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Groucho Marx once famously said “Time flies like an arrow; fruit flies like a banana.” It’s this linguistic word play that makes the phrase funny. You hear it and initially believe he means all fruits fly like bananas when in fact he means the fruit flies, as in the insect. The double meaning highlights not only some of comedy’s earliest stylings, but the nature of language and how playful it can be when we try to elicit laughter from others in modern venues like www.chocolatesundaes.com in Los Angeles. According to Mel Helitzer’s book, Comedy Writing Secrets, there are six key elements to comedy called THREES: Target, Hostility, Realism, Exaggeration, Emotion, and Surprise. The Target can be any person or anything; it is the object of the joke. Hostility is the emotion used against said person or thing that the audience may have the same hostility to, which connects them to the joke. Realism relies on a common truth that the audience can relate to as makes the joke believable. Exaggeration, while working in tandem with Realism, expands on the notion by using excessive metaphors in order to fatten up the joke. Emotion is used to draw out the joke based on the hostility toward the subject of the joke. The longer you can go building up this emotion, the more invested the audience will be. Finally, Surprise is that twist at the end that the audience wasn’t expecting. The Surprise is what every part of the joke has built up to and if you lost your audience along the way, the joke won’t land. You’ve deflated your own balloon. Comedy is what happens when we expect one thing and receive another, psychologically speaking. Humor can’t necessarily be quantified; certain shades of humor affect people in different ways. The more “blue” style of comedy is one that doesn’t hold back on language (often foul) or focuses on less puritan sensibilities (taboo topics of the day, sensitive issues, etc). The comedy fan that loves Bob Newhart might not enjoy the stylings of Bob Saget due to their different nuances in joke-telling. This isn’t an unusual occurrence. What is unusual, however, is the nature of laughing. According to scientists and psychologists, laughing can be treated as if it were another, separate language all its own. While maniacal laughter differs greatly from humorous or joyous laughter, it’s the humorous laughter that’s viewed as a constant. Laughing in Marseilles, France is pretty much the same as laughing in Athens, Georgia. The result is the same, the effect the same as well. What’s interesting is that true, joyous laughter requires another individual to be in our presence. Studies have shown that we rarely laugh when we are alone, but the addition of another person around us significantly ups our desire to laugh or to make others laugh. Laughing is a symbiotic relationship between two or more people and once it gets rolling, it’s hard to stop. Think about the last time you got caught up in a laughing fit with others around you. Once you realize the laughing won’t stop, no one can stop laughing. It continues on until tears arrive and stomach muscles ache. This phenomenon stems from something called “laugh detection” that psychologists believe is a neurological mechanism. We are wired to laugh, basically. It’s in our nature to break down and laugh uncontrollably around others who laugh too. This is why comedy nights like www.chocolatesundaes.com are such a great little incubator for laughter. You’re surrounded by others who have made themselves available to the possibility of laughter because we’re all built to laugh. It’s in our genetic makeup, it’s in our DNA. Chocolate Sundaes www.chocolatesundaes.com is the authority in all things comedy. We also have a weekly comedy show held inside the Laugh Factory Hollywood. Visit our page on http://www.Chocolatesundaes.com/ for more info!
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