oh
I don't like the script. I I

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felt devastated. It was like,
um, it was like getting broke up

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with by a girl every every every
week. Uh. And when and when

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clients leave left me, Um,
it was really like getting broke up with

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a girl, especially when they started
the conversation. You know, Steve,

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I like you as a person,
and I said, you know, I

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I when I was in my dating
years, I used to hear that a

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lot. So I realized that that
wasn't that wasn't my metire. It was

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kind of a zig when I should
have zagged. Uh and along the way

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I had run into a guy and
uh uh and and a funny you know,

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funny story. He was he was
showcasing a show and and I happened

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to leave in the middle of the
show because it was it was not very

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good. And and amazingly enough,
um years later he uh got in touch

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with me to take a look at
a script. Uh. So I I

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looked at a script and I gave
him notes and again I I was more

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cruel than kind. Uh. And
amazingly enough, a couple of years later

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he said to me, um,
and this is when I was really I

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was. I was about to say
this, this whole management thing was that

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move? Uh And he said,
I'm working with Robert McKay, and I

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think you could do for comedy what
Robert McKay does for story. And he

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said, have you ever taught comedy
to writers? And I said, well,

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I started out teaching comedy to actors
at my theater company. Um,

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and I've worked on a lot of
scripts with a lot of playwrights, and

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I assume that I can this,
this will translate over to writers. And

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from there it from that little seed, a mighty oak grew. Now I

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mean it seems such a for for
somebody who doesn't understand the concept of breaking

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up comedy and you know, seeing
what's going on and why it's working and

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why people are are laughing at something. What was kind of like that first

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step into teaching comedy. What were
the first kind of like obvious things that

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that you found that people needed to
to understand about comedy. Well, I

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mean, well you should understand that
the theater company that I was running,

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um UH, that I started with
two other actors, Manhattan Punchline, was

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a theater completely devoted to comedy.
So that's all we did. We produced

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comedy plays, we um, We
showcased improv groups. Michael Patrick King,

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who later went on to write Sex
in the City and Two Brooke Girls was

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was was one of the leaders of
this uh improv group along with um,

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you know Don Morevero, who's now
a very well known stand up comic.

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We produced late night shows with stand
ups including Rita Rudner Jane Anderson who's now

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a very famous playwright. Uh.
And so that's all we did. And

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the first thing I noticed about comedy
is that it's fucking hard, and it's

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it's elusive. Would I would be
producing a show and I would be standing

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in the back of the audience,
and the show that was a riotous hit

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on Thursday was met with crickets on
Sunday, and the actors would come off

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stage and they would say, what
a terrible audience. But I was standing

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in the audience, and I wasn't
terrible, and I was prepared to enjoy

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it. I might not laugh out
loud as much as people who hadn't seen

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the show, but I I started
noticing differences. I started noticing that there

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was a different approach to the material, a slight differentiation in how the actors

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were meeting the material night by night. And that's what started me on the

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exploration that that became a forty week
master class, which then became a weekend

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workshop, which then became a book, which translated into Chinese, because God

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knows you need some funny your Chinese. Well you know you've arrived, yes,

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um uh, and and it's going
to be translated into French. So

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so now we can be rude when
we're funny. Maybe I shouldn't say,

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finally the French will have commedy.
I'm su I'm supper. Yeah, I'm

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really I'm supposed to be U supposed
to be going to Paris in April,

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so so hopefully they will listen to
that part of the podcast. Well,

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we have a big French you know, listening exactly. So So I started

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to notice that that there were certain
certain things that that were for the most

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part unrecognized or or not thought to
be uh important or or or vital uh.

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And these became what I called the
hidden tools of common will be right

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back after a word from our sponsor, and now back to the show.

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I mean, all the actors and
the playwrights that I was working with,

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you know, they had all gone
to college or conservatory, and they all

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knew Uda Hogan and Stanislavsky uh and
and great uh playwriting techniques. But but

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there were certain things that they they
were not aware of that I started to

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become aware of only because I was
standing the back and and oftentimes I was

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directing a play, and I would
start to notice that that there were things

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that they did that decreased the comedy
and things that they did that increased the

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comedy. So I mean, for
instance, um, one of the things

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that that kills comedies if if you
know the actor knows too much if the

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act you know, in in acting
classes is called anticipating, but what it

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really is is the actor is too
aware of um, of what's happening,

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what's going on, too in fact
too smart. Uh So. So one

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of the things that um, that
I started to realize that were there,

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there were these principles that had not
been taught anywhere, or for the most

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part, had not been taught,
and that great comics and comedians either picked

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up or new by by instinct,
um, but that could be analyzed and

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uh and presented and taught uh to
people who hadn't spent their entire childhoods uh

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listening to all the George Carlin and
and Richard Pryor albums for instance. Right,

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and oh and you would like to
hear one of these, Yeah,

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that would be that would be helpfully
is okay? Well this podcast? Okay?

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Uh So, So there's there's the
um, there's the dynamic of straight

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line wavy line. And that's that's
my terminology for it, which which basically

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means that rather than a straight man
in a comic, everybody thinks that you

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know, if you see a duo, there's a comic a funny person doing

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funny things and a straight man who's
just kind of or a straight woman who's

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just kind of setting things up.
And I came to realize that that dynamic

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is false, that it's not about
a funny guy doing funny things and other

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people just kind of setting them up. It's really about somebody who is blind

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to the problem or creating the problem, and somebody who's struggling with the problem

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but unable to solve it because they're
they're flawed. They're they're just a flawed

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human being. Way when, for
instance, when John Klee started Monty Python,

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he said that when they started Monty
Python, he thought that comedy was

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watching somebody do something funny. What
they came to realize is comedy is watching

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somebody watch somebody do something funny.
Yes, you know, it's a man's

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life in England's Mountain screen. That's
what I hear. That I'm going to

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stop this sketch down and that there's
anymore of this. I'm going to stop

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the whole program. I thought it
was supposed to be about teeth anyway,

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what I am going to do something
about teeth? I'm rustic, man,

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Alon not sleeping with that producer again. Comedy is the person who is kind

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of like us, struggling with some
idiot, so that if you put Jerry

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Seinfeld and Kramer in a room,
yes, it looks like Kramer is doing

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all the funny stuff, but without
Jerry being a human being kind of perplexed

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and amused and confused by Cramer,
there's no comedy has life on the Red

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Planet. It's killing me. I
can't eat, I can't sleep. All

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I can see is that giant red
sun in the shape of a chicken.

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What did you go down to the
Kenny Rodgers and complaint? Oh? They

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gave me the heave hole. You
know, I don't think that Kenny Rodgers

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has any idea. What's going on
down them? What are you doing?

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That's tomato juice that looked like milk
to me, Jerry, my rods and

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cones ross I got say, I
gotta move in with you, Jerry.

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I don't know, Craig. My
concern is that living together after a while,

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I might start to get on each
other's nerves a little. Listen to

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me. I got a great idea. Now you're a heavy sleeper, right,

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Why don't we just switch apartments?
Or I could sleep in the park.

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You can knock these walls down,
make it an eight room luxury,

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Sweet Jerry, these are a load
buried walls. They're not gonna come down.

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Yeah, that's no good. You
have to drive that place out of

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business. How are you gonna do
that like we did in the sixties taking

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it to the streets. That's one
of the things that I, you know,

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mentioning that I always remember, Like
Conan O'Brien, one of the things

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that makes his skits so funny is
having something completely insane happening, and then

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you don't really laugh until the camera
cuts back to Conan's reaction to it.

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Exactly. So if you if you
start, if you watch sitcoms, good

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sitcoms, you'll notice that that the
the comedy, really, the comedy is

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the comedy circuit is completed when there's
a reaction to the craziness, not just

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the craziness. Uh so, uh
so, what seems to be the east

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part the straight man really is essential
to comedy. And if you watch a

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good SNL sketch, and there aren't
you know, not every SNL sketch is

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good, but a good SNL sketch
is the comedy is the human being in

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the equation. It's the it's the
person who's being weirded out by the weird

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stuff that's happening, and it's only
underscored by the idiot who's not paying any

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attention. Right, So uh there. I mean, just the other night

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on SNL there were you know,
Adam Driver was on him. Yeah.

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I guess he didn't get such great
reviews. Somebody said, well, it's

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not Trump SNL bad, but but
there was a there was a there was

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a great Aladdin sketch in which he's
flying on the magic carpet and um uh

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and uh the uh, the girl
I can't remember. I think it's um

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Cecily Strong. I think I think
that's who it was. Uh, is

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on the magic carpet and first a
bird flies into her and then a bomb

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drops in hercus there over Syria,
and she keeps on getting weirded out,

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and then she keeps on trying to
get back into the romantic moment. And

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that is so human. Uh.
And meanwhile, uh, Jeff, you

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know, Aladdin, as played by
Adam Driver is completely oblivious. So that's

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the perfect example of straight line wavy
line. Somebody who's on a straight track,

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like has blinders on blind to the
problem or creating the problem, and

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somebody else who's struggling the problem.
But because they're they're what we call a

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non hero, unable to solve the
problem. And a non hero is another

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is another thing that or principle that
we talk about in which it's not about

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being a ridiculous person, a clown, you know, a silly clown.

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It's really just about somebody who lacks
some, if not all, the essential

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tools and skills with which to win. So sometimes the most basic skill with

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which to win is simply knowing.
So so one of the best directions you

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can ever give in comedy is don't
know so much don't know, And what

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that means is that if something happens, don't because you've read the script and

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you know what's happening on this page
and what's going to happen on the next

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page, don't react like you've got
it. I understand it. Be confused,

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let there be doubt. Doubt is
the friend of comedy. Being unsure

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is the friend of comedy, and
being sure being certain about things is dramatic.

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It just becomes being self reflective is
a dramatic moment. And what we

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found out is that these principles aren't
just here's how you be funny. It's

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really about here's how you can modulate
the levels of comedy or drama in a

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scene. You want a character to
be more dramatic, make them, give

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them more skills, make them more
empathetic, more sensitive, more kind,

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more knowing, make them, make
them less comic. Take away those skills.

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Create a comedy, create a strong
straight line wavy line relationship, create

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a dramatic moment. Have everybody make
you know, make eye contact and be

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empathetic with each other, and have
them have them share the scene, will

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be right back after a word from
our sponsor, and now back to the

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show. So those kinds of things
don't apply just to comedy, but you

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can actually modulate the amount of comedy
and drama in a scene by increasing or

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decreasing these principles. When you're talking
about you know, you would see one

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show and then you'd see the same
show and it wasn't funny for whatever reason.

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Were those improv shows or were they
literally saying the same things in that

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In that case, what's happening is
the actors will subtly begin to adjust their

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performance so they look less ridiculous because
nobody in the world wants to look like

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an idiot. And so in a
comedy, sometimes the characters are doing idiotic

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things, but the actors will subtly, subtly, just make an adjustment so

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that it's a little bit more understandable, appropriate, logical, and rational.

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And so sometimes that's why a script
is Sometimes the funny is the first time

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the actors get around the table to
read it, because the actors aren't aware

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of how stupid they're going to sound
when they say this line. Once they

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understand how stupid they sound, they
either make it sound stupid or and again

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to put on a mask to protect
themselves, or they make it sound just

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slightly less stupid. Here's an example. It's hard. It's hard to think

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of a film or TV show where
you can see somebody anticipating, although you

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know, they used to talk about
how they would have to trick the three

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Stooges into not knowing when the pie
is coming, because if they knew when

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the pie was coming, it wouldn't
be funny. So what they would say

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is that, okay, we're gonna
hit you on three, one, two,

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and they would hit him on two. They would do everything they could,

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and these guys were hit with thousands
of pies, so they would go

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to great lengths to try to fool
them when the pie was coming, because

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if they knew when the pie was
coming, it wouldn't just be that they

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would flinch, they would subtly react
that, oh, I'm going to get

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hit. But a better example is, uh is like bad comedy like,

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um, I'm not a fan of
late Jerry Lewis. I love early Jerry

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Lewis because if you watch early Jerry
Lewis like at Home in the Army.

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I think the first movie he made
with Dean Martin, he is so innocent,

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so sweet, so unknowing. But
later, when when you know the

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French told him he's a genius,
he's he just twists himself into a pretzel,

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as though as though to say,
if you just looked at me,

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you wouldn't see an idiot. So
I'm gonna have to pretend I'm an idiot.

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Uh So you know, just think
of any bad comedy you know,

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um, something bad with Rob Schneider, Grown Ups two in which people are

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acting are pretending to be idiots.
And my point of view, what I

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always tell writers and actors is that
you don't have to pretend we are idiots.

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I mean, that's who we are. We're human beings. We're we're

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we're we're you know, these stupid
dupasts who are bumbling around this this planet,

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you know, hurt link through space, you know, making up all

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sorts of reasons why and we don't
know, We just don't know. So

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so the art of comedy is actually
the art of telling the truth about what

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it's like to be a human.
It seems like the moment somebody is trying

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to intentionally be funny or you see
something like you know, you can kind

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of see that, oh, look
they're trying to be funny right now,

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right is the moment that it just
it's not funny at all, you know.

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And you seem to see that in
a lot of these comedies that they're

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just like, especially let's say whatever
Kevin James movie. You know, it's

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like, okay, we're gonna have
this wacky thing and there, let's do

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all these situations where oh, he's
going to be put into this situation,

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in that situation, and it's just
like there's nothing funny about it, maybe

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for like a five year old,
but it just doesn't doesn't work. Oh,

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well I haven't seen uh Paul Blart
Mall Cop two? I have seen

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it? You have seen it?
Yeah? Was it great? It was

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so good? No, I mean
it's it's like I love I love watching

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bad movies as well as good movies
because you get to kind of like put

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it together and and you know,
I mean it just it has a couple

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of moments. But I mean ask
you this. Have you not seen it?

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Have you seen Hitch? I've seen
Hitch Chess with the Smith with What's

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the difference in Kevin James between Hitch
and Paul Blart Mall Cop two. Um,

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he's got a slight accent and fake
teeth, I think is the only

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difference. That's the only difference.
Well, I don't really remember Hitch that

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well, he wasn't, I mean
plays he plays this sweaty guy who wants

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to marry, who wants to get
with a supermodel, Right, I can't.

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What I remember about Hitch is that
he was recognizable. He was like

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one of us, Okay, and
he was a little clumsy, but he

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but he wasn't such an exaggerated clown
that he was no longer recognizable as human,

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Right, whereas I'm guessing in Mall
Cop two, he does things that

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no, no sentient human being would
do. Somebody thought, wouldn't it be

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funny? If right? Yeah,
well, you know most of the movies

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that you know, and a lot
of things, all these situations happened that

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aren't that really aren't, you know, believable. So I think you're kind

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of watching it like, oh,
that's kind of funny or whatever, but

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you don't you're not brought into the
story. You don't actually believe any of

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these characters are real, right,
you know. So if you look at

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a movie like um, The Other
Guys with Will Farrell and and Mark Wahlberg,

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there's a moment in which, uh, in which they're walking away from

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a store and the store explodes,
and then they're on the ground and Will

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Farrell's going, it hurts. They
never tell you it hurts. And that's

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the comedy, is noticing what's around
you and being and being aware of the

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inconsistencies, the absurdities what Dorothy Parker
called having a sharp eye and a wild

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mind. As I can't here yeahs, oh my god, I walk away

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in movies without flitsy what it explodes
behind that there's no way. What bullshit

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00:27:10.440 --> 00:27:14.720
on that? When they flew the
Millennium falcon outside of the desk start it

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00:27:14.799 --> 00:27:19.640
was followed by the explosion that was
bullshit. Don't you demo star Wars that

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00:27:19.799 --> 00:27:29.400
was all accurate. I've got softishue
down. There's no way. I don't

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00:27:29.440 --> 00:27:33.799
have softission down at least. I
just want to go somewhere and breastfeed right

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now. So so when a comic
comes out in a club and says uh

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and says hey you in the front
row and starts to make a comment,

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that's the essence of comedy, which
is noticing what's around you and not taking

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00:27:47.359 --> 00:27:52.720
it for granted and seeing the absurdity
in it, and and share and and

317
00:27:52.880 --> 00:27:56.799
being confused by it, not necessarily
knowing all about it and being a dick

318
00:27:56.839 --> 00:28:03.279
about it, but but just kind
of commenting on it in a way that

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both expresses what you feel and also
questions it and doesn't doesn't quite know what

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the answer is, which is why
a comic is what about that? What's

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the deal with? It's a question? It's not a statement. Once you're

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making statements your your your politician,
a question is as a comedian, So

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yeah, I mean, what what
do you think is I mean, do

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00:28:29.680 --> 00:28:33.079
you feel like, for example,
when I'm writing, I you know,

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I'm also a writer. Um,
A lot of the things great by the

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00:28:37.039 --> 00:28:41.079
way, I love it. It's
golden the comedy for me, Like I

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00:28:41.119 --> 00:28:44.480
grew up always seeing things as being
comic, you know, And when I

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was in as early as I can
remember, I would be in just situations

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00:28:47.519 --> 00:28:49.319
and just start laughing, and people
would even get mad at me because I

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would talk into somebody and just all
their little quirks and things would just like

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something would come out of that and
I'd start laughing and they'd be like,

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00:28:56.799 --> 00:28:59.200
well, what, what's so funny? You know, there's medication to get

333
00:28:59.240 --> 00:29:03.440
mad at me? Yeah, well, thank god. And when I when

334
00:29:03.480 --> 00:29:07.680
I write, it's like it's impossible
even if I mean the stuff that I

335
00:29:07.720 --> 00:29:11.920
write is more kind of character driven
stuff, but it's the humor just comes

336
00:29:11.960 --> 00:29:14.599
out of it. It's like I'm
not even trying. And then once you

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00:29:14.680 --> 00:29:18.519
have, once you really feel a
character on the page, living and breathing,

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00:29:18.759 --> 00:29:21.799
just the humor just comes out of
it without even trying to do anything,

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00:29:21.839 --> 00:29:25.599
just their actions. And I've never
looked into it deeper to try and

340
00:29:25.680 --> 00:29:27.559
dissect why it's funny, but it
just seems like that. It's like,

341
00:29:27.559 --> 00:29:30.519
I don't even know why it's funny, but it's funny that when you have

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00:29:30.559 --> 00:29:34.000
like a real character and they do
something that you're just like, oh,

343
00:29:34.000 --> 00:29:37.319
that's you know, that's that character. You know, that's how they do

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00:29:37.359 --> 00:29:41.119
stuff. Well. In the course, what I say is that the value

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00:29:41.119 --> 00:29:45.599
of the course is not to take
what you do and change it entirely.

346
00:29:45.640 --> 00:29:48.640
It's not it's not a methodology.
It's not here's how you make the sausage.

347
00:29:48.680 --> 00:29:52.039
But it's it's a toolbox, and
you use tools when something is broken.

348
00:29:52.200 --> 00:29:57.359
So if if you're writing and everything's
working, great, we'll be right

349
00:29:57.400 --> 00:30:04.200
back after a word from our spon
answer and now back to the show.

350
00:30:06.839 --> 00:30:11.599
Don't look at it, don't say
well what is Blake Snyder and and Robert

351
00:30:11.640 --> 00:30:15.160
McKee and Steve Kaplan, No,
just keep going. But when there's a

352
00:30:15.200 --> 00:30:18.359
scene that doesn't work, that's when
you can use a tool. Um,

353
00:30:18.400 --> 00:30:22.720
that's when you can try to figure
out what we teach is what comedy is,

354
00:30:22.880 --> 00:30:26.119
how it works, why it works, what's going on when it's not

355
00:30:26.240 --> 00:30:30.240
working, and what can you do
about it. So when you if you

356
00:30:30.319 --> 00:30:33.480
have something that's not working. Then
you have some tools to try to figure

357
00:30:33.480 --> 00:30:37.519
out and you want the scene to
be comic. Um, that's when you

358
00:30:37.519 --> 00:30:40.480
can figure out, well, what
could I do here? Can I?

359
00:30:40.519 --> 00:30:44.440
Can I use a metaphorical relationship?
Can I should there be a straight line

360
00:30:44.440 --> 00:30:48.559
wavy line relationship. Now, when
you look at somebody like Judd Apatow and

361
00:30:48.720 --> 00:30:52.799
I just recently watched again this is
forty, it just seems like so much

362
00:30:52.839 --> 00:30:56.799
of that we're always kind of riding
this line between what's kind of going too

363
00:30:56.839 --> 00:31:00.920
far, what's going to be something
to And you know, with a lot

364
00:31:00.920 --> 00:31:03.880
of the comedy podcast too, the
comedy is not coming out of people trying

365
00:31:03.880 --> 00:31:08.160
to be funny. It's coming out
of really difficult situations and people, you

366
00:31:08.160 --> 00:31:11.720
know, fighting about things and whatever. What How do you look at that

367
00:31:11.839 --> 00:31:17.359
kind of comedy versus all these kind
of stupid slapstick kind of you know,

368
00:31:17.440 --> 00:31:19.839
silly coms. I mean, my
my favorite comedies are the comedies that tell

369
00:31:19.880 --> 00:31:23.400
the truth about about people. Now, it could you could tell the truth

370
00:31:23.559 --> 00:31:29.880
in a fantastical situation like groundhog Day
one of my favorite comedies, but one

371
00:31:29.920 --> 00:31:33.839
of my other favorite comedies his forty
year Old Virgin and One of the reasons

372
00:31:33.880 --> 00:31:38.559
I love forty year old virgin is
because they don't make him a ridiculous character.

373
00:31:38.759 --> 00:31:41.119
You know, after the poker game, and you know, he's kind

374
00:31:41.119 --> 00:31:45.680
of ridiculous. He's he's riding a
bike, he's never he's he's he's you

375
00:31:45.720 --> 00:31:51.119
know, he's frozen in this adolescence. But after the poker game, he's

376
00:31:51.200 --> 00:31:56.599
humiliated. Yes, it is question, are you a virgin? Are you

377
00:31:56.640 --> 00:32:01.039
a virgin? Yeah? Yeah,
since I was ten, it all makes

378
00:32:01.079 --> 00:32:06.279
sense. You're a virgin. I
am shot. How does that happen?

379
00:32:06.400 --> 00:32:08.599
He's a fucking virgin? All knew? If that makes so much sense?

380
00:32:08.640 --> 00:32:13.880
Man, virgin, You guys are
hilarious, right, don't be mean.

381
00:32:14.039 --> 00:32:15.160
I'm not being mean. I'm trying
to help the part now. I'm trying

382
00:32:15.160 --> 00:32:17.519
to say. I want to get
you laid. Dude, I understand what's

383
00:32:17.519 --> 00:32:34.160
going on. Guys. I'm so
up your asses the MAGA san Come on,

384
00:32:34.319 --> 00:32:39.319
man, you can do better than
that. You are so stifend.

385
00:32:46.359 --> 00:32:52.759
Come on, Uh, it's gonna
be fine. They don't even remember.

386
00:32:53.279 --> 00:32:58.640
Those guys are cool and you feel
for him. It's not like I It's

387
00:32:58.640 --> 00:33:02.839
not like some I don't know Rob
Schneider I assume he's a very talented guy.

388
00:33:02.839 --> 00:33:06.640
I'm just using Rob. If you
were listening to this, I'm just

389
00:33:06.759 --> 00:33:10.000
using you as kind of an icon
of not good comedy. Without Rob,

390
00:33:10.039 --> 00:33:17.880
this is Steve So I mean,
they're not just making him some idiot.

391
00:33:19.039 --> 00:33:23.400
They're humanizing him. And he goes
he rides home. Uh. He he

392
00:33:23.559 --> 00:33:29.839
has this primal scream and it's so
in touch with true emotions, what we

393
00:33:29.880 --> 00:33:34.319
would all be going through. And
then he goes back into work and he

394
00:33:34.359 --> 00:33:37.440
thinks, maybe I'll just maybe they
won't remember it. And yeah, they

395
00:33:37.440 --> 00:33:40.039
say, Hi, how you doing, And all of a sudden, everybody's

396
00:33:40.119 --> 00:33:45.240
ragging on him, and uh and
and uh, you know, loo,

397
00:33:45.839 --> 00:33:49.839
let's get the virgin laid and he
us not the store. And the thing

398
00:33:49.880 --> 00:33:53.000
that made me love the movie was
was Paul Rudd running after him, trying

399
00:33:53.039 --> 00:34:01.000
to help him. Right, human
sweet, Uh, not ridiculous. So

400
00:34:01.200 --> 00:34:07.400
they never you know, Yes,
there are some outlandish, very very broad

401
00:34:07.559 --> 00:34:09.920
things in that movie, but for
the most part, it's grounded in a

402
00:34:10.039 --> 00:34:15.599
human condition. In the in in
What would Happen to Us? Uh,

403
00:34:16.519 --> 00:34:22.039
Chris Rock was talking about his evolutionist
as a filmmaker, and he was talking

404
00:34:22.079 --> 00:34:27.280
about that that he's learned a lot
from Louis c. K and that now

405
00:34:25.840 --> 00:34:30.920
uh, whereas in the past he
would go for any joke possible, but

406
00:34:30.159 --> 00:34:37.840
now especially with um his uh I
can't remember the name of the movie five

407
00:34:37.000 --> 00:34:43.760
Things or top five uh. That
he basically said, put somebody in a

408
00:34:43.800 --> 00:34:47.719
situation and say what would they do
now? And to me, that's the

409
00:34:47.760 --> 00:34:52.800
best way to develop a comic premise
is you come up with a with a

410
00:34:52.840 --> 00:34:59.800
fantastic premise, something that's impossible or
implausible, and then put in you know,

411
00:35:00.000 --> 00:35:02.719
our typical comic comedy characters and then
see what would they do now,

412
00:35:04.559 --> 00:35:08.119
what would happen now? And develop
it, like you say, through character

413
00:35:08.239 --> 00:35:14.079
as opposed to plot. Yeah,
it's it's interesting, you know, going

414
00:35:14.119 --> 00:35:15.960
back to the forty year forty year
old Virgin. One of the things that

415
00:35:16.000 --> 00:35:20.000
people forget about that is if you
go later in the film, once his

416
00:35:20.519 --> 00:35:25.320
relationship with Katherine Keener develops, it
actually becomes a very like you know,

417
00:35:25.400 --> 00:35:30.840
it's still comic and everything, but
it's more like it's a real heartwarming story,

418
00:35:30.840 --> 00:35:34.400
you know, and he's you know, showing the dealing with the daughter

419
00:35:34.440 --> 00:35:36.880
and all that stuff, you know
what I mean. I love I love

420
00:35:36.960 --> 00:35:39.039
that scene where he's like, you
know, I speak sarcasm too, and

421
00:35:39.039 --> 00:35:42.079
he's got you know, he does
a magic trick and she's like, do

422
00:35:42.119 --> 00:35:45.239
you walk around with the ear in
your pocket? You know? I mean,

423
00:35:45.280 --> 00:35:47.039
I love those scenes, but they're
not like you know, they're they're

424
00:35:47.079 --> 00:35:50.840
more of like a drama, you
know, it's like a real story.

425
00:35:51.519 --> 00:35:58.280
It's and and because they because they
don't feel the need to do a joke

426
00:35:58.880 --> 00:36:04.119
or a bit every ten seconds.
That a favorite team of mine is when

427
00:36:04.199 --> 00:36:10.440
he takes the daughter to the planned
parenthood the clinic. Now you're all here

428
00:36:10.480 --> 00:36:15.840
because you're interested in obtaining birth control. Any questions. Here's a cute story.

429
00:36:15.840 --> 00:36:20.360
I came home the other day and
he is with his girlfriend in my

430
00:36:20.400 --> 00:36:24.880
marital bed doing things that are illegal
in Alabama, sex acts right, things

431
00:36:24.880 --> 00:36:29.400
that my wife won't do. Okay, did you have a question? How

432
00:36:29.400 --> 00:36:31.559
do I get my wife to do
that? Does anybody else have a question?

433
00:36:31.679 --> 00:36:37.880
My daughter is, for lack of
a better word, dumb. How

434
00:36:37.920 --> 00:36:40.920
do I stop her menstrual cycle?
You want her to stop having a menstrual

435
00:36:40.960 --> 00:36:44.519
cycle? I want to stop it, maybe just for a few years.

436
00:36:44.960 --> 00:36:47.360
Yeah, I don't think that's a
good idea. Does anybody else have a

437
00:36:47.440 --> 00:36:52.280
question? I have a question.
I think some of the people here might

438
00:36:52.360 --> 00:36:57.119
be sexually inexperience. Is it true
that if you don't use it, you

439
00:36:57.280 --> 00:37:01.599
lose it? Is that a serious
question? No, it wasn't. Now,

440
00:37:01.719 --> 00:37:07.039
there are a lot of activities that
you can engage in without having sex

441
00:37:07.079 --> 00:37:10.679
that are both fun and safe.
What sort of activities I think everybody wants

442
00:37:10.679 --> 00:37:15.440
to know about the activities. Well, instead of having intercourse, you could

443
00:37:15.480 --> 00:37:21.360
have outer course. Outer course?
Oh what's that? Yeah? What is

444
00:37:21.400 --> 00:37:27.199
that? Well? Outer course is
anything that isn't vaginal intercourse. I prefer

445
00:37:27.280 --> 00:37:32.199
a vaginal intercourse. He really does. Now, there are ways of having

446
00:37:32.280 --> 00:37:38.480
sex without intercourse. Let's see.
There are things like body rubbing or dry

447
00:37:38.559 --> 00:37:44.480
humping. You could try hump.
There's masturbation, masturbation, play with yourself,

448
00:37:44.559 --> 00:37:50.000
mutual masturbation, play with a friend, deep kissing, there's erotic massage.

449
00:37:50.400 --> 00:37:53.039
All that sounds like it would be
nice. Oral sex play sounds like

450
00:37:53.039 --> 00:37:58.400
my Friday night upset we went to
temple. Okay, are there any virgins

451
00:37:58.519 --> 00:38:05.360
here who are thinking about having sex
for the first time? Wait, so

452
00:38:05.559 --> 00:38:10.519
you're a virgin? I tapped that. Oh yeah, you tap that,

453
00:38:10.840 --> 00:38:14.840
Seth, what do you think you're
cool with your little jew frow? We

454
00:38:14.920 --> 00:38:17.199
don't say tap that? What what
are you talking about, Seth? You

455
00:38:17.239 --> 00:38:24.119
know what, I'm a virgin too, that's we're virgins too. Yeah,

456
00:38:27.519 --> 00:38:30.159
no, you know what. It's
a it's it's a personal choice. And

457
00:38:30.960 --> 00:38:34.119
okay, um, I can't listen
to any more of this because it's making

458
00:38:34.119 --> 00:38:37.880
me six up by You can get
this information on your website. Right.

459
00:38:37.920 --> 00:38:40.440
Oh yes, thanks, nice meeting
everybody? Any other questions, give me

460
00:38:40.559 --> 00:38:45.599
extra large condoms us Seth, you've
got a tiny penis, and he's asking

461
00:38:45.639 --> 00:38:50.320
more questions than anybody else. But
then he's sitting around all these people,

462
00:38:50.360 --> 00:38:53.920
all these all the you know,
the the kid who thinks he's hot stuff,

463
00:38:54.400 --> 00:38:58.320
and and uh, the guy who
just wants, you know, his

464
00:38:58.480 --> 00:39:00.760
daughter to be here. Can we
can we make sure that she doesn't have

465
00:39:00.800 --> 00:39:07.119
any sex till she's thirty five?
And then on the drive home, um,

466
00:39:07.480 --> 00:39:12.880
uh, the daughter just turns to
him and says, you're a virgin,

467
00:39:13.000 --> 00:39:20.639
right, and he's And rather than
pretending, which which some some uh

468
00:39:20.960 --> 00:39:25.119
script teachers will teach, will tell
you that the key to comedy is deception.

469
00:39:27.480 --> 00:39:34.920
And you know that's such a uh
yeah sometimes. But but if if

470
00:39:34.960 --> 00:39:37.920
you take that to its logical illogical, you know, to its logical conclusion,

471
00:39:38.079 --> 00:39:43.119
you never tell anybody the truth.
And that's exhausting. It's exhausting.

472
00:39:43.960 --> 00:39:46.559
And what I love about the scene
is he just says, yeah, but

473
00:39:46.639 --> 00:39:50.159
don't tell your mom. Okay,
well, what are you gonna do it?

474
00:39:50.199 --> 00:39:52.440
Well, I'm getting around to it. It's so I keep on going

475
00:39:52.480 --> 00:39:57.039
back to that word. It's human. It tells the truth about the human

476
00:39:57.079 --> 00:40:05.440
condition. Will be right back back
after a word from our sponsor, and

477
00:40:05.599 --> 00:40:09.920
now back to the show. Drama
helps us dream about what we could be,

478
00:40:10.239 --> 00:40:15.159
but comedy helps us live with who
we are. Comedy is the truth.

479
00:40:15.559 --> 00:40:22.280
Drama is the exaggeration. Drama is
the idealization of life. Would that

480
00:40:22.400 --> 00:40:29.480
we were as tortured and as sensitive
and as poetic and as intellectual as Hamlet?

481
00:40:29.880 --> 00:40:32.119
Right we're watching Hamlet. Oh what
he's going through? Have you ever

482
00:40:32.280 --> 00:40:36.840
seen a production of Hamlet? Um, I've seen the movies? Okay,

483
00:40:37.400 --> 00:40:38.519
okay, you seen him, rookie
of Hamlet? Have you ever seen in

484
00:40:38.559 --> 00:40:43.760
the movie? Did Hamlet fart?
Not in the ones I saw? So?

485
00:40:43.920 --> 00:40:45.360
What would what do you think would
happen. If Hamlet's going to be

486
00:40:45.559 --> 00:40:52.159
or not to be, I probably
would enjoy it a lot more. And

487
00:40:52.199 --> 00:40:57.719
but yet people do fart, right, yeah so so, but by making

488
00:40:57.800 --> 00:41:01.039
him more human, you make it
immediately more comic. So I hate comedies

489
00:41:01.199 --> 00:41:05.920
that pretend or let me, let
me put it this way. I hate

490
00:41:05.920 --> 00:41:08.480
comedies where every ten seconds they're going, wouldn't it be funny if this happened?

491
00:41:08.599 --> 00:41:12.920
Wouldn't it be funny if that happened? Because I'm more interested in what

492
00:41:13.000 --> 00:41:16.199
would happen if this really happened to
these characters? What would they do?

493
00:41:16.599 --> 00:41:22.519
What would all these different characters do? Because you don't have to invent shit,

494
00:41:22.960 --> 00:41:25.320
you don't have to make shit up. Put three people in a room,

495
00:41:25.320 --> 00:41:29.039
they're gonna go in three different directions. Half the time, they're going

496
00:41:29.079 --> 00:41:32.119
to run into each other because that's
who human beings are. So just let

497
00:41:32.159 --> 00:41:36.559
them. Let them deal with the
situation in their own way. If you

498
00:41:36.920 --> 00:41:43.039
if you haven't duplicated characters, you're
going to create your conflict and your obstacles

499
00:41:43.079 --> 00:41:47.920
just because of the characters you have
on screen or on stage in that situation.

500
00:41:49.400 --> 00:41:53.679
I do an experiment in my workshops. We call it the classic,

501
00:41:54.159 --> 00:41:59.440
the classic problem of the three lawyers. I have three people come up.

502
00:41:59.480 --> 00:42:04.039
I make sure that they're not actors
or improvisers. I ask for writers who

503
00:42:04.079 --> 00:42:07.960
have never performed, and I tell
them they're all three lawyers, and that

504
00:42:08.079 --> 00:42:13.920
the most important case of their careers
began in a courthouse four blocks away,

505
00:42:13.960 --> 00:42:17.880
five minutes ago. And I say, if you through that door and whatever

506
00:42:17.960 --> 00:42:22.559
room that we're in, whatever meeting
room or banquet room we're in, I

507
00:42:22.639 --> 00:42:27.360
say, through that door, is
the court has four blocks away, you're

508
00:42:27.400 --> 00:42:30.119
five minutes late. And then I
have two of them leave, and I

509
00:42:30.280 --> 00:42:37.119
tell each one separately that for some
crazy reason, they have to be the

510
00:42:37.159 --> 00:42:40.280
second person out the door. I'll
do that for everyone. I'll say,

511
00:42:40.480 --> 00:42:43.800
listen, this is gonna be done. I'm gonna give everybody something different.

512
00:42:43.800 --> 00:42:46.239
But for you, I just want
you to know that, for some crazy

513
00:42:46.320 --> 00:42:50.480
reason, you have to be the
second person out the door. And then

514
00:42:50.519 --> 00:42:53.000
I'll bring all three of them back
and I'll say start. And what will

515
00:42:53.039 --> 00:43:00.400
happen is most times that they'll run
to the door and they'll stop, and

516
00:43:00.440 --> 00:43:05.639
the audience, of course knows what's
happening, and there there will be this

517
00:43:06.039 --> 00:43:12.960
great dance of trying to figure out
how to get how to be the second

518
00:43:12.960 --> 00:43:16.440
person out the door if they're all
trying to leave, and then I'll usually

519
00:43:16.480 --> 00:43:22.280
say to shout out you have you
have the permission to win, in which

520
00:43:22.320 --> 00:43:28.719
case I usually put two big guys
in a small girl in the group and

521
00:43:28.760 --> 00:43:32.320
you see you're anticipating, right,
yeah, I'll say you, I give

522
00:43:32.360 --> 00:43:36.239
you the permission to win. And
usually one of the big guys will pick

523
00:43:36.320 --> 00:43:38.000
up the small girl thrower out and
then he'll be the second guy to go.

524
00:43:39.119 --> 00:43:42.840
And it's usually a very funny scene. And when I did this a

525
00:43:42.960 --> 00:43:49.079
dream works once with three animators who
have never performed. The one animator was

526
00:43:49.159 --> 00:43:52.239
this tall, skinny guy and the
two guys tried to throw him out of

527
00:43:52.280 --> 00:43:54.400
the room and he put one foot
on one side of the door and one

528
00:43:54.400 --> 00:43:58.599
foot on the other side of the
door, and he was like completely horizontal.

529
00:43:59.280 --> 00:44:02.719
It was it was amazing. I've
never seen that before. And my

530
00:44:02.840 --> 00:44:08.559
point is that you don't need you
don't need clever dialogue, you don't even

531
00:44:08.639 --> 00:44:13.719
need you don't need directors, you
don't even need writers. You just need

532
00:44:14.440 --> 00:44:22.559
characters, humans in a situation with
a with something unusual or not easy.

533
00:44:22.800 --> 00:44:25.519
And see what happens and you and
half the time's more than half the time

534
00:44:25.559 --> 00:44:30.039
comedy work will occur. Now you
raise an important important topic about characters and

535
00:44:30.320 --> 00:44:36.599
having two characters interacting. Do you
feel like you need to have, for

536
00:44:36.719 --> 00:44:38.719
example, one guy who's going to
be the straight man, one guy who's

537
00:44:38.719 --> 00:44:43.239
going to be the the you know, the comic part or whatever you want

538
00:44:43.239 --> 00:44:45.800
to say. I mean, when
you're when you're creating comic moments, do

539
00:44:45.800 --> 00:44:49.840
you have to have that sort of
conflict between your characters when when you're talking

540
00:44:49.840 --> 00:44:52.159
about characters, you don't. It's
not so much the conflict, it's it's

541
00:44:52.480 --> 00:44:58.519
you want our typical character. If
you think about any commedia troope, you

542
00:44:58.559 --> 00:45:02.000
would have the lectris old man,
the wily, tricky, clever servant,

543
00:45:02.440 --> 00:45:07.800
the young, innocent, the fool
and you. You just make sure that

544
00:45:07.239 --> 00:45:14.079
you have those artypical types in in
your story. I mean, who is

545
00:45:14.239 --> 00:45:16.800
the um think of? You know, just in terms of winning the Pooh?

546
00:45:16.800 --> 00:45:21.480
Who's your tigger? Who's your e
or you know who who's your who's

547
00:45:21.480 --> 00:45:24.000
your pooh? Who's the tin man? Who you know? This is Chris

548
00:45:24.039 --> 00:45:29.199
South? Who you know who talks
about you know, the the Wizard of

549
00:45:29.199 --> 00:45:31.719
oz method of character development. You
know, who's the tin man, who's

550
00:45:31.719 --> 00:45:37.440
the scarecrow, who's the who's the
lion, the child, the the animal,

551
00:45:37.960 --> 00:45:42.800
uh, the the thinker? So
yeah, you it's not. No

552
00:45:42.840 --> 00:45:46.320
one is a straight man. Paul
Rudd is not a straight man in in

553
00:45:46.519 --> 00:45:52.199
forty year Old Virgin, although he's
more the voice of reason than anybody else.

554
00:45:52.239 --> 00:45:55.239
But he's got his own thing because
he's you know, pining for Mindy

555
00:45:55.320 --> 00:46:00.679
Kaling uh, And he's this he's
this romantic who's all you know, fucked

556
00:46:00.719 --> 00:46:06.079
up in his head. So so
I don't think that the whole idea that

557
00:46:06.119 --> 00:46:10.679
there's a straight man is again is
a misnomer. And I think I think

558
00:46:10.719 --> 00:46:15.760
a false dynamic. If you take
a look at the other guys at any

559
00:46:15.800 --> 00:46:22.239
one moment, one of them is
insane and the other one is sane but

560
00:46:22.360 --> 00:46:27.000
not quite knowing what to do.
In this situation, when Will Farrell brings

561
00:46:27.599 --> 00:46:31.480
Mark Wahlberg home, he's married to
some hottie, and Allmark Whorlberg can say,

562
00:46:31.559 --> 00:46:39.119
is she really your wife? Hi
must be Terry. I'm sorry I've

563
00:46:39.119 --> 00:46:45.800
been hiding, honey, but this
dinner was tricky for you. I'm doctor

564
00:46:45.800 --> 00:46:49.519
Sheila gamble his wife. Come on, seriously, who is that his old

565
00:46:49.559 --> 00:46:53.719
lady? Sweetie? It's a workstation. It can you come in here dressed

566
00:46:53.800 --> 00:46:58.320
like a hobo. It's distracted.
I know you're working. I'm so sorry.

567
00:46:58.320 --> 00:47:00.880
Come on, seriously, come on, what who is that? Stel

568
00:47:01.840 --> 00:47:08.519
feel Ball and Jane get over here? Not right now? Okay, look

569
00:47:08.559 --> 00:47:12.360
they're not all first round picks.
Okay, come on, are you gonna

570
00:47:12.360 --> 00:47:15.679
tell me who that is? Are
you really Alan's wife? Mhm? I

571
00:47:15.800 --> 00:47:22.440
know people are shocked because he's Episcopalian
and I'm Catholic, but somehow it works.

572
00:47:22.840 --> 00:47:27.320
Are you gonna change? I already
did. It's no big deal.

573
00:47:27.360 --> 00:47:30.440
You look really, really nice,
Terry. You don't have to be polite.

574
00:47:30.800 --> 00:47:34.079
Okay, she looks kind of shitty. I don't speak to her like

575
00:47:34.119 --> 00:47:36.760
that. Alan. Look, if
I put that in my Cosmo Fashion app,

576
00:47:36.760 --> 00:47:39.880
you probably get a D minus.
Alan and his apps, he loves

577
00:47:39.960 --> 00:47:43.559
him. You know, he's designed
three of his own. One of them.

578
00:47:43.840 --> 00:47:46.079
Can tell him one of them.
You can take a pitch of anybody's

579
00:47:46.119 --> 00:47:50.840
face and I'll tell you what the
back of his head looks like. Faceback,

580
00:47:51.000 --> 00:47:53.320
face back. Got some horrible reviews
coming out of the gate. It's

581
00:47:53.320 --> 00:47:57.639
gonna hit, it's gonna catch me. Why are you with Alan? I

582
00:47:57.760 --> 00:48:00.039
mean, that's not what I meant. I meant um. How did you

583
00:48:00.119 --> 00:48:04.519
guys meet? It's a really typical
how we met story, Terry, You're

584
00:48:04.519 --> 00:48:07.320
gonna be bored by it. I
was a dancer for the Knicks while finishing

585
00:48:07.400 --> 00:48:12.039
my residency at Columbia Hospital. Alan
came into the ear with poison ivy on

586
00:48:12.119 --> 00:48:15.519
his rectum. Needless to say,
I fell for him immediately. It's funny.

587
00:48:15.559 --> 00:48:19.480
It's it's like a scene from that
one movie always forget the name of

588
00:48:19.559 --> 00:48:22.000
it with Meg Ryan. Yes,
I don't remember a moving with Meg Ryan

589
00:48:22.079 --> 00:48:24.800
meets a guy with poison ivy business. I'll think of it. I'll think

590
00:48:24.840 --> 00:48:28.840
of it. So what about you, Terry? Do you have a girl?

591
00:48:29.079 --> 00:48:31.320
I did? Yeah, I'm supposed
to get married, but she backed

592
00:48:31.320 --> 00:48:35.480
down. It's complicated, Terry shot
Derek Jeter, shut up, Alan,

593
00:48:35.559 --> 00:48:38.400
this is before That's okay. Ah, she's got mail. That's the name

594
00:48:38.440 --> 00:48:42.480
of it. That's it, honey. But Tom, thanks right, and

595
00:48:42.599 --> 00:48:46.039
Meg Ry right, he didn't have
poison ivy ask Yeah, yeah, way

596
00:48:46.119 --> 00:48:49.920
up there. Well, Terry can't
thank you enough for coming by. What

597
00:48:50.039 --> 00:48:54.239
a what a wonderful, lovely evening. Thank you so so nice, my

598
00:48:54.320 --> 00:48:59.400
pleasure. Thank you. Remember all
I ask of you is you don't let

599
00:48:59.440 --> 00:49:01.519
him get hurt. She tells me
that every day before I leave. Yep

600
00:49:01.719 --> 00:49:06.480
I do. I come downstairs and
I make him as fresh cut strawberries and

601
00:49:06.639 --> 00:49:08.199
I say, listen, my little
sugar balls, whatever you do today,

602
00:49:08.239 --> 00:49:13.480
you just don't get hurt every morning. And then I show him my breast

603
00:49:13.559 --> 00:49:16.000
and I say, these these are
waiting for you when you get back home.

604
00:49:16.199 --> 00:49:19.519
You know, Terry, they're they're
not the biggest breast he's ever seen,

605
00:49:19.639 --> 00:49:22.239
but man, not by a long
shirkey. And they are firm,

606
00:49:22.320 --> 00:49:28.239
and they are yours. They're a
nice lady. Thank you for coming.

607
00:49:28.719 --> 00:49:34.159
Detectives, Hoych and gamble. Detectives, Hoych and gamble over, I found

608
00:49:34.199 --> 00:49:37.920
your red priests right. I was
trying to vote for Ralph Nader. Come

609
00:49:37.960 --> 00:49:39.840
on, okay, sugar balls,
list enough. It's gonna be fingerprints in

610
00:49:39.920 --> 00:49:44.119
that car, and tomorrow I'm gonna
run those fingerprints through the system. If

611
00:49:44.159 --> 00:49:46.039
we get a hit, this case
is gonna eat a faster than a junkie

612
00:49:46.079 --> 00:49:49.800
spoon. You do one thing when
you wake up tomorrow. Bring it,

613
00:49:50.519 --> 00:49:53.639
thank you, Oh go bring it
good night, good night, Thank you,

614
00:49:53.800 --> 00:49:59.079
Sheila. Bye Terry, by Sheila. I'll never forget tonight. Bye

615
00:49:59.239 --> 00:50:07.599
Terry. All right, whatever,
go inside bay, Sheila. We'll be

616
00:50:07.760 --> 00:50:17.239
right back after a word from our
sponsor. And now back to the shows.

617
00:50:19.920 --> 00:50:25.199
And it's hysterical because one of them
at any moment is aware of what's

618
00:50:25.239 --> 00:50:30.400
happening around him without having the complete
answer of what to do about it.

619
00:50:31.039 --> 00:50:34.280
One of the things I wanted to
talk about too is going back through the

620
00:50:34.400 --> 00:50:37.679
history um and talking about somebody like
Buster Keaton. So for him, he's

621
00:50:37.679 --> 00:50:43.920
always been kind of an example for
me of um, somebody for whom like

622
00:50:44.079 --> 00:50:46.840
for example, Uh, you know
what happened with the Silent Films is he

623
00:50:47.039 --> 00:50:51.239
was hugely popular up there with chaplain
and everything. In the moment he was

624
00:50:51.280 --> 00:50:54.239
asked to speak, it changed the
dynamic of his comedy. Well, it

625
00:50:54.400 --> 00:50:58.639
can't be the great Stone face and
speak at the same time, right,

626
00:50:58.760 --> 00:51:01.760
So I was curious about if you
you know, went into any sort of

627
00:51:01.840 --> 00:51:05.719
thing like that, that people have
to be in the right kind of comedy

628
00:51:05.840 --> 00:51:09.079
for their kind of personality or whatever. Uh, Well, we we do

629
00:51:09.280 --> 00:51:12.880
talk about the history of comedy,
just in terms, just in terms of

630
00:51:12.960 --> 00:51:19.599
the development of Western comedy that comes
from these are typical characters that that you

631
00:51:19.679 --> 00:51:24.239
know was uh kind of codified in
the commedia, but really goes back all

632
00:51:24.280 --> 00:51:30.559
the way to the Greeks, uh
where the the the new Greek comedy was

633
00:51:30.599 --> 00:51:37.599
all about our typical characters, cowardly
braggett soldiers, lectures old men or miserly

634
00:51:37.679 --> 00:51:40.599
old men. And you see you
see these characters in Shakespeare, you see

635
00:51:40.599 --> 00:51:45.119
them in more year, you see
them on sitcoms. Who's the idiot,

636
00:51:45.199 --> 00:51:50.559
who's the the wise cracker, who's
the um the uh, the the space

637
00:51:50.639 --> 00:51:58.519
kidet. I mean that's I've just
described friends. Uh. So so what

638
00:51:58.719 --> 00:52:02.800
you what you wanted, what you
what you want to know is that is

639
00:52:02.840 --> 00:52:09.519
that these are typical characters appear and
reappear and reappear in in dozens of movies.

640
00:52:10.199 --> 00:52:15.280
Uh. And they they they're there
for a reason because those they embody

641
00:52:15.840 --> 00:52:22.480
certain aspects of the human condition,
uh personified. And it's a good idea

642
00:52:22.559 --> 00:52:25.199
to have a good mix of them. Do you need all of all of

643
00:52:25.280 --> 00:52:30.480
the different character types? No?
But uh, when I read scripts sometimes

644
00:52:30.519 --> 00:52:35.800
I'll say you have three three best
friends. You really need three best friends

645
00:52:35.840 --> 00:52:40.480
and they're all exactly the same.
Maybe maybe one should be uh different?

646
00:52:42.159 --> 00:52:45.920
Um, or maybe they should maybe
they should be different? For instance,

647
00:52:45.480 --> 00:52:52.440
Uh, here's here's a we do
a comic premise exercise where where we have

648
00:52:52.840 --> 00:52:58.480
h we break people up into groups
and they work on comic premises. So

649
00:52:59.440 --> 00:53:01.400
let me give you a premise.
Um, it's not a great movie,

650
00:53:02.000 --> 00:53:06.639
but this is something that actually that
a group actually came up with. Um.

651
00:53:07.280 --> 00:53:10.760
So here's the premise of this comedy
movie. Uh. A college football

652
00:53:10.840 --> 00:53:16.280
team discovers that the only time that
they can win is when they get the

653
00:53:16.440 --> 00:53:22.639
nerd laid. Now that's already a
good start for a premise because it made

654
00:53:22.679 --> 00:53:25.719
you giggle. So tell me who's
in this movie. Well, you've got

655
00:53:25.800 --> 00:53:30.559
the jock, You've got the best
friend. Excuse me? What position is

656
00:53:30.599 --> 00:53:34.280
the jock? Quarterback? I guess
quarterback. Who are his friends on the

657
00:53:34.320 --> 00:53:37.639
team? You got the big fat
guy, you got the lineman. Okay,

658
00:53:37.679 --> 00:53:40.000
you got the lineman. Who else? See? But I don't know

659
00:53:40.079 --> 00:53:44.840
anything about football. You're you're you're
already there. Okay, you have the

660
00:53:44.920 --> 00:53:47.159
lineman, and who else should be
there? Uh? One of his friends

661
00:53:47.280 --> 00:53:50.920
is a big fat guy. Who's
the who's the other friend? Gotta have

662
00:53:51.000 --> 00:53:53.280
the skinny guy that okay, the
skinny guy guy? Okay? Who?

663
00:53:53.719 --> 00:53:59.119
So you don't know anything by football, but but the uh the team can

664
00:53:59.159 --> 00:54:00.559
only win when they get the nerd
late. So who else needs to be

665
00:54:00.679 --> 00:54:04.199
there? Well, you got your
nerd. You're the nerd. Okay.

666
00:54:04.320 --> 00:54:07.920
You gotta have the most attractive girl
in the school girl And what what position?

667
00:54:07.039 --> 00:54:10.320
What what does she do? Uh? He cheerleader of course, cheerleader.

668
00:54:10.480 --> 00:54:14.519
And then who's the who's the uh? Then there's a coach, right

669
00:54:14.800 --> 00:54:19.480
okay? Sure? Okay? Uh? And how is the cheerleader uh connected

670
00:54:19.480 --> 00:54:22.159
to the coach? Uh? Daughter? Daughter? Okay? Because one of

671
00:54:22.199 --> 00:54:29.320
the things that Molier teaches us is
that comedy's a closed universe because the old

672
00:54:29.400 --> 00:54:32.280
guy who's wandering around Enact one always
turns out to be the uncle of the

673
00:54:32.360 --> 00:54:37.480
two orphans in Act five. So
you have the quarterback, the linebacker,

674
00:54:37.679 --> 00:54:40.960
the wide receiver. That's the skinny
guy, the nerd, the cheerleader,

675
00:54:42.079 --> 00:54:46.679
the coach okay nerd Steve Correll,
quarterback, Paul Rutt line big lineman,

676
00:54:46.760 --> 00:54:52.960
Seth Roken, um, skinny guy, Rominey Malco cheerleader, a young Catherine

677
00:54:52.039 --> 00:54:57.440
Keyner coach James, you've just given
me the cast, a forty year old

678
00:54:57.519 --> 00:55:05.119
virgin. There's a reason why these
these these are typical characters appear and reappear

679
00:55:05.159 --> 00:55:09.599
and reappear because they tell stories.
You can tell any story you want if

680
00:55:09.639 --> 00:55:14.440
you have all the right characters there. That was pretty mind blowing. I

681
00:55:14.559 --> 00:55:19.119
like that. That was our Ted
talk moment for the conversation. Well Tom

682
00:55:19.199 --> 00:55:22.599
Ted tell Ted I applied to Ted. They haven't gotten I thought it would

683
00:55:22.599 --> 00:55:25.440
be a great Ted talk. Well
they listen to this, so you know,

684
00:55:27.199 --> 00:55:30.840
just just wait, it'll happen.
So Ted listens as well as the

685
00:55:30.920 --> 00:55:35.480
French. Yes, and Rob Schneider
and Rob Shire Rob, I love you,

686
00:55:37.119 --> 00:55:43.480
copy guy. That was the best
thing on snlka um So I want

687
00:55:43.519 --> 00:55:45.800
to talk for a second also about
Ben Stiller, because you mentioned Ben Stiller

688
00:55:45.880 --> 00:55:51.920
in your your book um and one
of the things that book I I have

689
00:55:52.760 --> 00:55:58.159
skimmed the book. Unfortunately, my
um my credit card got had some problems

690
00:55:58.199 --> 00:56:00.199
at Amazon, so I had to
go back. I can change some things

691
00:56:00.280 --> 00:56:04.079
and then buy it again. And
then I was kind of the clock was

692
00:56:04.079 --> 00:56:07.599
against me. So I'm gonna yeah, but I do. A lot of

693
00:56:07.679 --> 00:56:13.079
my stuff is from other podcasts and
from you know, YouTube, so luckily

694
00:56:13.119 --> 00:56:15.880
there's a wealth of knowledge out there. Okay, So if any of my

695
00:56:16.440 --> 00:56:20.480
questions sound exactly the same as some
other people, oh no, no,

696
00:56:21.679 --> 00:56:24.760
I don't. I don't think I
ever insulted as many people on other podcasts

697
00:56:25.079 --> 00:56:29.800
as I have on yours. I
am honored. Thank you. Well.

698
00:56:29.800 --> 00:56:31.599
I wanted to talk about Ben Stiller
for a second because you you know,

699
00:56:31.920 --> 00:56:36.039
you'd talk about him. And one
of the things that I remember when Ben

700
00:56:36.760 --> 00:56:40.559
was, you know, my buddy
Ben first kind of was getting popularity,

701
00:56:40.960 --> 00:56:47.000
was that the kind of comedy that
he was doing was so like, not

702
00:56:47.960 --> 00:56:53.000
um obvious. I guess you could
say, it was just he was so

703
00:56:53.239 --> 00:56:58.920
much the character and so uncomfortable and
so kind of, you know, different

704
00:56:59.000 --> 00:57:00.800
than what I had seen before.
And there have probably been other people who

705
00:57:00.840 --> 00:57:06.000
have done that kind of comedy,
you know, like there's something about Mary

706
00:57:06.039 --> 00:57:08.280
and stuff like that. But I
just, for some reason that just stayed

707
00:57:08.280 --> 00:57:12.719
in my mind. Is that being
you know, why is that funny?

708
00:57:12.800 --> 00:57:16.000
Why is what he's doing funny?
And you know why is just his nervousness

709
00:57:16.119 --> 00:57:20.920
or his like being in that situation
making me laugh. And I had never

710
00:57:21.039 --> 00:57:23.320
really felt like that with anybody else, you know what I mean? Well,

711
00:57:23.440 --> 00:57:28.480
I think because one of the things
that he does well. Now,

712
00:57:28.559 --> 00:57:30.239
he's a smart guy, right,
I mean, he had his own sketch

713
00:57:30.280 --> 00:57:35.039
show on Fox when he was in
his twenties. He's a smart guy.

714
00:57:35.440 --> 00:57:40.639
But he lets himself be seen as
less than smart very well. In There's

715
00:57:40.679 --> 00:57:45.280
something about Mary. He's about to
go on a date with Mary, and

716
00:57:45.400 --> 00:57:49.679
Chris Elliot's telling him, have you, you know, pulled pulled the pud?

717
00:57:49.760 --> 00:57:53.159
Have you you know, spanked the
monkey? Uh? Have you flogged

718
00:57:53.199 --> 00:57:58.440
the dolphin? And and rather than
Ben still are going what are you talking

719
00:57:58.480 --> 00:58:04.440
about? He goes, huh huh
and what are great comedy lines? Because

720
00:58:04.480 --> 00:58:07.400
they see something they're just not quite
sure what they're seeing. Uh. And

721
00:58:07.719 --> 00:58:12.599
he lets himself be talked into,
you know, uh, masturbating just just

722
00:58:12.719 --> 00:58:16.639
before the date. Uh. And
and it's it's ridiculous, it's you know,

723
00:58:16.880 --> 00:58:25.000
it's it's gross out humor. But
there's something very vulnerable and uh and

724
00:58:25.440 --> 00:58:34.239
and and not in charge uh that
that I think appeals to all of us

725
00:58:34.239 --> 00:58:37.760
because that's how we feel, we
feel that we're not completely in charge.

726
00:58:37.960 --> 00:58:44.400
That we're uh that we're less than, and he embodies less than in a

727
00:58:44.639 --> 00:58:51.199
very unforced way. He doesn't pretend
to be less than, he just is.

728
00:58:51.519 --> 00:58:57.320
There's one of my favorite moments in
There's Something About Mary is when they

729
00:58:57.440 --> 00:59:00.719
do the flashback and he's about to
ask take Mary out to the prom,

730
00:59:00.039 --> 00:59:07.079
and he's got these great braces on
and he's wearing this tope tuxedo. She

731
00:59:07.199 --> 00:59:10.920
goes to the door and David Keith, oh I believe is playing the dad

732
00:59:12.079 --> 00:59:15.800
comes out and David Keith is an
African American. Mary, of course is

733
00:59:15.880 --> 00:59:20.800
Cameron Diaz, who's not African American. So she, you know, Ben

734
00:59:20.880 --> 00:59:23.519
Stiller looks at David Keith, looks
up at the door number, Am I

735
00:59:23.639 --> 00:59:28.239
in the right place? Usually that
gets a laugh just by not being sure.

736
00:59:28.719 --> 00:59:31.119
And then David Keith says, she's
already gone to the gone to the

737
00:59:31.320 --> 00:59:37.800
problem with woogie, and he goes
woogie, Yeah, woogie. And then

738
00:59:37.599 --> 00:59:42.679
and you can't really see this over
a podcast, but I'm kind of grinning

739
00:59:43.960 --> 00:59:49.920
sadly and going okay. And I
usually when I do my workshops, by

740
00:59:49.960 --> 00:59:52.559
the way, I have a workshop
coming up at the end of January,

741
00:59:52.599 --> 00:59:57.719
which we'll talk about hopefully at the
end of the podcast, I usually freeze

742
00:59:57.760 --> 01:00:06.119
frame on that we'll be right back
after a word from our sponsor, and

743
01:00:06.320 --> 01:00:10.400
now back to the show. And
I say, if the movie ended,

744
01:00:10.480 --> 01:00:16.199
there, hasn't he broken your heart? That's the essence of comedy is The

745
01:00:16.360 --> 01:00:21.199
essence of comedy is not to pretend
that there's no pain. It's all silliness.

746
01:00:21.440 --> 01:00:24.599
The essence of comedy is We're always
in pain. Life is a painful,

747
01:00:24.840 --> 01:00:29.480
painful deal. How are we going
to deal with it? What are

748
01:00:29.519 --> 01:00:34.320
we going to do? The comedian
is the courageous person who gets up in

749
01:00:34.400 --> 01:00:37.760
front of a group of strangers and
admits to being human and and basically says,

750
01:00:38.280 --> 01:00:42.960
you know, gives us shrug and
says, you'll live. It's tough,

751
01:00:43.199 --> 01:00:46.880
you get kicked, but you'll live. And that's a very life affirming

752
01:00:47.519 --> 01:00:52.079
way of looking at the world.
So if that was written as a drama

753
01:00:52.880 --> 01:00:54.679
and not a comedy, well,
if it was written as a drama,

754
01:00:55.719 --> 01:01:00.119
he wouldn't be an idiot, he
would know more. He would be good

755
01:01:00.199 --> 01:01:04.280
looking, he would be wearing braces. Like I said, if it was

756
01:01:04.280 --> 01:01:08.559
a drama, he would be something
that we would aspire to as opposed to

757
01:01:09.280 --> 01:01:14.880
something who we can recognize as us. Look at the movie that I always

758
01:01:15.079 --> 01:01:20.480
saw, The Maze Runner or The
Virgin. Those kids are gorgeous, you

759
01:01:20.599 --> 01:01:22.400
know. And in the Apocalypse,
are we all going to look that good?

760
01:01:24.199 --> 01:01:29.400
I mean, of course, am
I going to have tapped teeth?

761
01:01:29.760 --> 01:01:31.840
You know? In a dystopian future? I wish, you know, that

762
01:01:31.880 --> 01:01:38.480
would be great. Only the good
looking survive. One of my favorite Ben

763
01:01:38.559 --> 01:01:44.519
Stiller performances is in Tropic Thunder Oh, one of my favorite movies, when

764
01:01:44.559 --> 01:01:49.599
he is you know, captured and
they make him reenact his character simple Jack.

765
01:01:50.000 --> 01:01:53.719
Simple Jack. That to me is
like the pinnacle of his career.

766
01:01:54.320 --> 01:01:59.920
But the moment that I love is
when he and Robert Downey have the conversation

767
01:02:00.199 --> 01:02:02.400
about why he didn't get the oscar. Yeah, exactly. You know,

768
01:02:02.679 --> 01:02:07.719
there were times when I was doing
Jack that I actually felt retarded, like

769
01:02:07.920 --> 01:02:13.079
really retarded it. I mean it
bush my teeth retarded, I rode bust

770
01:02:13.159 --> 01:02:16.559
retarded in a weird way. I
had to sort of just free myself up

771
01:02:16.639 --> 01:02:20.880
to believe that it was okay to
be stupid or dumb, to be a

772
01:02:20.960 --> 01:02:24.880
morong Yeah, to be moronical,
exactly, to be a moron an imbecile.

773
01:02:25.079 --> 01:02:30.360
Yeah, doctor, dumbest motherfucker to
devil live. When I was playing

774
01:02:30.400 --> 01:02:32.920
the character Wendy was secure. Yeah, I mean as Jack, definitely Jack,

775
01:02:34.599 --> 01:02:37.960
stupid ass Jack trying to come back
from that. In a weird way.

776
01:02:37.000 --> 01:02:42.039
It was almost like I had to
sort of fool my mind into believing

777
01:02:42.119 --> 01:02:45.159
that it wasn't retarded, And by
the end of the whole thing, I

778
01:02:45.239 --> 01:02:47.639
was like, wait a minute,
you know, I flushed so much out,

779
01:02:47.679 --> 01:02:52.480
How am I gonna jump started up
again? It's just like, yeah,

780
01:02:52.679 --> 01:02:54.320
yeah, right, he was foughting
in bathtubs and laughing the asso.

781
01:02:55.159 --> 01:03:00.039
Yeah yeah, yeah. But simple
Jack thought he was, or rather didn't

782
01:03:00.079 --> 01:03:02.719
think it was retarded. So he
can't afford to play retarded. Being a

783
01:03:02.800 --> 01:03:07.000
smart actor playing a guy who ain't
smart but thinks he is. That's tricky,

784
01:03:07.639 --> 01:03:12.039
tricky. It's not working for Mercury. It's high science. Man,

785
01:03:12.079 --> 01:03:15.480
it's odd for him. Yeah,
you're an artist, that's what we do,

786
01:03:15.679 --> 01:03:17.679
right, Yeah. Yeah, hats
off for going there especially. No,

787
01:03:17.840 --> 01:03:27.920
nothing Academy is about that ship m
about what they're serious. They don't

788
01:03:27.920 --> 01:03:34.360
know. Everybody knows. You never
go full retarded. What do you mean?

789
01:03:35.239 --> 01:03:38.440
Check it out? Dustin Hoffman ray
Man Luke retarded at retarded, not

790
01:03:38.559 --> 01:03:45.559
retarded, can't two picks to your
cards artistic shop. Not retarded, ain't

791
01:03:45.559 --> 01:03:47.519
a time of hands for us?
Gump slow, Yes, retarded. Maybe

792
01:03:47.519 --> 01:03:51.039
he braced his owners bed, but
he chomed to pass off next to and

793
01:03:51.039 --> 01:03:54.320
they want to pin pong competition that
he retarded. He was goddamn war hero.

794
01:03:54.679 --> 01:04:00.119
You know what, he retired war
heroes? You full return man,

795
01:04:02.280 --> 01:04:06.639
never go full return. You don't
buy it, Yeah, Sean pent two

796
01:04:06.639 --> 01:04:13.599
thousand one. I am saying no
when full retire. And and that's such

797
01:04:13.639 --> 01:04:16.159
a beautiful moment because it's the first
moment in the film where they're really just

798
01:04:16.400 --> 01:04:20.599
relating to each other and they're connecting, and they're not they've let their their

799
01:04:20.760 --> 01:04:26.239
rivalries go. And and Robert Downey
goes, you don't know. You can't

800
01:04:26.280 --> 01:04:29.719
go full Todd. You went full
time. You can't go half Todd.

801
01:04:29.760 --> 01:04:34.519
You can't go full Todd. It's
great, great, I mean, those

802
01:04:34.760 --> 01:04:42.920
those human, simple human moments where
people share what makes them vulnerable, what

803
01:04:43.119 --> 01:04:48.440
makes them silly, what makes them
lost, what makes them human? And

804
01:04:48.639 --> 01:04:53.840
and and that's that's why in terms
of straight line wavy line, uh,

805
01:04:54.159 --> 01:04:57.760
you you know, Mark is funny. But you can't have Mark without mindate

806
01:04:58.360 --> 01:05:01.920
mh. You to have a human
being in the equation at every moment.

807
01:05:02.039 --> 01:05:10.000
So even your silliest character can have
a moment where they're human and they're having

808
01:05:10.079 --> 01:05:16.079
a human experience. Well, everybody
else is acting crazy around them. And

809
01:05:16.239 --> 01:05:20.559
that's why the division of funny guy
in straight Man is incorrect, because everybody

810
01:05:20.639 --> 01:05:25.639
gets to has a chance to be
funny. Everybody has a chance to be

811
01:05:26.559 --> 01:05:30.000
you know, the same one.
Well, tell me if if you had

812
01:05:30.039 --> 01:05:32.760
the same feeling as I did.
But watching that, if you've got Robert

813
01:05:32.760 --> 01:05:35.400
Downey Jr. You've got Ben Stiller, and then you've got Jack Black,

814
01:05:35.480 --> 01:05:40.360
and Jack Black, to me,
like most of the stuff that he did

815
01:05:40.440 --> 01:05:43.559
in the film kind of fell flat. Though I don't know how you you

816
01:05:43.679 --> 01:05:45.360
kind of perceived that, but it
just seemed like one more person there that

817
01:05:45.480 --> 01:05:49.599
like didn't necessarily like add to it. I don't know, Well, I

818
01:05:49.679 --> 01:05:55.079
mean, I can see that point
of view. I'm not going to argue

819
01:05:55.119 --> 01:05:58.239
that he's the best thing in the
film, but he's there because you needed

820
01:05:58.320 --> 01:06:03.280
a primal character. Again, we
go we go back to to our typical

821
01:06:03.440 --> 01:06:08.800
characters, the archetypes, the comedia. You have your clever, tricky servant

822
01:06:09.320 --> 01:06:15.079
that's Robert Downey Junior. Uh.
You have your nerdy guy that's Jay Barrichelle.

823
01:06:15.119 --> 01:06:17.679
You have your idiot that's uh,
or your fool. Yeah, that's

824
01:06:17.920 --> 01:06:21.719
that's Ben Stiller. Uh. Then
you have your primal character, you know,

825
01:06:21.840 --> 01:06:26.159
and he's got he's got primal needs. I need, I need my

826
01:06:26.360 --> 01:06:31.719
drugs, um uh and uh.
And out of that mix comes comes the

827
01:06:32.360 --> 01:06:40.920
comes this disjointed, uh dysfunctional family
that all comedy aspires to. All comedy,

828
01:06:41.039 --> 01:06:47.079
especially tele comedy, aspires to create
dysfunct large, dysfunctional families that that

829
01:06:47.480 --> 01:06:54.599
we can relate to and in some
way uh enjoy being with because they remind

830
01:06:54.719 --> 01:06:57.840
us of our dysfunctional families, only
we don't have to be with them that

831
01:06:58.039 --> 01:07:01.400
much. So So yeah, so's
is Jack Black? You know? Is

832
01:07:01.440 --> 01:07:05.920
that Oscar Oscar nominated performance? I'm
not sure, but I see the I

833
01:07:06.000 --> 01:07:13.480
see the use for him because you
need that unbridled energy. Now is that

834
01:07:13.639 --> 01:07:17.599
unbridled energy the best it could be? I don't know. I wasn't crazy

835
01:07:17.599 --> 01:07:25.679
about the about the the blonde buzzcut, um, but um, you know,

836
01:07:28.199 --> 01:07:30.960
I mean I was just wondering if
there was something we were not available,

837
01:07:31.880 --> 01:07:35.079
right, I mean that would be
that would be John Belushi or John

838
01:07:35.159 --> 01:07:39.440
Candy or Chris Farley. That would
be their role. That's what they would

839
01:07:39.480 --> 01:07:43.960
be there for. And maybe they
would have brought a little bit more what

840
01:07:44.159 --> 01:07:47.239
I call the Shemp factor, you
know. So Shemp was the stooge that

841
01:07:47.719 --> 01:07:51.320
made you care. So that's what
John Candy and Chris Farley would do.

842
01:07:51.400 --> 01:07:56.000
They would make you care. And
Jack Black, I guess, just make

843
01:07:56.079 --> 01:07:59.800
you care that much because Jack Black, if if I'm going to analyze it

844
01:08:00.760 --> 01:08:05.679
from your point of view, Jack
Black gave was too much a performance that

845
01:08:05.840 --> 01:08:12.760
he was outside of as opposed to
owning it. He wasn't sharing his addiction.

846
01:08:13.199 --> 01:08:19.319
He was making this character's addiction the
focus. And when you distance yourself

847
01:08:19.600 --> 01:08:24.800
from your character and you distance yourself
from the audience, there's that distancing factor

848
01:08:24.920 --> 01:08:29.159
that doesn't work for some people.
In five hundred BC, the first comedy

849
01:08:29.239 --> 01:08:33.319
written, the actor comes out and
talks to the audience directly in a different

850
01:08:33.359 --> 01:08:38.880
way than they did in Greek Tragedy. There's a connection that comics make with

851
01:08:38.960 --> 01:08:44.319
their audience. It's an actor centric
art and it's about telling the truth about

852
01:08:44.359 --> 01:08:47.399
what's happening right in front of all
of us. I'm an actor, I'm

853
01:08:47.439 --> 01:08:51.279
on stage, you're watching me.
Let's go, and so there's truth there,

854
01:08:51.760 --> 01:08:57.039
and so you might be you might
be reacting to the fact that he

855
01:08:57.239 --> 01:09:01.439
wasn't as connected and as truthful as
the other actors. That's my guess.

856
01:09:02.119 --> 01:09:04.760
But it didn't bother me as much. But I can see from your point

857
01:09:04.800 --> 01:09:10.239
of taking a look from your perspective, I can see what you're talking about.

858
01:09:10.359 --> 01:09:12.960
Yeah, I mean, it just
kind of fell flat sometimes I'm going

859
01:09:13.079 --> 01:09:17.199
to he just was he fucking sucked? Okay, I mean it's kind of

860
01:09:17.279 --> 01:09:20.239
like late Jerry Lewis, like you're
saying, it just felt like a performance,

861
01:09:20.279 --> 01:09:25.119
you know. Anyway, Right,
I'll get off that all right.

862
01:09:25.279 --> 01:09:28.680
Um, we're at about an hour. I wanted to make sure that you

863
01:09:29.239 --> 01:09:30.760
discuss the things that are coming up
with you and how people can get in

864
01:09:30.840 --> 01:09:34.960
touch and sign up for your classes. Um, you want to talk about

865
01:09:35.000 --> 01:09:39.000
that a little bit. Uh.
Yeah, I'm Libra, I'm lonely.

866
01:09:39.920 --> 01:09:43.720
I like long walk long walks on
the beach. I'm on staff. No

867
01:09:43.880 --> 01:09:46.600
no, no, no, I'm
I'm I'm I'm happily married. But um,

868
01:09:47.199 --> 01:09:56.079
you can you can tweet met at
SK comedy. That's SK comedy comedy

869
01:09:56.119 --> 01:09:58.880
with a C. Because I'm not
a hack. I don't do that comedy

870
01:09:58.960 --> 01:10:06.039
k thing. We'll be right back
after a word from our sponsor, and

871
01:10:06.199 --> 01:10:13.600
now back to the show. My
website is Kaplan Comedy one word dot com

872
01:10:13.880 --> 01:10:18.359
and you can email me at Steve
at kaplan Comedy dot com. And right

873
01:10:18.439 --> 01:10:23.880
now, in January thirtieth and thirty
first, in Los Angeles, we're having

874
01:10:23.920 --> 01:10:30.560
a workshop at the Marriot Burbank and
you can register for it online. And

875
01:10:30.840 --> 01:10:34.760
if you're in Ireland, we're going
to be in Ireland in early June,

876
01:10:35.600 --> 01:10:40.079
London the week later. I think
we're going to be in Paris in April,

877
01:10:40.279 --> 01:10:44.319
and we're going to be in Denver
in October. And you should read

878
01:10:44.399 --> 01:10:48.560
my book The Hidden Tools of Comedy. We it's translated into Russian, Chinese

879
01:10:48.600 --> 01:10:55.359
and French. But for you for
the Indie Film Academy podcast listeners, we

880
01:10:55.560 --> 01:11:00.760
have it for you in English and
it's available on Kindle. You can download

881
01:11:00.800 --> 01:11:03.439
it, but make sure that your
credit card doesn't get screwed up like Jason's.

882
01:11:03.720 --> 01:11:12.319
And and it's also available through Amazon, and you can also buy it

883
01:11:12.439 --> 01:11:15.840
on our website for an autographed copy. I want to thank Jason so much

884
01:11:15.920 --> 01:11:18.640
for doing such a great job on
this episode. If you want to get

885
01:11:18.720 --> 01:11:21.439
links to anything we spoke about in
this episode, head over to the show

886
01:11:21.479 --> 01:11:26.439
notes at Bulletproof Screenwriting dot tv.
Forward slash tune ninety nine. Thank you

887
01:11:26.439 --> 01:11:29.960
so much for listening to guys as
always, keep on writing no matter what.

888
01:11:30.319 --> 01:11:33.479
I'll talk to you soon. Thanks
for listening to the Bulletproof Screenwriting podcasts

889
01:11:33.720 --> 01:11:35.880
at Bulletproof Screenwriting dot tv.