Writing Comedy Characters
As you may have read I’m busy writing for 2 comedy writing competitions; the first is the Sitcom Mission and the second is for the BBC Laughing Stock. In the past my writing has been quite scattered. A bit of character work, some dialogue and various other elements.
Comedy Comes from Character
But the thing is I’ve not had the success I’ve craved so now I have to be more professional and a lot harder on myself, well disciplined. After generating sitcom ideas I worked on the character of 1 proposed comedy script, Captain Fate. If I don’t have the character then there is no point.
Being Humour
What I am looking for is ‘being humour’ which is what you feel when a character is faced with a situation. That is the anticipation of how he is going to react. Think of Del Boy faced with the police visiting his flat. You know what he is going to react. That’s what I am aiming for…
A Question of Comedy Character
One of the easiest ways to find our what your character is going to do is to ask lots of questions. If you are a performer you’ll going to be put in a ‘Hot Spot’ and others ask you questions and you react. With a writer working on his own you use various questionnaires.
See my comedy character questionnaire which I’ve gathered from formats used in newspapers and magazines.
Comedy Character Starting Point
Remember this is only a starting point. There’s a lot more work to be done till you find a character that works and that means once the hard work is done he/she will write themselves.
If you have a way of writing comedy characters drop us a line at bitcomedy.co.uk.
Download Sitcom-Mission-Character
TooT!
Jim
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