They say a test of a podcast is if get to 100 episodes... well, I did 3... So yes I fell 97 short but here are the 3 inspiring episodes!...

The video is an excerpt from my Zoom Stand-up Comedy Writing Sessions for gigging comics - I run the course regularly throughout the year - and every class is different. Here are the latest dates. I'm doing a series of short videos on stand-up comedy techniques. This one is about telling the audience what the problem is (and getting laughs there) but THEN setting out a surprising, absurd or counter-intuitive solution. It's this second step that can get the biggest laughs but

I can help you in a lot of different ways with your stand-up comedy writing - so many different ways in fact that I thought I'd write a...

About Lucy Lumsden: Lucy Lumsden is a producer and director. She runs her own production company Yellow Door Productions based in the UK...

g 5 x 2 hour sessions on Zoom Monday 14th September 2026 - 12th October 2026 7pm-9pm UK time 8pm-10pm European time 11am-1pm Pacific time (PDT) 2pm-4pm Eastern time (EDT) £135 (repeat fee £125) (see below for full info) BOOK A PLACE DEVELOP NEW STAND-UP MATERIAL AND PUNCH UP YOUR EXISTING STUFF! Learn more about your persona, develop your performance and get loads of new comedy tools and perspectives in my online stand-up group for gigging acts. You'll be part of a group with

I run a two part workshop online for gigging comics to explore their persona. NEXT DATES A key session in my London stand-up comedy course is where we explore your persona (and in the video above you can hear me talking about persona in the class, where I discuss it from the comedy booker's point of view). Finding this persona is key. It’s your on-stage character; a simplified, exaggerated version of yourself. Understanding your persona helps you find the angle you’ll take on

In this clip from the class I explore misdirection (a classic comedy tool) using two car based clips. ESSENTIAL TOOLS OF COMEDY WRITING COURSE (ON ZOOM) 3rd November - 1st December 2026 (5 x Tuesday nights) 7pm-9pm UK time 8pm-10pm European time 11am-1pm Pacific time (PDT) 2pm-4pm Eastern time (EDT) BOOK YOUR PLACE The course has spawned a book! The Complete Comedy Script Toolkit "I can't speak highly enough of how positive I've found the sessions with Chris. The sessions h

My class in action in a room above a pub in Soho, London I ran beginners and intermediate stand-up courses in London for around 15 years and I am now running Stand-up Comedy Weekend Workshops for anyone who wants to develop stand-up material, learn comedy techniques and get inspiration. I'm currently offering a series of Saturdays with Geoff Whiting on Crowd Work. Next dates You can also receive one-to-one stand-up coaching from me on Zoom. And also I run regular Zoom Stand-u

Twenty-five years ago I got myself an open-spot at the venerable Bearcat comedy club in Twickenham, greater London. I was at university...

Stand-up Crowd Work Masterclass Saturdays in LONDON Next dates How the show unfolds The role of the compere (or emcee/MC) is a crucial one in a stand-up comedy night and the compere has many things to do as the show unfolds. Put simply, as the compere your role is to warm the audience up at the start, bring the acts on and then round off the night at the end. I break down this apparently simple role into a sequence of steps through the night below, and then I go on to conside

Hecklers often believe that heckling is all part of the fun and that comedians welcome it and that it helps them. While there are some comics who relish taking on a heckly audience, most comics want to do their act without it being interrupted by shouted interjections that they have to deal with. (And you do have to deal with it – ignoring them is not an option). When I interviewed my friend and top compere Barry Ferns for my book (in a quote I didn’t have room for in the fin

For this the twenty-second lesson I thought I’d speak to a couple of working comics. To get a broad perspective I spoke to one newer act,...

In the last lesson I discussed Set List, the entirely improvised stand-up night. In this lesson, I’m discussing the use of “games” in...

I'm running a two part workshop online for gigging comics to explore their persona. 7pm-9pm UK time, Monday 1st & 8th 2026 , from £50 (On Zoom) BOOK YOUR PLACE I'd been planning a lesson on persona and inspired by a question from a reader of my blog Ronan Anderson, I have combined the topic with improv. He said: “I'm very curious about your opinion on the place of emotion, riffing and the idea of finding one's voice. Comedians seem to develop authentic material quickly and in

In this bumper blog we’ll see pretty much everything we’ve discussed about stand-up writing in a two-and-a-half minute Jerry Seinfeld...

Mark, a stand-up student of mine on my intermediate new material course, asked me to say more about what he termed ‘comedy metaphors’,...

Twenty five is a nice neat number isn’t it? It’d be a shame if it were ‘27’ lessons – hence me combining these three topics. I think I...

In the last few lessons we've been exploring transpositions. Let's end this exploration on personification. Also known as...

In the previous lesson we discussed transpositions. We’re going to develop this idea and look at a common comic effect that can be...

In the previous lesson I discussed the importance of going beyond what actually happened, and going into playful speculation. In your...