Comedy Acting - Don't Push the Funny

While drinking a cup of coffee and thinking about how to write this article, a particular memory kept coming into mind. Picture this: it was a warm, sunny summer day. I was working with a casting director in Chicago, and it was my responsibility to take notes throughout each audition. The audition was for an independent comedy film, and we had nearly 75 actors to review that day.

One-by-one, the actors flowed in, delivered their monologues and were asked to either stay for a cold-read or thanked and asked to leave. Hour-after-hour, the actors arrived and departed. You could almost taste their disappointment when they were asked to not stay. However, I remember this one actor. I'll always remember him, although, it may not be for the best of reasons.

I called him into the audition room, and after slating his name, with a little giggle afterwards, he began to deliver his monologue. It was some contemporary piece by a playwright I've never heard of, and while the actual monologue was written well, this actor completely ruined it by pushing his funny a little too hard.

You know what I mean, someone who is trying so desperately to be funny. Using vocal inflections that are overused, pretending to use props that weren't there, and pausing after jokes hoping we would laugh - we didn't.

As he left, I had a sense of empathy for him. He wanted to act so bad, that was obvious, but unless he learned how to tone down his version of funny, he wouldn't go very far in this industry.

When you're performing a monologue or scene, don't try to be funny. This may seem a little counterproductive, but trying to be humorous is nothing more than performing a scene in a believable fashion. Comedy scripts are written to deliver laughs. The composition and sentence structure has been carefully crafted to deliver a specific brand of humor, and it is your job as an actor to create a character and stay true to the world the script has created. Don't push for the humor. Create a character, and deliver the lines as if you were naturally talking.

There is a golden rule to comedy acting: If you believe what you're saying, the laughs will soon follow. Take time to study character development. Carefully construct your character and his movements and how he talks, and simply deliver the lines in the script. The funniest comedy moments come from actors who are talking in a natural and effortless manner.