“All great comedy has managed to circumnavigate executive meddling.” – pg. xiv
“Success was a by-product, not the goal.” – pg. xv
“What has bothered me most for the last few years is that kind of lazy, political comedy, very safe but always pretending to be brave, that usually gets what my colleague Seth Meyers calls, ‘clapter.'” – James Downey, pg. 3
“I avoid anything I feel is a cheap laugh based on shock or just being dirty. You can always get a laugh, but you don’t want it to come at the price of your dignity.” – James Downey, pg. 11
“Writers tend to write ordinary people in weird situations. Performers tend to write weird people in ordinary situations. That’s a broad generalization, but it’s fairly true.” – James Downey, pg. 12
“I like to think that unless you’re making an observation, and that observation is true – and I hope fresh – it’s not worth writing a piece.” – James Downey, pg. 14
“You also need confidence to communicate what it is you do that’s different from what everyone else is doing.” – James Downey, pg. 21
“We’d write together, and we were almost writing for this seventh voice. There was always that image of another voice that was there. It was the Python voice, really.” – Terry Jones, pg. 25
“If you want to create comedy, try to make people laugh. If you can make people laugh, head in that direction. If nobody laughs… well, that’s not good news. Head in the opposite direction.” – Terry Jones, pg. 29
“Other people’s ideas are never as important as yours.” – Diablo Cody, pg. 31
“If you really love it, you’ll keep doing it even if you’re not successful. If you don’t love it, you don’t belong here.” – Diablo Cody, pg. 31
“Write about how people attempt to navigate this awful screwed-up world and to then find a way to be happy within it, and to make things better.” – Mike Schur, pg. 39
“Jokes are fleeting, but good characters and emotional stories are forever.” – Mike Schur, pg. 43
“Someone said that the best ending for a story is at once inevitable and surprising. That it was the only way it could’ve happened, and yet the audience didn’t see it coming.” – Mike Schur, pg. 44
“Staffs should ideally be like the X-Men – lots of different weird mutants with specific voices and talents.” – Mike Schur, pg. 45
“For that, never underestimate the importance of carefully weaving your own voice into your submission well enough that it cannot be easily separated from your ideas. That’s the balance that I think is important to strike: supplying something familiar that no one ever saw coming.” – Todd Levin, pg. 57
“You’re going to need a very unique comedy voice to stand out.” – Andres Du Bouchet, pg. 59
“The only advice is you just have to do it.” – Henry Beard, pg. 76
“Somewhere, somehow, you can get your script read. And if it’s good, you will be noticed.” – James L. Brooks, pg. 82
“And if you’re in a genuine process, there are no mistakes. If nothing gets down that day, it’s supposed to be that way.” – James L. Brooks, pg. 82
“Just write. Lose yourself. And when you look up, maybe you’ll be somewhere you always wanted to be.” – James L. Brooks, pg. 83
“You know, having a writer’s room is very conducive to getting nothing done.” – Peter Mehlman, pg. 109
“If you approach everything from a pure creative angle, the work and employment will take care of itself.” – Paul F. Tompkins, pg. 113
“We always try to make our movies one-third satire, one-third parody, and one-third original storytelling.” – Adam McKay, pg. 118
“It becomes very, very funny when characters deny that the ship is sinking, even as the water’s rising past their knees.” – Adam McKay, pg. 126
“The entire game is to make your character as awful and irresponsible as possible, while still keeping a toe in the pond of his still being a human being.” – Adam McKay, pg. 131
“‘It’s all about who you know.’ That’s actually the biggest mistake a lot of people make. It’s really about jumping in and doing it, and just starting to write, starting to make sketches and movies, and just putting them up on the internet no matter who or where you are. You just have to start doing it – even if you’re not getting paid.” – Adam McKay, pg. 135
“Part of success is just starting something, working towards a goal, and then living long enough to achieve it.” – Adam McKay, pg. 136
“You usually struggle in the dark for years and years. The trick is that if you love it enough you’ll keep going.” – Adam McKay, pg. 136
“I actually have such a love-hate relationship with writing. I kind of hate it. [Laughs] But you have to tell yourself, ‘I get to do this.'” – Kay Cannon, pg. 179
On Dan Harmon’s ‘Spit Draft’: “You write the scene with dummy dialogue that you’ll later replace with actual jokes. […] If you can’t get through a script that way, then chances are your story doesn’t work.” – Carol Kelb, pg. 194
“You aren’t good at writing, but if you can get over that, then one day maybe you will be okay at writing.” – Gabe Delahaye, pg. 203
“Write what you think is funny. […] Make friends with smart, highly motivated, encouraging, wonderful people who are more talented than you.” – Gabe Delahaye, pg. 204
“It is impossible to work in television without having original material.” – Joel Begleiter, pg. 233
“The ability to get away from your ego enough to recognize your limitations, and to take actions toward becoming a writer or working for a sketch group – that’s a big moment.” – Marc Maron, pg. 237
“The truth of the matter is that eventually you’re going to have to do the work. You’re going to have to find your consistency and your groove – somehow.” – Marc Maron, pg. 238.
“I think because I wrote only for wanting to crack up my friends, and I was cracking myself up in the process, it worked.” – Dave Hill, pg. 266
“Once I was truly at the point where I was not trying to get anyone’s attention, that’s when I got everything I wanted.” – Dave Hill, pg. 266
“Do your best to entertain yourself. Or entertaining the fifteen year-old in you. Or just creating something that you want to see exist.” – Dave Hill, pg. 267
“A problem never comes without a gift in its hand.” – Tom Scharpling, pg. 277
“You have to trust what you’re doing. There’s something running through everybody that others will eventually respond to.”– Tom Scharpling, pg. 279
“All you can really hope for is to connect with people and to hopefully put food on the table – and to then get a chance to do it again the next day.” – Tom Scharpling, pg. 290
“It’s really more about time than it is about perfection. Just put in the time, and don’t be too precious about things. Work with your friends. And maybe, eventually, you’ll get paid.” – Amy Poehler, pg. 301
“If you stick around, if you’re a good collaborator, if you’re open to new ideas and you keep trying, then you’ll find there’s a lot of different ways you can work as a writer.” – Amy Poehler, pg. 301
“If it makes you laugh out loud, it probably belongs on the page. […] Have trust in amusing yourself.” – Patton Oswalt, pg. 326
“It’s the ones who just keep going who eventually make it.” – Patton Oswalt, pg. 327
“I always say not to do it unless you can’t not do it. If you need encouragement from a stranger, then you shouldn’t do it.” – Daniel Clowes, pg. 350
“I’d avoid reading interviews with writers. None of us know what we’re doing. You can learn more from reading a good book than all the floppy advice from the people who make them.” – Daniel Handler, pg. 358
“I preferred to either read someone’s original pilot or original play or original screenplay in order to see the invention they were able to come up with.” – Paul Feig, pg. 390
“I’d much rather see a writer come up with, ‘I knew somebody like this.’ Or, ‘What would it be like if these three people got mixed together?’ At that point, you can then ask, ‘Okay, what’s the best context for them to be in? What situation?'” – Paul Feig, pg. 391
“That is the key to comedy as far as I’m concerned: lightning in a bottle. You have to capture that moment when it first happens, because that’s when it’s funny.” – Paul Feig, pg. 391
“With stand-up and writing, it’s about trying to be good at it in the way that my heroes, the people I admire, are good at it.” – Stephen Merchant, pg. 401
“Even the missteps are productive, because you’re getting something out of your system.” – Stephen Merchant, pg. 403
“I had no idea that comedy could be more than just jokes. That the whole thing could be in service of exposing some truth. […] To realize that I could also say something that I believed in, or describe a worldview I shared, or attack a dishonesty that bothered me, through comedy – that changed everything.” – Dan Guterman, pg. 407
“The danger, when you do it for long enough, is that comedy can become a series of variables in a mathematical equation. I know that if I balance the equation correctly, that if I manipulate x and y in just the right way, the end result will be laughter.” – Dan Guterman, pg. 411
“Someone could be an outright genius, but they’d still pass on him or her if they were a fucking asshole.” – Dan Guterman, pg. 414
“There was never a honeymoon period with comedy. I took it way too seriously, way too early.” – Dan Guterman, pg. 417
“Having your self-worth inextricably linked to your work may be unhealthy, but it’s also responsible for most of my success.” – Dan Guterman, pg. 417
“I’ll never be the kind of person who does cartwheels or stands around parks holding balloons. But that doesn’t mean I don’t love the life I have. Sometimes I don’t remember to enjoy it enough, but I’m extremely happy that I get to do what I’m passionate about.” – Dan Guterman, pg. 419
“It’s similar to the medical profession. You come in, you look at the patient, and you identify what’s wrong. Then you describe what you can do to remedy it.” – Alan Spencer, pg. 422
“I’ve noticed that it’s very important to have a wonderful third act – a powerhouse ending.” – Alan Spencer, pg. 423
“There’s always a virtue to listening, and there are intelligent people in Hollywood. You have to be a politician and a diplomat. Also, a human being.” – Alan Spencer, pg. 426
“Just write as much as you can. That’s the only way you’re going to get better at it.” – Mike Dicenzo, pg. 429
“You can’t teach writing. You can teach some basics of writing: act one, two, and three; how to create a premise; how to develop a story; how to sharpen jokes. But you can’t ever teach people how to get talent in their guts. You can’t teach people how to express this gut-level talent. That’s just impossible.” – Mel Brooks, pg. 434
“You can be silly, but you still have to hew to the underlying truth. If my heart’s in the right place, I can go anywhere.” – Mel Brooks, pg. 436
“The characters are everything. If you’re talented, you’ll find a good idea to put these characters in.” – Mel Brooks, pg. 38
“The real struggle is to take a premise, the center of it, and blossom it into a punch line.” – Mel Brooks, pg. 440
“I was here. I did something. I made my mark. And I will not be completely erased by death.” – Mel Brooks, pg. 447
“Whatever you write has to make you laugh. Not just laugh, but really laugh, from your belly, laugh with your gut.” – Mel Brooks, pg. 447
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