Tuesday, June 12, 2007

One of the hardest things in editing a comedy is to trust that the jokes you laughed at originally are still funny. After you've seen a joke ten, twenty times, you start stressing about the delivery, about the cinematography, the choreography, and everything else. And then you want to cut the joke.

It's important to remember your original reactions, so that you can remind yourself that yes, this is funny. The most dangerous thing is to start cutting things that seem obvious or boring or unfunny to you after you've lost all taste for them. You may find yourself cutting the meat.

Labels: comedy, directing, editing

8:33 AM

1 Comments:

It is also important to remember that there are different kinds of funny. Some rely almost exclusively on surprise, so once you already know what will happen, it is no longer funny. I felt this way the second time I watched Flirting with Disaster, a movie that I loved the first time. It was just not funny the second time, since i knew everything that would happen.

The comedy that depends more on the delivery (often, but not exclusively slapstick) can remain funny longer. There are certain comedic bits that crack me up every time I hear them, even after 20 or more times.

So the TYPE of comedy matters here a lot as well.

By  Fun Joel, at 1:15 PM  

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