The Irony of It All

 December 17, 2022

   I am still reading, no, make that studying, Robert McKee's masterful book "Story" trying to find the key to unlocking the mechanics of story, so I can better tell my own stories. Of course, today, the mechanics of storytelling are a Google search away. Still. . .

"The computer can't tell you the emotional story. It can give you the exact mathematical design, but what's missing is the eyebrows."

—Frank Zappa

Daily Whip Out:

"The Eyebrows of Jesse James"

Irony In Storytelling

   A Moor finally gets what he always wanted, a wife who is true to him and who never betrayed him with another man, but when he finds out, it's too late, because he just killed her. That, my friends, is the plot of Othello.

   An out-of-work actor, who has alienated every producer in New York, impersonates a woman and gets cast in a soap opera where he falls in love with his co-star, but he's such a brilliant actor, her father wants to marry him and his co-star thinks he's a lesbian. That, my friends, is the plot of Tootsie.

   Four funny friends miss out on major financial sucsess but laugh about it until the cows come home. That, my friends, is the plot to The Zane Brothers.

The Zane Brothers, Minus One 

   Dan The Man Harshberger, the editor of National Lampoon Tony Hendra, and, ironies of irony, me.

"I love irony, I just wish I knew how to use it."

—Othello