Bring the Funny

by Greg DePaul

A sharp, funny book about comedy screenwriting from a successful screenwriter that uses recent – as in this century – movies you've actually seen as examples. Greg DePaul (Screenwriter, Bride Wars , Saving Silverman ) has sold scripts to Miramax, Fox, Disney, New Line, Sony, MGM and Village Roadshow. He's worked with comedy stars like Jack Black, Kate Hudson, Jason Biggs and Amanda Peet. Now Greg takes everything he knows about writing comedy and breaking into the biz, tosses it into a blender and serves up this tasty, fat-free smoothie of a book that’s easy to read, brutally honest, and straight from the heart ... of Hollywood. Bring the Funny is chock full o' tricks, strategies and insider terms used by successful comedy screenwriters, Comic Justice Wrylies Genre-Bending Shadow Characters The BDR's The Two-Hander The Conceit Comedic Escalation Gapping A.I.C. Fish Outta Water The Idea Factory Really Important Comedy Screenwriting Rules Number 99 and 100 If you're looking to write funnier and better screenplays, you want this book. But if you're ready to pack up your car, drive out to L.A., and dive into a career as a comedy screenwriter, you need this book. Now. Buy it, jam it into your pocket, and hit the gas. Greg's got your back.

Genres: Writing

230 pages, Paperback

First published June 13, 2016

Reviews

[Roland Trafalgar · Rating 5 out of 5]

Greg DePaul's book is just plain fun to read, whether you want to write comedy screenplays or just want to know more about comedy movies like Trainwreck, We're the Millers, The Hangover, and others. I highly recc this funny book. I laughed while learning about comedy writing.

[Jalaj Jha · Rating 5 out of 5]

Once a father noticed his 9 year old reading a book on parenting. He smiled, went up to him and said "This book is not for you at this age".. The kid replied "I was just checking if I am being brought up properly or not!"

I may look like this kid for neither I am a screenwriter nor working to become one, but am surely one of the end-beneficiary of a screenplay, the moviegoer. This book popped up as a recommendation based on previous readings and I decided to go for it.

Author of this book, Greg DePaul, have successfully sold many screenplays to various studios of which two turned into successful movies. In this entire book he gives honest guidance to those who aspire to become screenwriters. By honest I mean HONEST, and his tone is funny throughout.

Similar to what he does in any screenplay, Greg divided this book into 3 Acts. Act 1 prepares you to write, Act 2 throws in all concepts and method that would help to write to your best and Act 3 takes you into the world where you actually sell your work. Greg mentions in the book that the Act 2 is the soul of any screenplay, if it is good the screenplay is good. In this book, the Act 2 is just excellent (probably I am short of words to describe it).

The book covers comedy movies released between 2000-2016 for elaborating on the concepts and methods, due to which book also smells fresh.

I often repeat view good movies, and so am doing with this book, a re-read cover-to-cover.

PS: Apparently I am the first one to review this book on Goodreads, so don't want to write too long to find someone else already posted one. Anyways I recommend reading the book instead of reviews for they they all will agree on one thing "a 5-star". (As of now 7 ratings on Amazon and all 5-Stars)

[Benjamin Fasching-Gray · Rating 2 out of 5]

There were some interesting points in here, but the overall effect is pretty discouraging. Like the Hollywood comedies referenced in this book, everyone is running on a treadmill and the stakes and the obstacles get bigger and harder, none of it is very funny, some powerful people will demand a “boner joke” every few scenes and in the end you “learn” what you knew all along, cue big phoney tears and bourgeois value confirmation.

Greg DePaul does make it clear that the main thing is to work hard for years. His explanation of the industry is where it gets discouraging. I was hoping for more stuff about being a funny storyteller, but I guess I need more literary criticism for that.

Also: most of the jokes in the book itself are not funny. He ends each chapter with a pop-quiz riddled with joke answers and the joke answers are more or less the same joke over and over. Who knows how many of the awful, racist and homophobic jokes from "Saving Silverman" were DePaul's? (Like, why is there even that scene with the older 'Chinese' guy? And the 'South Asian' dialect Neil Diamond song? Why?) I think we can be certain though, that the sexism of "Saving Silverman" is DePaul's responsibility. But maybe it's me. I don't laugh as easily as I used to.

[Mateusz Płocha · Rating 3 out of 5]

Niewiele tu konkretów na temat samego pisania. Raczej jak być scenarzystą komediowym w Hollywood. Dla osób spoza USA jest to zdecydowanie za mało. Naciągane 3/5.