I was just writing something about a video I came across on YouTube. It was Louis C.K. paying tribute to the great George Carlin. Then I received an email from a student of mine referring me to HuffPost Comedy which is a segment of the Huffington post. They had beat me to it and written their own piece on Louis’s tribute.
Louis says so many of the things that I have said about George Carlin, so I am going to share those thoughts on it. I am no HuffPost writer so if you want to ready their article you can find it here.
In the video, Louis talks about how George Carlin inspired him to dig deeper and find more material. Like a lot of comedians I know, Louis had the same act for 15 years. Think about it! Fifteen years of the same material! George Carlin would do an HBO special, then chuck out all the material he did in that special and write a brand new act for the next special. How’s that for inspiration?
I had an opportunity to meet George about 20 years ago and the advice he gave me was gold. He said, “Take the stuff that drives you absolutely f**king crazy and make it funny:” That was when my entire approach to comedy changed.
In the video below you’ll get to see Louis C.K. talk about a similar experience he had in his career as a result of George Carlin. I think George has inspired many of us. He certainly inspired me and still does. So many things he said still resonate in my mind and I still apply them in my writing and teaching.
I am always writing and I encourage my students to write constantly, dig deeper, really go for it to find the jokes and say something that’s important to you, something that actually means something. George said there’s three levels of comedy:
- Funny
- Funny with good ideas.
- Funny with good ideas and compelling language.
It’s great advice.
People are blown away that George Carlin actually threw away an act and wrote an entirely new act each and every year. One of the reasons is we are often taught that it’s really hard to come up with material. And it is sometimes, but so what? Who said it was going to be easy, right?
There are other reasons we fight that urge to write. In some comedy classes, teachers actually say to their students, “if you write one new joke every week, at the end of the year you’ll have fifty-two new jokes and I think, What?! Hey, if you’re a television writer and you write one new joke every day, you’re fired!
Bottom line is this: George Carlin taught us that ideas are a dime a dozen. As comedians, we are an endless fountain of material, we just have to dig deep to find it.
Enjoy the video! Louis has earned the right to pay this tribute. He is probably the next George Carlin.
