writing material

copperhead

when writing your own material are you every worried that you are subconsciously stealing someone else material, or sailing very close to what someone has said or done before ?. now i dont mean that you intentionally set out to take someones elses ideas and jokes / material it might have been something you heard while at an open mic night night and made the same observation a year later and had completly forgotton that another comic had done a simular joke, i write some material from time to time and i would hate for someone to think that someone thought i was stealing jokes, i mean there is no real way to research material or is there ?

AnthonyK7

Was listening to a podcast a while back & all the pro comedians worry about that, the premise is always going to clash with others but the result should be different, hopefully.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/24/opinion/24seinfeld.html?_r=1

I_smell_fear

I agree. The chances of spontaneously writing the same joke, set-up and punch line as another writer must be pretty slim.

On a side note, how do you guys go about writing material for your stand up or comedy sketches? I've heard many comedians keep a notepad of some sort, writing down any funny thoughts they develop throughout the day to refer back to at a later stage. Is this the common practice? or does anybody sit down (or stand-up..sorry) with the purpose or writing jokes etc or is there another way for that matter?

jay99

I_smell_fear wrote: »

I agree. The chances of spontaneously writing the same joke, set-up and punch line as another writer must be pretty slim.

On a side note, how do you guys go about writing material for your stand up or comedy sketches? I've heard many comedians keep a notepad of some sort, writing down any funny thoughts they develop throughout the day to refer back to at a later stage. Is this the common practice? or does anybody sit down (or stand-up..sorry) with the purpose or writing jokes etc or is there another way for that matter?

I think it's a little different for everyone - but most I know use the notebook method you described. I get random ideas in my head on and off - (mostly in the shower or if I work out) - and grab the nearest sheet of paper, email myself, or record it on the iphone app if it's long or if I have certain inflections I want to capture. I haven't ever really had to "think" of raw material - except when something ****ty happens and I'm like - ok I know this has a funny side to it but I have to figure out where it is. Most of the thinking comes in when I put it together...to make it have transitions, some kind of structure, some way to remember it (hardest part for me because I am not focused), etc... I keep all the different jokes/bits in folders on my computer in separate files w/ the titles being the name/theme of the bit...which is growing extraordinarily large now & i can't find anything... but it's similar to older comedian's notecard/file drawer method. Then I start looking through that & put things together as it gets closer.

On copying other people's stuff (accidentally) - I think these days most people do acts that are pretty personal...and if someone uses a joke "off the shelf" it sticks out strangely. The other night I deliberately used a well known joke (at least among some people...it didn't seem like people heard it in the room though) - but I wanted to add my spin on the joke...which was funnier.