Jokes and the Jokers That Write Them

Mar 11, 2014

An old blog post I originally posted in 2006:  Every day it seems I get a joke, or worse yet, pages of them in my email. Most I’ve heard (read) before, some of them in grade school. Some I’m not familiar with. Some amuse me; most don’t. But every once in a while one actually gets me laughing.

Certainly you’re familiar with what I’m talking about. But you’ve probably never asked yourself; Where do these jokes come from? I’ll tell you. Usually from stand up comedians. Sometimes from comedy writers who write but for whatever reason don’t do stand-up. Hardly ever from comics who describe themselves as “high energy.” Although someone who jumps around and makes faces can be entertaining (ask any parent of a 3-year-old), these folks usually aren’t proficient and are never prolific joke writers. Need an example?

Quick! Rattle off a Jerry Lewis line. Okay, but “Hey, Lady!” really isn’t a joke.

So how do the jokes get from the comedian to your computer screen? From what I can gather, someone either hears a line on TV or live at a comedy club and starts sending it around. And since jokes aren’t copyrightable they instantly become public domain. And usually, unless the teller is famous like Jay Leno or Goerge Carlin, the author and/or original teller of the joke is never known nor credited. That’s what happened with the couple of jokes I wrote.

So what I’m going to do here is give comedians and joke writers a chance to post on the comments jokes they wrote and an opportunity to get credit for their “intellectual property.” I’ll start first. (Hey, it’s my blog!) Here’s a joke I wrote and performed on An Evening at the Improv way back during the comedy boom. It’s a joke that I not only have received several times via email, but have also seen printed on apparel. Here goes:

“For my 21st birthday my frends chipped in and bought me a sweater. I would have preferred a screamer or a moaner."–James R. Zingelman

Okay, comedy guys and gals, it’s your turn. (All jokes claimed as original will be subject to verification by a third party.)



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James Zingelman

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James R. Zingelman is the "real" name of Hypnotic Comic Rusty Z.


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