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| Jonathan Winters (above) is an interesting guy. You can spend a lifetime in the entertainment business and never come up with an appealing character, and here's Jonathan Winters who comes up with new ones by the cartload every time he speaks. What was his secret? |
I'm not sure. Maybe it had something to do with Winters being mischievous. People like that quality. Maybe that's why mischievous people make good joke tellers. They make you aware of the absurdity of the fact that you just dropped something important to listen to something that's going to be incredibly stupid.
I don't remember many jokes, and I'm not really good at telling them. What I do remember is the way they were told. I love the way joke tellers look both ways then grab your arm and lean in furtively. I love the whole ritual that's associated with joke telling. Mischievous people are experts at creating the atmosphere that precedes a joke.
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| In animation you know you've got a good character if you start laughing before he even talks. Good characters have ignorant charisma. Funny things happen just because they're in the room. The air fills with electricity and potential just because a force of nature has arrived, and is checking out the room. For me the joke is of far less importance than the set up. John achieved this with Ren and Stimpy. In his best period Winters achieved it every time he opened his mouth. |
