Comments on: Writing loglines for a comedy

By: Doug Whaley

Doug Whaley — Mon, 14 May 2007 06:34:10 +0000

You write a comedic logline like you write a joke. You end the sentence with a punchline or something comedic (i.e.; tyrannical midget lord).

By: neville nickels

neville nickels — Fri, 01 Jul 2005 22:24:02 +0000

Comedy is about perspective. How I see life and its meaning drives my comic perspective. I see log lines from thrillers and see their comic possibilities. Howard Hawks the great American film maker once said, ‘whever I see a story I work out how to make it funny’. A number of writers have said that thillers are just comedies without the laughs. So to write a log line for a comedy is even more important than for anything else.

By: John

John — Mon, 27 Jun 2005 17:55:50 +0000

F Link:

I think the goal of these loglines is not to make you laugh out loud, but to say, "Yeah, I see how that could be funny."

Real humor doesn't come in a sentence, or three sentences, unless it's a play on words. A good limmerick does not a movie make.

By: F. Link Rapier

F. Link Rapier — Sun, 26 Jun 2005 16:39:02 +0000

Thanks for all the effort you put into your site for fellow writers. I see that you have a caveat up front about the quality of the above loglines — and this isn’t going to be one of those attack-the-successful-guy-out-of-jealousy things that make my blood boil — but I find it ironic how often this kind of advice falls flat: In the examples of loglines you’ve offered, you’ve violated your own counsel two out of three times on word count, keeping them to a single sentence and by the evidence (in my opinion) that none of the three are funny or even humorous. Do you have any loglines for your own pitches which worked that you’d care to share, whether they followed your own advice or not?

By: zay

zay — Tue, 21 Jun 2005 02:36:20 +0000

Hey,

I just saw Go again for the first time since I saw it in the theater.

I'd forgotten how good it is. Great job.

Zay

By: Jeff

Jeff — Mon, 20 Jun 2005 14:32:11 +0000

Thanks for the advice!

By: electroglodyte

electroglodyte — Sun, 19 Jun 2005 22:03:38 +0000

It went something like: â€œA _____ must _____ in order to ______.â€? That pretty much summarizes any good logline, I think!

May I suggest the slightly more verbose (but I think more effective, especially for a comedy):

â€œA _____ must _____ in order to ______, but then ______.â€?

(Incorporating a bit of Shane Black's pitching advice...)

By: Fun Joel

Fun Joel — Fri, 17 Jun 2005 21:04:47 +0000

Though I wouldn't say I'm any kind of master when it comes to writing loglines, I've had to develop the skill somewhat over the years I've been reading scripts. So a few comments.

Jeff -- you may be having a little trouble with this if the script you wrote is full of funny gags and lines, but is not built on an inherently funny concept. This is certainly possible to do (I think many Woody Allen movies would fall into this category, for example), but is definitely a harder pitch. Though I never do it, you might try keeping the logline straight with the simple added words "an [adjective] comedy" somewere in the logline, as an identifier. I don't do it because I'm not pitching the script I write loglines for, and there is another spot where I specifically identify genre. So there's no reason for me to. But it might work well for your purposes.

Also, in general on loglines: I always try to keep my loglines to one sentence, 20 words or under (though I think 25 is certainly acceptable). When you have to do this, you'd be amazed at how much is extraneous. By now it is a rare film that I can't summarize in 20 words.

Start with the main character and basically just summarize his or her central plight. I forget which blog I saw this on recently (Thinking Writer? Complications Ensue? Somewhere else?), so my apologies to the writer, but I saw a nice little formula. It went something like: "A _____ must _____ in order to ______." That pretty much summarizes any good logline, I think!

By: Don Merritt

Don Merritt — Fri, 17 Jun 2005 20:35:06 +0000

Not sure where in the world DirectTV gets its taglines from, but the best I ever read was on the dish for Hal Hartleys "TRUST" - atleast part of it read:

An unemployed television repairmen carries around a hand-grenade, just in case.

By: RDane

RDane — Fri, 17 Jun 2005 18:59:06 +0000

You knew this was coming, John!

A resourceful chick desperate for Christmas cash double crosses a notorious drug dealer in this intertwined tale of tantric sex, feuding soap opera hunk lovers, and pyramid scheme-loving undercover cops.