Hey everybody!
So, as some of you know, I am a maker of multi-genre stuff. I am sometimes funny, sometimes poignant, sometimes musical, and sometimes just downright poetic. Lately, I have been working on two comedy pieces-
which is very likely coming to a city and computer screen near you in 2016! Hang tight for more info!
And here is a pic from the recent video shoot:
Unedited, unphotoshopped, just straight up Erin 'tude.
AND, among other things, I am developing an action-comedy web series with my partner in life, crime, and writing, Carlo Carere. (We have a very serious, very commercial action-thriller sci-fi script if anyone has 40 million dollars lying around and is friends with Bradley Cooper by the way. Script Shark analysts even said the "future looks bright" for THAT script. But our WEB SERIES is for us, for fun, for COMEDY!) (Sorry about bragging rights from Script Shark, but, well, you know, what if Bradley Cooper, or, say, Ryan Reynolds or Chris Pratt reads this blog somehow? You never know. They might! Just putting it out there.)
I've been studying and analyzing comedic structure a long time, (and recently actually applying it! Ha!) and while I LOVE studying the masters- Steve Martin's "Born Standing" is an amazing book- I recently got to work on a set with sketch comedy masters Jane Curtin and Dan Akroyd- just watching them get up from their seat to walk on set was a Master Class in and of itself!)- I thought it would be fun to talk a little comedy shop with some of my friends in the business who are brilliant comedians, if not as famous as those aforementioned icons. (Also they are all my age-ish, so, you know, give us all another 10, 20, 30 years and maybe we might enter the doorway to the threshhold to the valley to the field of the masters.)
Today, I want to share a conversation about comedy with one of my earliest comedic partners, Josh Margolis. Josh and I became friends in Minneapolis years ago, so many years that I think, according to IMDB, I wasn't born yet. But that's cool. He and I worked together on many projects, most of which he wrote and I acted in, but some things which I also directed. Our show was called "Josh and Sandi," and it was very "Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman." It was the 2000s, and people were in the mood for "Friends." We were like the bizarro version of that. Actually we were like the bizarro version of "Debra Messing and the Hot Gay Guy." I know that show has a real title and was very funny, and it was also actually all about Jack and Karen for me, but for the life of me, I think of that show as "Jack and Karen" or "Debra Messing and the Hot Gay Guy."
So here's the convo!
E: When did you first realize you were funny?
E: OMG, that's kind of my story, too.
J: I don't think I'm actually that funny in person if I don't know someone well.
E: Oh, really? I think you're hilarious!
J: Well, of course, that's true, but we know each other very well.
E: And have from the start. Like, the minute I met you, even just talking on the phone with you, I felt like I had already known you for eons.
J: It takes awhile for my sense of humor to come out in day to day life until I am comfortable with someone or a group. People who've seen the various film and TV things I've done through the years expect me to be funny in real life, but I think I channel all of that in my writing.
E: I hear this about so many funny people. Like, they are often actually very serious, or very hurt, or very angry people in real life... often very different on a day to day basis than their performing or writing selves. So, what kind of comedy do you love the most? I mean, that's a wide open question, but you know, just whatever comes to mind first.
J: I love comedy with a point of
view and comedy that is character driven. I think anything that is based
in reality is funny, like the quirks of people and behavior. I often
think of Gilda Radner and how she committed to her characters in a way
that she made even the most ridiculous situations real and funny. There
was always a truth to everything she did. She always seemed to care for
her characters and never was condescending to them or the audience. An
earned joke is a funny joke.
E: Yeah, I feel like it's true that comedy comes from that level of seriousness. Comedy comes from pain, and commitment, and observation. Everything Amy Schumer says is funny, but it is also, taken out of the context of a comedy stage with a microphone and put in a shrink's office, very tough! Okay, sure. Funny. But tough stuff, too! So, where do you get the material for your comedy?
J: Almost all of
my comedy is from my own life. Sometimes it's heightened or changed to
the way I want it to be, other times it's written exactly as it
happened.
E: When I did my first one woman show, "The One," a lot of people thought stories were about THEM when they really weren't! "What really happened," at least for me, is subjective. But a lot of what I write theses days is definitely filtered. I mean, it's always filtered through my style and intention and framing, anyway.
J: It seems like all my characters are different parts of my
personality trying to figure things out and trying to find the meaning
in everything. When I reread some of my older scripts, it really becomes
obvious to my that I was trying to work something out in my own life on
the page.
E: I wonder if that's true for everyone? And if so, yeesh! Scary! I say that because I recently found a series of short stories I wrote in 5th and 6th grade, and they were all about the end of the world due to environmental catastrophes. And this was the 90s, you know? They are HILARIOUS. I will maybe post one or two on my blog. But they weren't meant to be funny at the time. They were MEANT to be very serious.
J: Reading my older scripts now, I feel like I understand better
what I was trying to say. In those old scripts, there are jokes and
lines I had forgotten and they make me laugh and then I think "this is
so me." It's clear to me as I review all the things I've written that I
will always be obsessed with the same things.
E: I felt that way about Steve Martin when I read "Born Standing." In the book, he shares jokes that he loved but other people didn't get. To be honest, I didn't really get them, either. Do you have jokes that you think are hilarious but haven't caught on yet, or just need time or the right context to ripen?
J: The jokes that I
think are so funny don't always get as strong a reaction as I'd like.
Sometimes these jokes are really inside jokes that I don't realize until
later that the audience won't get it because they are not in on the
joke.
E: Yeah, actually, that can be tough for a lot of comedians who are so smart, usually, and often in their heads. But what is really funny is what is relatable, I think. And so you have to also consider the audience. Like, how do you make jokes about an experience that is a little more niche and make it funny to a wider audience?
J: When writing, I can get so inside my head that I don't always
communicate clearly. It's usually the "throwaway" jokes or lines I don't
even think that much about that people seem to like and quote back to
me. I'm also surprised when people laugh when I'm not trying to be funny.
E: Yeah, me too. Every time I perform a show, whether it's a set at a comedy club or a one woman show, something like that pops up, you know, things that weren't even jokes are things people laugh at. But then it gets back to that question of when we realized we were funny. For both of us, and I think for a lot of comedians, it kind of happens/ happened on accident.
J: I'm always surprised at what makes
people laugh. I think I have a peculiar (or particular) sense of humor
because for the most part, I don't find a lot of current comedies to be
funny. In the last year or so, there has been a return to more character
driven comedies, but for so long before then, there was a lot of gross
out type of comedies and those always leave me cold. I don't like mean
humor. I think jokes can be funnier and more shocking if they are more
subtle.
E: I don't like gross out comedies myself, but I do love some of the new icons of comedy- Melissa McCarthy, Amy Schumer, Tina Fey. I wish they would make a new Golden Girls starring Tina as Sophia, Amy Schumer as Blanche, Melissa McCarthy as Rose.
J: Who's Dorothy?
E: Me, duh!
J: No, you're way more Blanche.
E: No. I claim Dorothy. But if you get to be Dorothy than I want Blanche and, sorry Schumer, you're out. Anyway, now, I'd like to thank you for being a friend...
(Everyone ready to sing along?)
Josh Margolis is a comedy writer
based out of Austin, TX. He has written the cult classic "Joanie" movies
and well as a TV comedy series in his hometown of Minneapolis. He is
currently observing everything he can. There is so much to write now.
He's still waiting for the people of Austin to "get him."
