British Comedy Guide

Coffee Shop scene - funny

Robert and Kyle go out for a coffee. They are in the line, discussing what to get.

Robert
We just having a break from letter writing! (to the camera) What you getting? (to Kyle)

Kyle
That mint frappucino looks good

Robert
What’s that?

Kyle
It is like cold coffee

Robert
Well that’s pointless

Kyle
What are you getting?

Robert
A muffin (excited)

Kyle
Just a muffin?

Robert
There’s no drinks I like in here

Kyle
(looks in disbelief) You were the one that asked to go to the coffee shop!!

Robert
Yeah I wanted a muffin

Kyle
(Can’t believe it) well… (stops and decides not to finish his sentence)

They both order, Robert orders a coffee too but Robert doesn’t hear or see. As Robert is about to pay for his muffin he takes a large bite out of it and the woman at the till asks if he wants a bag for his muffin, Robert looks innocently at her with a mouthful of muffin and nods his head to suggest no.

They both sit down at their table
Kyle
I thought you weren’t getting a drink?

Robert
Changed my mind. So we got the concert all organised?

Kyle
We do indeed

A Cleaner then walks past their table and is called back by her teenage daughter. The two women chat beside them. Camera shows Kyle and Robert with the two women in the background. Their conversation is heard clearly. Robert and Kyle turn their heads away during the conversation desperately holding in their laughter.

Daughter
What time you finishing?

Cleaner
About 5 or so

Daughter
Right, well Dave is coming round later to watch a film with me

Cleaner
Auck (annoyed)

Daughter
Well mum, he was out at the Lighthouse Inn last night and you know Vicky, his ex. She tried it on with him, and he was like no I am with Stacey-Ann now and she was like so what, then he was like I have only cheated once before, I am not a cheater. So then apparently she tried to get him drunk and he didn’t even realise. So he was like, are you trying to get me plastered? And she had the nerve to say Yes I am!! But Dave said by that stage it was too late, he was too drunk to say no so he kept on drinking, then at the end of the night she came up, right and she said this, she went… Dave you know what you are the best lover I have ever had and all this, trying to flatter him. And it worked for the bitch!! So she took advantage of him, he is raging this morning now. Woke up in her bloody bed. He is devastated, so I going to make it up to him, if you know what I mean

Cleaner
Aw that’s alright love, I going out on a date anyway, you know your uncle Clive?

Daughter
Aw mum, he is cute

Cleaner
No no, his friend. So did Dave do Vicky?

Daughter
Yeah, but he said he didn’t want to, it was practically rape so I believe my Dave

Cleaner
Yeah you should, he is a great guy. Brilliant catch, and he loves you very much I heard.

Robert and Kyle on the verge of bursting in to hysterics

Daughter
Right I am a way for a pee

Robert and Kyle explode in to laughter.

Cuts

Camera shows the guys talking but the conversation is not heard and the camera seems zoomed out. Then the volume is restored and camera zooms back in closely to conversation

Kyle
Aww man you have a hair in your muffin

Robert
(pissed off) Aw no!! Where?

Kyle
There (points to the inexistent hair)

Robert
(squints and looks very closely) I can’t see it. Your lying.

Kyle
(being serious) I am not, am looking directly at it!

Robert
(once again studies the muffin for a hair) There is no hair, your winding me up

Kyle
Well fair enough you eat it but I know that you are a picky eater, I thought it would bother you that there is a hair on your muffin

Robert
Hmmm. (the conversation freezes and Robert eventually reaches out towards the muffin and tries to grab the hair that obviously isn’t there)

Kyle bursts out laughing and then Robert also starts to laugh

Robert
I knew it… it wasn’t THAT funny!

You paint a clear picture with your dialogue which is usually good but as has been mentioned before by other posters, your stuff seems to be more observational humour and might fit better in a sitcom series rather than a sketch show and I think you touched on that yourself.

I suppose because sketches are my main thing of interest, I'm always looking for a good set up (which your style of writing always has) but I want to arrive at a final punch line at the end that clearly signifies that the scene has concluded.

There's nothing wrong with writing in the way you do but you have to be careful that you don't leave people thinking how did it end? It's a bit like saying to a friend that you overheard a conversation on the bus/train/next door toilet cubicle between two women and one was saying that she was coking a meal for her new man but everything went wrong, like she burnt some things, knock wine over the carrots, etc. etc. and although it was funny and you tell your friend what you heard, when they want to know the outcome, you say "Well I don't really know, I came to my stop/finished doing my business and had to leave"

Occasionally you can do a joke where you don't actually deliver the punch line but people can finish it off themselves by your set up, such as saying something like "Why is the word dictionary in the dictionary?" or my signature line about "Why do fat people wear tracksuits?" and this leaves people to think, yeah that makes sense because if you didn't know what a dictionary was, then what's the point of having it's meaning in there as you wouldn’t know to use a dictionary to look it up.

By the same logic, tracksuits are a fitness/health/sporty related thing and you wouldn't wear a wetsuit, goggles and flippers unless you were going diving, and as most fat people aren’t really the sporty types, why where a tracksuit?. It’s like seeing a Mr Muscle look-alike wearing a gym vest with a muscular bloke’s picture on the front.

Also as I mentioned in another thread, I personally find it easier to already have an ending so that I can almost work backwards and then manipulate a set up that takes me to the ending. That’s not to say my way is right, it’s just that once I have the ending then I already know where I am going but if I just started with a couple of characters and tried writing funny dialogue for them, I’d probably end up rambling and then trying to end it once I felt it looked long enough.

Try this, attempt to write a sketch or scene where the punch line is “No wonder you couldn’t spell it, you can’t even say it” It’s from an old joke about a boy and his dad and I’ll tell you it later but see what you can come up with yourself and anyone else is welcome to try themselves too or are welcome to post a thread with an ending so that others can try to create something, just for a bit of fun

Yeah this is actually in a sitcom i am writing. Have you checked out my other stuff? i dont really tend to do a lot of sketches anymore i did for a while and then realised sitcoms were more my thing but i wil have a go at the spelling sketch.

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