Cantu Humor: Breaking into Humor - Comedy
and What to do When You Get There

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Cantu's Comedy Wit and Humor Wisdom
reprint CantuHumor ezine
by John Cantu ©1999-2003


TABLE OF CONTENTS:
PERFORMANCE/PLATFORM SKILLS:
  • The Danger of Using the Web
  • Stage Fright?
  • You're in Good Company
  • Only the Truth is Funny
  • How to be more dynamic on stage
  •    Part two
  • Publicity
  • Introductions. Getting a good introduction
  •    Part Two
  •    Part Three
  • Dealing with Hecklers
  • Dealing with distractions
  • Do Not Be Afraid of Jokes
  • Inability to See Your Audience
  • How to Determine the Best Form of Humor for You
  • Some Tips on Using a Microphone Professionally
  •    Part 2
  •    Part 3
  • Who Is Humorous?
  • "Do What You Love and the Money Will Follow" and other myths
  •  Feed back. Good feedback - versus the useless
  •    Part 2
  •    Part 3
  • Achieving Success as a Comedian/Humorist
  • Evaluating a comedy coach, a how-to book...
  • Boost Your Audience Response and Appear More Charismatic
  •    Part 2
  •    Part 3
  • Stage Fright - How the Pros Deal with It.
  •   Part Two
  • Diversity
  • Ten best things ever said about comedy/humor
  • Your Goals - Big Enough?
  • Hey! Keep It Clean, Okay?
  •    Part 2
  •    Part 3
  •    Part 4
  • To Improve Your Material, Create a Humor Story
  • Some Thoughts on Success and Greatness
  • What's Funny?
  • Bombing When You First Try to Use Humor
  • Durability of Your Material
  • Begin to Practice Optimal Behavior
  • Tips for editing and for proof reading
  • The Pros Memorize Their Material
  • How to Make Any Subject More Humorous
  •    Part 2
  •    Part 3

PART II
HUMOR DEVELOPMENT TECHNIQUES

  • Introduction
  • The Substitution Technique:
  • Writing the reverse joke
  •    Part Two
  • Humor Principles - #1
  • Observation and Inspection of Wordplays
  • Writing entertaining and realistic dialogue
  •    Part Two
  • Complex/simple Contrast
  • Anthropomorphism
  • Exaggeration Technique
  • The Essence of British Humor - Understatement
  • Thirty Years of Comedy/humor Writing - Some lessons Learned
  • The Word Play - Words That Sound Alike
  • Off-The-Wall Humor
  • Finding humor lessons For You in the Work of Gary Larson
  •    Part 2
  • Your Humor Lessons In The Work of Monty Python's Flying Circus
  • Doing Full-scale Sketches
  •    Part 2
  • Some additional thoughts on sketch writing
  • The Misdirection Humor Technique
  • The Take-away Joke and It's Cousin the Negation Joke
  • The Combo Technique
  • The Truth Joke
  • Formula Jokes
  •    Part 2
  •    Part 3
  •    Part 4
  • The Fill-in-the-Blank Joke Technique
  • "Ignoring the Obvious" Humor Technique
  • The Endless Segue Story Telling Technique
  • The Use of Overlays to Spice Up your Humor
  • Literal Sarcasm Humor Technique
  • Pattern Jokes
  • The Art of Riffing
  •    Part 2
  •    Part 3
  • Writer's Block? Look Around You and Create
  • Increase Laughs by Using Funny Attribute for Quote Authors
  • Increase Laughs by Using The Relabeling Humor Technique
  • The Misunderstanding Humor Technique
  • Your Material's Acceptance
  • The Alphabet Humor Technique
  • Increase Laughs by Using The Time Machine Humor Technique
  • Don't Pre-Judge Your Initial Ideas
  •    Part 2
  • Increase Laughs by Using Humor Through Contradiction
  • Increase Laughs by Doing-Things-the-Hard-Way Technique
  • The "Hammer & Nail" Humor Technique
  • Physical Jokes - Jokes That Have a Physical Component to Them