Last article I had to complete Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic 2, this time was the Star Wars: Jedi Fallen Order. Eventually I will run out of Star War games to procrastinate with, then I will pick up another game series… maybe. It was a fun game, super buggy though.

Speaking of the last article – I left off at a kind of somber note talking about class and how it was really hard on me being socially inept and the confidence akin to a couch cushion that has been overused a bit too much. We all know that couch cushion. That’s my confidence, or that was my confidence might be a better way to phrase it. It’s time to talk about the one comedy tip to change it all for me. The one that took me from ‘a complete noob’ to a ‘confident beginner.’

CUT DOWN Featuring: The Epiphany

This is where my epiphany moment started setting in. I think it was week 4-5 before I understood this properly, but the first lesson of week one was ‘Cut down the unfunny parts, if it’s not adding anything, eliminate.’ Damn, I really wish this didn’t take as long to sink in. I see a ton of new people struggle with this. The real epiphany was when I realized YOU DO NOT NEED TO EXPLAIN YOURSELF OR YOUR THOUGHT. If the joke doesn’t explain it, the joke needs to be fixed. Let me provide you with a joke of mine from what it was, to what it is at the time of this article.

Version 1: Pre Epiphany

‘Back in my day’ — We got sick of hearing that. But we listened. ‘Back in my day I had to walk 3 miles in the store to go get myself a bottle of milk.’ ‘Back in my day we had to wait until a taxi drove by!’ ‘Back in my day’… … … “back in my day we had two water fountains, one for the whites… one for….’’. We listened to you. We didn’t want to put up with any of that, especially the last one. We invented uber, because one of us one day was dosed up on adderall waiting for a taxi and said ‘this is bullshit, I got youtube and time.’ 3 hours later the taxi showed up, and we asked him if he was interested in our new job! The first uber was just invented.

My grandparents still walk 3 miles to go to the store, except it’s to bring me my groceries – blasting the latest rap music, because we are actively trying to kill country music. Rock and rap music is made up for methed up kids.

Oh god it hurts. ‘Back in my day’… okay, so this might work for some jokes, but my use case of it here was very very off. It was used as a storytelling element versus a part of the joke, more on that later. Lets move on to version 2.

Version 2: Post Epiphany

My grandparents like to tell me my generation is lazy. I ask them why they are serving KFC for thanksgiving. My grandmother told me about walking 3 miles to go to the store to buy groceries. She says I am lazy because I order my groceries online and have them delivered. You would think she’s happy to see me when she’s handing me my groceries. We only get to talk to each other when she picks me up. She tells me I am spoiled for having uber, but she’s my uber driver and I am paying her mortgage.

This has been my closing joke for roughly 3 months now, and not to toot my own horn, on stage it kills nearly every time. I am not saying its my best or funniest joke, but it does the job well for a closer. Eventually I will need another one, but hey I am a beginner.

Okay, but where is the difference?

The difference is pretty cut and clean, one is a story with some gross somewhat laughs spread in there, the other is a joke. That was the epiphany, and what I see a ton of new comedians struggle with. You can tell a story, but the story needs to be a joke. John Mulany is great at this – most of us compare ourselves to that and wonder why ours is not landing. For example – his joke about accidentally chasing the girl on a subway, write it down and attempt to read it. There is a ton left to be assumed by the listener which creates engagement. He doesn’t explain every last bit of the Subway or have an awkward conversation between him and the girl.

I wished I had the story telling joke ability he does. Something fun to work on!

The joke is the joke. Get to your point, if there is stuff left to be assumed it helps create engagement from your listeners. One of my jokes I call a guy I saw the first time I went to a nudist beach ‘Long John Silver’, add a long pause for the audience to get it, then add a tag in there saying ‘because of the eye patch’ to throw them off. With that name, and a small context story (literally almost as small as I began this with) did you understand that I was naming him that under the pretext that most people assume nudists are fat or old, and he had a long john? Most people get it and the fact I do not explain it initially lets their imaginations go wild with the joke. It keeps people engaged.

I am still not understanding

So with being direct as possible, cut down the unfunny parts. As my teacher taught us “Rodney Dangerfield would take out a word each time a joke got a laugh until it did not, in his eyes once it did not get a laugh, the last version was perfect.” I aim for what I call a 5-9 Approach. Every 5ish seconds I am attempting to get some form of audience reaction, every 9 there should be a big laugh. A lot of people have their own forms of this methodology, and I am not claiming mine is the best, but it is what I currently do.

Keep shortening your joke, backstory, if absolutely necessary, is a part of the joke. That is to say if you have one it’s now a joke – not an explanation. Don’t be scared to not explain something. This brings me to another point – tags. It’s like a mini joke after the punch line. I think my ‘Long John Silver’ is a good example, tags often get much better laughs than the punch line if it landed, if your punch line didn’t it may save it, however it shouldn’t come to that.

Another example joke of mine (and yes I got a lot of nudist jokes) is ‘I went to a nudist halloween party, everyone got second’ *wait for the laugh here* ‘except for Kristin who was Jabba the Hut’ *see if this lands* ‘She was naked.’ Depending how you look at this I have two tags in here. The ‘everyone got second’ being the main punchline, then the following two jokes as tags.

In Conclusion

CUT DOWN YOUR JOKES. I mean there are a ton of other lessons I learned during this, but compared to the epiphany of cutting down on the unfunny parts they matter less to me. Doing this and starting to succeed on stage is how I grew my confidence and overcame a lot of my stage fright. It would never have happened in one day, and I still have issues at times, but nothing gives confidence like success does.