The NEW Comedy Bible: The Ultimate Guide to Writing and Performing Stand-Up Comedy

by Judy Carter

The New Comedy Bible is a step-by-step, no excuses manual for writing, performing, and launching your career as a stand-up comic. Written by Judy Carter, the author of The Comedy Bible (2001), which was called by The Washington Post and Forbes as a “Comedy Essential.” This new book, penned in classic Carter’s style -- part career coach and part comedy dominatrix -- has 100% new content where you

Partake in 48 new exercises to turn your problems into punchlinesCreate 60 minutes of new materialDiscover your authentic comedy personaConquer stage fright and slay hecklersPush part procrastination and get bookedWhether you’re a beginner just starting out or a pro looking to create new material for your next Netflix Comedy Special, Carter’s proven methods are legendary among today’s top performers. Alumni of her workshops Seth Rogan, Hannah Gadsby, Sherri Sheppard, and Maz Jobrani among others. As Lily Tomlin says, "Judy Carter helps others find their authentic persona and communicate in a way that makes audiences laugh." Interviewed by Oprah Winfrey, she said, “Judy Carter can show you how to make your sense of humor pay off.”

The exercises in this book will get you off the couch and onto the stage, helping you develop the skills necessary to envision, and achieve, a successful career in comedy.

Genres: Comedy, Humor, Writing, Nonfiction, Stand Up, Audiobook

337 pages, Kindle Edition

Published January 26, 2020

About the author

Judy Carter is an American comedian, magician, motivational speaker and author of five books on comedy and self-improvement.

Reviews

[emily · Rating 5 out of 5]

my engineer brain loves the step by step approach, did i actually do the exercises? absolutely not. will i refer back to this frequently? probably.

[Gerald Matzke · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book caught my eye at the library. I’ve often wondered what makes comedians funny and successful. Now I have some idea. It takes a lot of work. Talent helps and a good sense of humor is essential but it still takes a lot of grinding to develop an act and learn by experience what works and what doesn’t. The author uses her years of experience to help the aspiring comedian get off to a promising start. She employs lots of examples and works you through a process that includes writing and revising and practicing material. Then you have to be prepared for the unexpected, so she includes chapters on improvising, dealing with hecklers and what to do if you forget your next bit. This was fun to read and I will watch a stand-up comedian a little differently now.

[Dragos · Rating 3 out of 5]

good not great

[Mike Degen · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’ve read a lot of books on joke writing and this was by far the best one.

It teaches everything from topic generation, to act outs and turns. My comedy significantly improved from this book.

[Bernie Gourley · Rating 5 out of 5]

As the title suggests, this is a soup-to-nuts exploration of building a standup comedy act. While the bulk of the book discusses how to build jokes that work in a comedy club setting, it also gives helpful tips on relevant issues such as stage fright, hecklers, bombing and bomb recovery, set arrangement, and editing material. It offers many insights that may seem counterintuitive to a neophyte reader.

In writing, there is a common distinction made between "plotters" and "pantsers" (as in "by the seat of one's pants.") Plotters do a lot of research and outline everything thoroughly before beginning to write (as most people understand the writing process.) Pantsers like to get right into the typing and are willing to have a much messier process in exchange for greater feelings of spontaneity and surprise. A similar distinction seems to exist in standup comedy. Jerry Seinfeld might be the posterchild for the comedic plotter, writing and rewriting jokes on paper and having an already finely honed collection of jokes when he goes into the comedy club to revise through audience feedback. Other comedians seem to like to work by riffing and editing material on the fly. My point is: this book will definitely appeal most to plotters. That said, I think it has a lot of useful information that will save pantsers a great deal of trouble, but I suspect those with intense pantser proclivities will be skeptical of such a step-by-step approach.

The book is set up as a workbook woven into an instructional guide. That is, it has exercises throughout. It also presents a lot of jokes and partial bits by headlining comics to help the reader see how successful comics apply the principles in question.

I enjoyed reading this book and found it helpful. I thought that many of the exercises were quite helpful in triggering joke ideas. If you are looking for a book that deals in both joke writing and comedic delivery, I'd highly recommend this book.

[Ilhaam Bardien · Rating 2 out of 5]

I don't want to be a comedian but I read this anyway so my review might be biased due to disinterest but alas. Why did I read this? I really don't know. I'm an introvert and I was interested in whether this would touch on confidence I guess.

Anyway. Found it a bit lame and a little obvious. But I did have some outtakes that I found interesting:

1. Put yourself in people's faces. Sometimes you have to blow your own trumpet. (kind of obvious but a good reminder nevertheless).

2. Self-mocking helps you build self-esteem and accept yourself as you are. (find myself doing this a lot. Nice to know it's a positive thing I guess).

3. Speaking in a loud voice is one of the characteristics of confident people. (personally I would debate this point but anyway).

[César Vásquez · Rating 5 out of 5]

Me costó terminar éste libro porque dejé de leer en algunos meses pero además por todos los ejercicios que se tienen que realizar en cada tema. Sin embargo es un libro que considero muy bueno cuando apenas quieres entrar en el mundo de la comedia (principalmente enfocado en el stand up). Creo que es un libro de referencia muy bueno para leer y releer cada vez que lo necesites o que olvides los conceptos. Da muchos ejemplos muy buenos y es clara y concisa en los puntos que toca, no divaga en cosas que no necesitas. Libro de fácil lectura.

[Björn Seidel · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is definitely one of the better Stand-Up practise books. Good (almost great) exercises, and it basically explains the format of a lot of jokes. Even if I didn't follow the exercises in every detail - it helped organise my jokes and writing. If anything, this book helped me analyse jokes and comedy in general, and that is something worthwhile. I deduct one point, because it is obvious the author wants to sell the comedy workbook (please don't buy that) and the organisation of your jokes is important, but come on, you have everything you need in this book...

[Graham Stanley · Rating 5 out of 5]

Recommended

This is one of a number of how-to guides I’ve read on doing stand-up, and it’s one of the better ones. I think it’s worth reading a few as they complement each other. There is great advice here that you can learn from. It’s clear the author is both passionate about and experienced in stand-up comedy. I can also recommend her Instagram account, where she has live and recordings of discussions and holds joke workshops, etc.

[Jenny · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book needs to be more popular! Very comprehensive and helpful. I see people are saying the book is good but doesn't have too much depth...guess what? You can't possibility teach the unique styles of well-established comedians because everyone is so wildly different, it's not like acting where you can succinctly verbalize the nuances and specific techniques. So as far as stand up structure and performance learning, this is about the best it can get.

[N. E. Rule · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was an excellent book on how to write jokes and perform (not that I could ever be a stand-up!) I love to watch comics perform and I have so much respect for their work. So it is great to see a little "behind the scenes" on how they write their content. And hopefully, some of this information will bleed into my RomCom and other writing.

[Samuel Sanders · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the more insightful parts of this book is learning about the "joke format," and learning how to weave those together to give the perception of storytelling through rapid jokes. This book helped me wrap my head around the comedy space and was a nice read for a beginner like myself.

[Richard Mulholland · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a four star book but a 5 star course. That's really what it is, a masterclass complete with assignments and a buddy system.

If you just want a book, I'd recommend Mastering Standup, but if you want to go deep, this is the one.

[Marwa]

Public
#connection to a higher entity Allah The Creator الوهَّاب #99NamesOfAllah⚖️💛 and #Belonging f

حق
-و عموماً 😅 "المسمَّيات" حَق-
(لامعٌ) مضحك
قارِن
كل ما هو سئ لوِّنهُ أقصوصة
أكتب يومياً
سطر واحد مضحك

[Kay Aye · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great read for new comics.

I highly encourage you to get the workbook to use while reading this book. The exercises are really great and they are the perfect foundation for joke writing

[Enhee Tsoodol · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ер нь хошигнолтой холбоотой зүйлсийг орчуулахаар тиймхэн болдог юм байна. Гэхдээ ерөнхий санаа, зөвлөмжүүд нь таалагдлаа, таалагдлаа.

[Rachael · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a really helpful book for me. The material is laid out in an easy to understand way with multiple examples.

[Robert Hill · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book was good, but wasn't superb.

[Joe Millye · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent material and extremely helpful. It's like having a comedy coach with you when you're preparing your act.

[Carles Caño · Rating 5 out of 5]

FAN-TA-BU-LO-SO

[Jason Cady · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a good guidebook for developing standard standup.

[Katy Jeremko · Rating 3 out of 5]

A casual read but didn't provide enough fodder for actually forming jokes, and often felt like the prompts weren't very useful.

[Justin Fanelli · Rating 4 out of 5]

Shep!

[Yilin Wong · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great tips, for me the best way to read is during polishing, getting ideas along the way.

[Mario Lefiti · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read the original version of this book when I first started doing stand up comedy almost 20 years ago. My comedy mentor suggested it would help with my writing and stage persona and it did. I decided to read the new version and its lessons still hold up. I definitely recommend this for any aspiring comic and student of the craft of stand up comedy.

[John P Smith Jr · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great book to learn more about finding your Topics/Sub-Topics, Premises, and Act-Outs. I love the number of Comedy Buddy exercises included.