Six-Week Comedy Writing for Actors Course with Mark O'Toole

Being Funny for Money with Mark O’Toole. This Comedy Writing For Actors short course will comprise six one-hour livestream Zoom sessions from Monday April 17 to Monday May 22, 2023, from 12-1pm Australian Eastern Standard Time, and 2-3pm NZ time. The course will cover all aspects of comedy writing for actors, beginning with exploring what your sense of humour actually is and how it works, before moving on to cover different types of comedy,  comedy tools and how to use them, how to find comedy in the world around us, tips and tricks for writing comedy, and finally, how to get the funny out of your head, onto the page, and then onto the screen. The sessions will be informative, fun and dynamic, and will involve instructional and interactive elements. Elements of theory will be interlaced with practical and illustrative examples and members will be encouraged to participate… and while the sessions will be structured, there will be room for them to be reactive to the needs of the attendees. While the main focus will be on writing for the screen, many of the ideas and tools discussed will be applicable to the stage and written work. Please note: Open to all levels of writing experience. No prior reading or notes are needed. While it will be more beneficial if members attend all sessions as they will feed into each other, it is not essential as each Zoom will begin with a bit of a recap and sessions will be designed to work independent of each other.