The Office’s writer/producer/director Jen Celotta will be speaking during the Vancouver International Film Festival’s Film and Television Forum on September 30th.
Jen will be speaking along with My Name Is Earl’s Greg Garcia in a session called
“LOL – Comedy Rules”:
Writing for comedy is a very specific skill … and not an easy one. What seems like a straightforward task, i.e. making people laugh, is actually an intricate and idiosyncratic mix of tension, conflict, recall, reference, timing, exaggeration, believability, sympathy, empathy, juxtaposition, satire and parody mixed with context, personality and persuasion. Easy, eh? A comedic writer needs practice and patience to go from the printed page to laugh-out-loud funny. Hear from Emmy Award-winning TV writers about some rules for scripting comedy and developing funny characters.
Link: Film and Television Forum Schedule
P.S. Jen wrote and directed this week’s episode, ‘The Promotion’!