Something about not waiting for the laugh of a laugh track allows you to take lines that otherwise might be seen as just direct jokes, and make them seem realistic.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
If I'm in something funny, I like to try and find some kind of serious line in it that people can relate to.
I realized that comedians of the day were operating on jokes and punch lines. The moment you say the punch line, the audience either laughs sincerely or they laugh automatically or they don't laugh. The thing that bothered me was that automatic laugh. I said, that's not real laughter.
When someone pitches a joke for a character that is just perfect, and you can imagine that actor reading that line at your table read or on the set, it's like the sound of a snap snapping into place.
When you don't have a laugh track, you can make the clothes funny. We can make a sign funny. We can make the way somebody walks funny. The makeup can be funny.
In point of fact, I'm not sure there are too many comedies with laugh tracks anymore. Most of what you hear is live studio audience laughing as a show is filmed. If this prompts you to wonder who those actual human beings are who are laughing at some of this stuff, that is a mystification I share.
I'm not good at telling a joke, but I can say a line in a certain way that makes people uncomfortable because they don't know whether to laugh or not, and I love that comedy.
You know something is a hit comedically if you can just call up one of your friends and belt out a line from the show and you both start laughing.
Comedy is surprises, so if you're intending to make somebody laugh and they don't laugh, that's funny.
I have no line. If I think it's funny, it's funny.
If I'm in a serious play, I often think to myself, 'I could make that line funny.'
No opposing quotes found.