testingdistance

Start with the honest part. If we believe that a character has some recognizability, some traits we identify with, some relationships to the world and other people we can respect as true, you can always make that funny. If you head right to the funny and miss with a joke, you can’t all of a sudden try to convince an audience that it’s real. They won’t buy it. Real can turn into funny, it’s harder to turn funny into real (especially because you generally only have to when the funny goes away.)