Keywords

Comedy, stand up, performance, original material, acting, auditions

Abstract

Stand-up comedy has been a major influence on American culture and has given the "Everyman" the ability to laugh at ourselves. Stand-up comedians have been performing in nightclubs, bars, clubs, and, most importantly, theatres for the past 60 years. Stand-up comedy can take many forms: a monologue of entertaining incidents that form a story, or a string of one-liners, or a succession of jokes. This performance project and thesis is an examination and an attempt at the art form that we call stand-up comedy. It will answer the question of what is the best approach to writing comedy for an actor finishing his graduate acting program. It will also challenge the idea of simple joke-telling versus storytelling and examine the following question: Can anyone be a standup comedian? A research of the history, an analysis of the practitioners, and training from graduate studio work will support the discovery of a practical approach to writing and performing a stand-up comedy routine.

Notes

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Graduation Date

2015

Semester

Spring

Advisor

Niess, Christopher

Degree

Master of Fine Arts (M.F.A.)

College

College of Arts and Humanities

Department

Theatre

Degree Program

Theatre; Acting

Format

application/pdf

Identifier

CFE0006046

URL

http://purl.fcla.edu/fcla/etd/CFE0006046

Language

English

Release Date

November 2015

Length of Campus-only Access

None

Access Status

Masters Thesis (Open Access)

Subjects

Arts and Humanities -- Dissertations, Academic; Dissertations, Academic -- Arts and Humanities

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