0409 – Comic Timing

2022.02.13 – 0409 – Comic Timing

Comic timing

There’s great importance of the pause before a punchline. It’s the ‘gap gap’ between the stress of the set up and the relief of the reward – laughter.

The anticipation within the pause adds punch to the punchline, it creates a beat and is a social signifier of “this next bit’s the gag, when I’ve said it, you laugh!”

That silence often gives the audience just long enough to settle into a false sense of security, but short enough so they don’t figure out the joke for themselves:

“I just flew into town [pause] boy, my arms are tired.”

The pause sets up the expectation that you are talking about flying on a plane, without giving them time to think: “hmm, this is a gag, they probably don’t mean exactly that…” and then get the gag for themselves.

The use of the pause gets greater applause.

The confident comic delivers the line (with the pause), and then pauses again for the laughter. A ‘nervous novice’ races on. Dare to be quiet, allow the audience time to respond, let the laughter build, don’t step on it. Indeed, some comics milk the laughter by pausing longer. They make the laughter longer longer by a raised eyebrow, a double take to the side, which itself can cause a second wave of laughter. Those gestures can actually end up being a trademark of individual comics.

In broadcasts and podcasts of course, there is no live audience to give you that response – a situation that as we have seen before is tricky. Some radio presenters have a ‘crew’, ‘posse’ or ‘team’ who contribute to the show and can act as the audience, responding appropriately.

On stage jokes can take longer to land with the mass audience so give an extra beat for a punchline to register.

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