Be Funny Or Die

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit joelmorris.substack.comIt’s Edinburgh festival time, so I’m going to share some chats about the craft of comedy with a festival flavour.This is a natter with highly experienced comedy writer Madeleine Brettingham (Harry Hill, Have I Got News For You, The Kumars) about her surprise decision to start doing stand-up, never having wanted to go on stage before.(She’s just won the …

This bonus Comfort Blanket podcast was originally made for a select few of the top patrons for the crowdfunder for the Be Funny Or Die book.In the end, that meant only a very select handful of the world’s most excellent people heard it, and since it’s a film that I love so much, and since I loved putting this episode together, I thought (a reasonable enough time after the book launch) it might be nice to share it a little more widely.Given the terrible situation that all Unbound’s authors have been left in, following the shameless theft of our earnings, and all the distress surrounding that, maybe this could be seen as an attempt to lift the mood a little, by celebrating a film about an audacious theft by seemingly nice middle class people, and the terrible mess that follows. I make no comment on why that might have occurred to me.Regardless of the shitshow at Unbound, and the dire position it’s left us all in, everyone who supported the release of Be Funny Or Die did a lovely thing. You helped a book exist, one that I’m really proud of, and which lots of people have enjoyed.So here’s something back. Maybe it can remind us of three things:ONE: Making stuff for people who like it is always a good thing to do.TWO: Supporting the things you love is a generous and noble act (thank you).And most importantly:THREE: Crime doesn’t pay.Cheers!Joel xPS: This bonus episode is being put out as part of my Be Funny Or Die podcast project. If you want more bonus podcasts like this, including thoughts on comedy, analyses of funny stuff, and some fairly unguarded chats with mates in the comedy world about the state of it all, then simply become a paid Substack subscriber. Ta.To support my work, do consider becoming a paid subscriber. Otherwise, simply subscribe to be kept up to date… This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit joelmorris.substack.com/subscribe

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit joelmorris.substack.comSome thoughts about the 1984 Zucker Abrahams Zucker follow up to Airplane! starring Val Kilmer…

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit joelmorris.substack.comThis is a short audio essay that I made for Tim Worthington’s ‘Looks Unfamiliar’ podcast, now with added illustrations and bells and whistles (and guest facts). Celebrating how Scooby Doo works. The clever blend of fear, formula and fun, and what we can learn from it.

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit joelmorris.substack.comI was looking for a sketch that I remembered us doing for Agendum, because it seemed to match the mad mood of the world this week, and I found that we’d never put it out. But I had some fragments of it on the hard drive, and they really made me laugh.So this is a quick chat about how we made these fake current affairs packages for the show, and then an …

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit joelmorris.substack.comThe second part of our Be Funny Or Die podcast chat with Adam Tandy (Detectorists, Inside No 9, Thick of It) about the state of British comedy production, and why it’s so hard to make funny stuff… even though television’s biggest recent hits (Gavin & Stacey, Wallace & Gromit etc) have been exactly that, and, when surveyed, we all tend to choose comedy a…

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit joelmorris.substack.comIn the second part of my chat with top directing bloke Al Campbell, we learn why unexpected TV star Barry Shitpeas took an eventual backseat on Wipe (thanks to the actor Kevin Eldon), and how Philomena Cunk was born…

A quick podcast with some ideas about how a Christmas classic weaves its comedy magic by playing it almost straight… This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit joelmorris.substack.com/subscribe

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit joelmorris.substack.comGeoff McGivern originated the role of Ford Prefect in Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy and has been in everything from Ghosts to Blackadder, from Back to A Bit Of Fry and Laurie, and here the legendary British comedy titan shares with us a tale of how he got over his fear of acting on camera… by working with Noel Edmonds and Mr Blobby.

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit joelmorris.substack.comThe smashing Al Campbell – directing supremo behind everything from It’s Kevin to Man Down, from Inside No 9 to Cunk – talks about how the original dimbulb pundit Barry Shitpeas came about, and reveals the answer to the mystery of Barry’s trademark bandaged hands…

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit joelmorris.substack.comI’m going to record some pub-table style eavesdrops on chats with people in comedy who know stuff. Loads more of these to come…Adam Tandy is the hugely successful producer behind Inside No9, Detectorists, The Thick Of It, The Armando Iannucci Shows, Alan Partridge and countless other brilliant bits of comedy.I recorded us talking about what could be see…

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit joelmorris.substack.comIn this first edition of the Be Funny Or Die podcast, I’m looking at Monty Python’s Dead Parrot Sketch, broadcast for the first time 55 years ago in December 1969, and wondering what on earth’s going on in there.I want to look at how the sketch’s accidentally perfect balance of familiarity and absurdism made it the unexpected signature sketch of the gro…