Forcing It
- Bang your head against the desk. Repeatedly.
- Crack the seal on a prized bottle of single-malt scotch and drink copiously.
- Give up. (NEVER!)
- Rent a DVD I highly recommend. Comedian, by Jerry Seinfeld.
Choice number one will give you a headache. Come to think of it, so will choice number two. Choice number three won't get you a novel. Choice number four . . . it will at least make you feel better. And not because the DVD is funny (it's not, really . . . parts of it are, but it's a documentary). It will make you feel better as you realize you are not the only one with this struggle.
Jerry Seinfeld has zillions of dollars. He certainly doesn't NEED the added few bucks he will get if you buy his DVD or rent it. BUT, despite having zillions, he is still trying to create, still trying new stand-up.
The DVD in question follows him as he tries out a new routine. At one point, he goes through this long set-up in front of a live audience in a small club--only to f*** up the punchline. He doesn't need to do this. But it's the creative process.
Whether you like his comedy or not, you end the DVD very aware that the creative process is full of frustration for most of us--zillionaire comics and writers alike. But there's more . . . a rather unknown comic is also shown. I won't ruin the DVD for those who will rent it except to say that he is insane. He analyzes his material with spreadsheets. Based on laugh response and all sorts of parameters. I suppose there is something to that, maybe . . . but what I was left with was the sense that some creative processes are simply that. Processes. They are messy and not adaptable to spreadsheets and numbers and figures.
So save yourself a headache. When you feel down about the process, remember, we're all, in one way or another, in this together. And yet utterly alone.
posted by Erica Orloff at 5:43 PM
14 Comments:
I don't know why this post reminded me of this, but I remember an episode of The Dick Van Dyke Show where Rob (Dick Van Dyke, who played a television comedy writer) went to Richie's (his son) elementary class, on career day or something, and tried to explain how comedy works. The kids were pretty bored with it all until he started to SHOW how it works. I remember one of his points was to always give the audience what it doesn't expect.
There's a lesson there for fiction writers too. Show, don't tell; anticipate what the reader might expect, and then do the opposite. It works in comedy, and it works in fiction.
Jude:
Because I write, about half the time, comic novels for Red Dress Ink, I am constantly thinking about comedy. I can't tell a joke to save my life, but I can see how the unexpected in a book can delight readers. I know in each comic novel, I think, there was a central unexpected something. In Spanish Disco, it was that Roland Riggs never had a sequel at all--but then there's a second twist on the last page that I won't spoil. Great advice . . .
And oddly . . . Dick Van Dyke struggled with depression and alcoholism his whole life, I think. And he is very much a loner--not what you see on screen.
Some of our most respected and beloved personalities aren't what they seem to be. Richard Pryor...Johnny Carson...Ted Bundy...
Gotcha. :)
Jude:
I laughed.
:-)
E
Speaking of serial killers and women who whack off penises with butcher knives...
What did Jeffrey Dahmer say to Lorraine Bobbitt?
"You gonna eat that?"
*Rimshot*
Jude:
Very sick. Yet again, I wonder if the serial killer gene lurks within. ;-)
E
I just checked the comments and forget what the question was. sorry.
Hmm. I guess the question would be: Is there some secret formula for success in the arts? Can we use charts and graphs and spreadsheets to anticipate what will keep readers turning the page? What will make an audience laugh? What composition and color selection will make the viewer of a painting say, "Ah"?
I don't think so. Maybe the best we can do is search for what triggers an emotional response in ourselves, and then hope enough people feel the same way. If there's a secret formula, I want to know what it is. NOW please!
Jude:
I think oftentimes certain genres are depicted as "formulaic"--and sometimes, I guess, that may be the case. I know I have spoken at a couple of conferences where writers have said they were going to write chick lit because it was "what editors are buying"--even though they didn't like it much. It was as if they were following a formula for publication.
I think the other question . . . or at least the topic I was inviting comments on . . . was that common frustration. Don't we all share it in some way? And yet. . . we can't cure it for each other. We can commiserate, but not fix it.
E
I guess I'm searching for a middle ground. I want to write within the expectations of genre, yet create something utterly original.
Also, I can't understand why anyone would want to write a book that they wouldn't want to read. I imagine the distaste would ultimately show up in the writing.
Morning,
Jude, who exactly WAS speaking of penis whacking? Just what did you see at work today? :-0
As for the actual topic, I never force it. Mind you, I'm not yet in a position where I have to answer to editors or deadlines. Honestly not sure if I could force it if my back was to the wall. As an unpublished, I have the luxury of writing to suit my own mood. When I feel emotional, I can feed an emotional scene, a smart ass= a comedy scene etc.
Commiseration goes a long way to 'fixing'. Sympathy from those who understand tends to make me less hard on myself, less sensorial about what I'm attempting. Noise usually helps me too, a blasting stereo, a vacuum or...who knows why, but I often think out some of what I think is my best dialogue while I cut grass, (we have a nicely manicured lawn;)
Goofy movies also help. Stuff I wouldn't ordinarily watch. Which raises another point. Not only do you have to write to the right person, you have to hit them on the right day in the right mood. For me anyway.
This weekend I watched Rob Schneider(sp) in "The Hot Chick', not my usual cuppa (not because I'm an intellectual snob, I just prefer more wry humor) But for whatever reason, listening to my kids giggle, I LMAO. Same with writing, sometimes, I can make myself chuckle...sometimes I just think I'm out ta lunch and should go...find something to whack besides a keyboard.
lainey:
That's one disadvantage in being pubbed--you have to work through a book--because you've already cashed the check! It's a nice problem to have--but if you are at that point in a novel when you're weary of it, it sucks.
E
Hi Lainey,
First la with the Ruger, Erica with an Uzi, and now you're in a whacking mood. This blog is getting more dangerous every day. :)
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