Laughter is so important to me. It has many shapes. I love it if you can get a child to the point of uncontrollable giggles. To make people involuntarily laugh with a huge guffaw is one of the best achievements you can have.
Or the delicious moment where, despite the serious atmosphere or solemn occasion, laughter just builds in you like rising water pressure.
Billy Connolly & Eddie Izzard are my favourites, their style and their absurdity. What also gets my attention are fearless comedians. Frank Skinner, Jimmy Carr, Frankie Boyle, Anthony Jeselnik. They push the edges of decency and what is acceptable. It is like a craft for them.
I like dark, slightly off-kilter funny that has a built-in half beat of silent shock followed by laughter; despite how wrong it is, it can still be funny.
A well-crafted line with a twist, or something that makes us look at ourselves honestly and collectively acknowledge that we are being shown something about the human condition, that while absurd, is also true.
In our house, the maxim is, ‘not should you?’ — but ‘are you brave enough to say it?’
I love the crispness and delivery of perfect comic timing. People who respect the beat of the reveal. A perfectly executed puzzled look or double take, harder to deliver well than you would think.
Most of the classic TV comedy bears repeat watching because even if we know and can anticipate the punchline, our enjoyment is rooted in the perfection of the delivery. The look, the breath taken just before they launch into it, is part of the delight.
It is our national humour reflected back at us on TV and films. We are the masters of the deadpan, scathing punchline that destroys our so-called friends.
So many writers of comedy speak about how they travel on buses and sit in cafés and soak up the rhythm and cadence of the humour around them in everyday life.
It is something that comes naturally to us; there are areas of the country renowned for their humour and delivery of a good line.
We have a natural fondness for knowing our friend is about to step into a social faux pas and letting them do it, for no other reason than we know it will be funny.
We even delight in self-deprecating stories and humour because the point is getting the laugh, not how it leaves us looking.
Our humour translates and travels well because it has at its core observation of the human vanity and weakness. We are not afraid to examine and expose it. In pursuit of a good laugh, we are prepared to reveal the pale, soft underbelly of our faintly ridiculous behaviour.
We understand, every one of us, that laughter is worth chasing, better than medicine, chases away the blues, keeps us feeling human.
A good laugh is worth having.
I leave you with these
Things I am banned from saying in public but want to badly if the opportunity presents itself …
To a chirpy waiter presenting the specials as if they are auditioning on Broadway: ‘Dylan — I just want a beer, not a relationship.’
Turning to the person on your left at a funeral, irrespective of who they are or how they are related to the deceased: ‘I never liked him — you?’
Finding a friend sitting on a bench quietly crying, sitting beside them and softly asking: ‘Is it your haircut?’