STORY: Two Pictures

A friend reunited with his college sweetheart after 25 years.

“I finally figured out the secret to a successful long term relationship,” he proclaimed, “take a little break in between!”

Then he showed me pictures of them when they were engaged at 23, and a picture taken shortly after they rediscovered each other, after a total of six kids and two failed marriages. He asked me which picture I liked better, prefacing; the ladies say ‘you two look good’ and the guys say ‘she looks great.’ What, what do you think?

After viewing both, I emailed him, “I’m rooting for the couple in the picture taken last weekend!”

© 2008 Scripting For Success
Written for Craig Ferguson

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I'm Not A Comedian But I tell Jokes In Real Life

For years I had secretly imagined myself writing bits for mostly male comics and gravitated to Robin William, Seinfeld, Steve Martin, Jay Leno, Steven Colbert, George Carlin, Chris Rock, Dave Chappelle and Dinnis Miller. I'm almost embarassed to say my worst inner critic distinctly sounds like Jim Carrey.

My earlier comical female influences included Goldie Hawn, Woopie Goldberg, Lily Tomlin, Bette Midler and just in general my all time favorite lady, Meryl Streep. I loved the way these people boldly framed the world through their distinct perspective.

Recently, I had a wake up call to the new generation of comics who had slipped my radar since dare I say, my husband and I unplugged our TV over a year ago. Hey that's what You Tube is for, right? While writing the opening scene for my screenplay "Five Rites" (where the leading lady gives a light hearted speech to her family the day she introduces her fiancé) I began researching female comics. A whole new world of humor and style opened up for me.

Over the last three years my own comic voice has come through as I've actively taken the funny , insightful moments in my life and jotted them down in a sketch comedy format. Lately my husband has been encouraging me to "put it in the joke file"

Then it dawned on me, I am writing for my favorite comics as I went back and wrote in their voice I heard in my head. Now that's comedy. So I'm starting a movement to maintain or restore sanity. It's called write your story down and then assign a comedian who would be great at telling your story as if it were their own.