How to make training and development fun? Go to Edinburgh for a Comedy Course.
We’re not looking for comic stardom. No, we don’t aspire to be the next Peter Kay. But what the 2-day beginner’s comedy course in Edinburgh did do is bring us lots of insight into the process of how comedians write and successfully deliver their material.
Step by step, the tutor took us through how to think up material, edit, perform and connect with an audience. And we came away with plenty of handy tools that we can apply to advertising.
The ‘Rant and Rave’ is a process for thinking up material we particularly enjoyed. This technique required us to rant about a topic we were passionate about with zero preparation. When you’re not constrained by conscious thinking, your subconscious will take over with unrehearsed thoughts and feelings, and this is where you can find some of the funniest and most unexpected material.
The course was intense. Daring us to step out of our comfort zone as we stood up in a room of people to perform a 5 minute comedy set we wrote the night before. However, putting ourselves in this uncomfortable position was great at testing our public speaking and performance skills. Although we’re not looking to leave our day jobs to become professional comedians anytime soon, we must admit that the thrill of people laughing at your jokes feels great. It makes you understand why anyone would want to have a comedy career. After our initial performance, we stayed on stage to re-perform the routine, but this time with the tutor guiding us on how to edit our work, eradicating unnecessary info and getting straight to the punchlines.
In such a short amount of time we were surprised by how much we learnt, developing some key skills that we’re sure is going to take our creative thinking one step further and funnier. You never know we may start a creative team comedy duo and open for Larry Dean in a year or two.
