Comedy, and all creativity, begins with questions. What takes you into comic territory, rather than literary or dramatic territory, is...

A stand-up will send me a video of their set and I will watch it, meeting them subsequently to discuss my observations on their material...

Note: This is by some margin my most popular blog! I originally wrote it in 2018 so in view of how many people are reading it, I've just sat down (in Feb 2023) and done a comprehensive rewrite to include even more info. Enjoy! How do you write one-liners? There are lots of ways of approaching it and you can learn all sorts of methods. For example, Greg Dean has his 'joke mine', as explained in his "Step-by-Step to Stand-up Comedy" book, Sally Holloway has her "Serious Guide

STAND-UP STORYTELLING WORKSHOP 10.45am-3.45pm, Saturday 28th February 2026 @ Theatre Deli , Leadenhall Street, London EC3A 4AF £75 Course info and booking There’s a problem with true stories in a stand-up context. The long build up that (eventually) culminates in a big laugh is often the form that anecdotes take; they have this in common with the ‘shaggy dog story’ type of joke. In modern stand-up you can't often get away with this long wait for a single laugh (however big).

In 2007 I interviewed Richard Herring in a Caffe Nero in Hammersmith for the short-lived comedy magazine The Fix. I’d recently seen him...

This blog on misdirection is one of the most popular ones and I originally wrote it in February 2018. So I've just given it a refresh in...

Now we've explored the wider context — the writing process and, starting the gig itself — let’s get stuck into the nitty-gritty, starting...

Having discussed bespoke material for the gig in the last lesson, I'm going to begin this lesson with the physical practicalities of...

The stand-up, compère, act booker and manager Geoff Whiting told me that many years ago he was an open-spot on a bill with Ross Noble,...

The lessons are about to shift into the writing of material. Before we go there, I wanted to say that the most important stage in...

Let’s address this early in the lessons as it’s one of the biggest challenges in stand-up, especially when you’re new. If you’ve taken...

Whether you’re using a laptop, note-book, the back of fag packets or doing it mostly in your head, an effective writing process will take...

I’ll begin by suggesting that stand-up writing need not be writing—by which I mean, there is no need to sit down and write a complete...

I was going to publish this material as an e-book (hence the snazzy cover above). But then I landed a proper book deal: namely, A...

In this blog I discuss creating characters that are deeply flawed, even unpleasant, and yet the audience want to spend time with them....

When you are creating a sitcom the characters and their relationships to each other are the key thing. Situation is secondary. When...

In this blog I describe how the classic comedy sketch works. While the style and content changes over time, the fundamentals remain the same. You can hear examples from Peter Cook and Dudley Moore through to Monty Python, into Not the Nine O'Clock News to Mitchell & Webb, SNL, Key & Peele, Catherine Tate, right up to more offbeat shows like Jam, Cowards and Cardinal Burns. Social media sketches also follow these dynamics, but often in very truncated form. A clash of points-of

One-liner comedians and Christmas cracker joke writers actually employ many of the same techniques. I explore the cross-over plus I offer...

As sketch group Daphne get nominated for the Fosters Edinburgh Comedy Best Newcomer Award Chris Head detects stirrings in the world of...

Alongside my work with comedians I deliver corporate training applying the tools of stand-up to presentations, pitches, meetings… I have...