A Newsletter of Humorous Writing

For August 23-29, 2023

Hello and welcome to A Newsletter of Humorous Writing, a roundup of the week's finest short humor pieces and funny articles, and a celebration of the fantastic writers who wrote them. It's once again time for movie pitch corner! We've got a great idea for a film about Susanna Hoffs feuding with Vicki Peterson on an isolated island in Ireland. We call it The Bangles of Inisherin. Is that anything???

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What We Enjoyed This Week

Common Proverbs as Video Game Tutorials by Matthew S. Burns (McSweeney's) Matthew finds so many fun, creative ways to explore this crystal-clear, rock-solid premise. He perfectly captures the tone of video game tutorials, and keeps surprising us by bringing in a wide variety of different video game tropes and details.

How to Stay Mindful When You Never Know What’s Going On by Madison Dillard (Reductress) This piece starts from a grounded, relatable place, and heightens in some really fun and goofy ways. A character who "never know[s] what's going on" could easily become vague, but Madison keeps things nice and specific.

An Honest Ranking of the 10 State Fair of Texas Food Finalists by Courtney E. Smith (Eater) We just love reading about unusual food, and this article presents ten particularly interesting dishes, all evocatively described and fairly evaluated. Warning: it will make you hungry for deep fried pho, which you will not be able to get unless you go to the State Fair of Texas.
 

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An Old Favorite

Please Stop Inviting Me, Leonardo da Vinci, To Your Dream Dinner Parties of People Alive or Dead by Steve N. (Points in Case) We all know the classic question, "Which notable people, living or dead, would you invite to a dinner party?" But nobody ever stopped to ask how those notable people would feel about having to go to one of those parties... until now. This is a really clever premise, the kind that makes you see a familiar situation in a whole new (funny) light, and you can't believe it never occurred to you to think about it that way before.

Do you have an Old Favorite of your own? Let us know by filling out this form and we may run your pick in a future edition of the newsletter.

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Updates From Your Hosts and Friends of the Show

Luke's got just ONE spot left in his Saturday 12PM advanced short humor workshop starting on September 9th! Writing from previous workshops has gone on to be published by The New Yorker, McSweeney's, The Belladonna, and more! (The section starting at 3PM has four spots available too!)
 

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Other Humorous Writing News

And in strike news: Last week the WGA released a memo detailing its position on the studios' latest counterproposal, which The Wrap wrote up nicely. The AMPTP is getting desperate and hired a crisis PR firm to rejigger their messaging, which means now more than ever, don't believe everything you see in the press! Some really good, detailed reporting by Cole Haddon in his Substack on Appendix A to the Guild's Minimum Basic Agreement, the part of the contract that covers "all the weird shows that don't fit in this thing," which includes a lot of comedy! More unions: The (VFX) crews at Walt Disney Pictures have filed with the National Labor Relations Board to unionize! Gallup released the results of their survey on labor: 67% of Americans support labor unions, and "by 72% to 19%, Americans sympathize more with the television and film writers than with the television and film production studios." Also in reports: the Treasury Department released a study on unions and found, among other things, that "unions boost the wages of their members by between 10% and 15%, an impact that spreads to the broader economy." Common Dreams has a good summary of the study. Related to the strike, the U.S. Copyright Office is taking public comments about generative artificial intelligence (AI) -- let 'em know what you think.

If you're looking to support striking workers from WGA and SAG, as well as Unite Here 11 hotel workers, Teamsters, and IATSE members, here's a great list of mutual aid funds that could use your donations!

There's lots of info and ways to show solidarity on the WGA's Strike Hub!

(A few of you have shared links and updates from the picket line with us--thanks! If there's anything you'd like us to share, a link, or a resource, or your personal thoughts or anecdotes from the strike, please reply to this email!)
 

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See you next week!

@lukevburns & @jamesfolta

We started this newsletter with our dear friend Brian Agler, and we want it to always honor his memory and his love of all things humorous. You can find our newsletter tribute to Brian here.

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