On Tue, 7 Jan 2020 13:01:20 -0800 (PST), Spains Harden
Post by Spains HardenPost by Peter T. DanielsPost by occam"A man has been found guilty of overusing commas. The judge warned him
to expect a very long sentence."
(Janet take note.)
Sometimes a comedian will follow something like that with "That joke was
written by my 8-year-old daughter."
It doesn't even rise to the category of "dad joke"!
It made me smile PTD. Don't be so ungracious.
There was a Northern Irish comedian named Frank Carson. One of his
catchphrases was "It's the way I tell 'em!" (referring to his jokes).
Apparently the catchphrase came from an interchange between two people
roughly along the lines of:
A: (Why do people laugh) Frank Carson's jokes are not funny.
B: It's the way he tells them.
That catchphrase is mentioned by another NI comedian, Alan McKee, in an
interview:
https://www.culturenorthernireland.org/features/performing-arts/my-cultural-life-alan-mckee
There’s a saying that 'dying is easy but comedy is hard'. Would you
agree?
Frank Carson used to say, "It’s the way I tell them", and there’s a
lot of truth in that handy catchphrase. The performance goes a long
way to make a joke funny. We always say comedy is no laughing
matter.
During the rehearsal period you get to a place where you’ve said the
lines so many times that you may lose all sense of spontaneity. It
feels awful. You’ve performed the gag so many times that it’s just
words. It’s then when you must have faith in the performance
element. You reduce it down to an almost mechanical level where it's
about the execution of moves and the delivery of lines.
--
Peter Duncanson, UK
(in alt.usage.english)