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Comedy and tragedy are two sides of the same coin. A talent in one area might also lead to a predisposition in the other.

Comedy takes a very specific technique, specific skills.

While the subject matter of my novels could not be further removed from the stuff I used to trot out at the Comedy Store, the delivery of the material employs many of the same techniques.

As much experience, education and awareness as one can attain is important for a comedian.

It really helps a comedian to be an outsider.

Comedians are really writers who don't have pens and pencils about them, but they riff.

The comedians all finished their acts with a song. They would get a certain amount of money from the song publishers and would use that money to pay the writers. None of them paid very much for their comedy material, but it all added up.

Editing and post-production is so important with comedy.

Comedians work great as actors because they're good under pressure. With a lot of actors, you have to make them feel like everything's going really well to get a good performance out of them. But, if you have a comedian on the set, you can tell them, 'Hey, you really are screwing this up,' and then they just get better.