: Re: How do I end a comedy sketch? I have a premise, which I think is funny/clever. I want to write this as a comedy sketch, to be acted out or shot on video. I have three "scenes" which are

@Carla500

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Generally speaking, humor comes from the unexpected. You anticipate that A will happen, but B happens instead.

Someone says "I want to give up cigarettes and switch to vaping." You expect that the person will put down the cigarette and pick up an e-cigarette, or hookah, or whatever it is. You don't expect that the person has to change an entire lifestyle. That's the twist, the unexpected.

So if that's not the punchline, and the sketch continues, what's the twist from your twist?

A Bit of Fry & Laurie sketches frequently end with the single joke (the twist) just going as far as it can go: the man whose address ends in a slap (finishes with Fry walloping Laurie with a bat; he actually hit poor Hugh too hard), the cricket commentators rhapsodizing about England to the point of verbal orgasm and then post-coital lassitude, the understanding barman whose food offerings sound like bawdy interruptions of a drunken customer's sentences. The twist on the twist is just that the two of them have gone to that level (the bat, the orgasm).

In a different sketch (the name escapes me and I can't find a clip), Fry is a British soldier who's been captured by Laurie's Nazi interrogator, but instead of bravely resisting questioning, Fry falls in love with him at first sight (the twist), and spends the whole sketch rhapsodizing about his eyes and his arse. Laurie is bewildered, expecting to have to force the information out of the soldier, who only wants to talk about how he adores the kommandant. Fry finally gives up the date and location of the Allied invasion in exchange for a kiss... which Laurie then agrees to (the twist on the twist).

In "Mr. Burmie at the Vet," Fry plays a man who's brought a daschund ("doxie") to the vet alongside Laurie's cat owner. Fry speaks in the most ridiculous baby talk for the whole bit, getting more silly and exaggerated (the twist), until the vet calls the dog, who then "responds" by saying "I'd like to have this man put down, please." (the twist on the twist)

In your particular case, your joke can escalate (you have to change your habit, and then your clothes, and then your hobby, and then your name! and then your ADDRESS!!), and then the punchline could be that the bloke takes a moment to consider it and then says "Nah, I'd rather die of lung cancer" and goes back to cigarettes. Or someone else could come along and say "Never mind vaping, you should try weed!" and start parading a third set of clothes/hobby/address etc. and then a fourth person comes along, and so on until the original person starts shopping for the hobby he prefers so he can take up that appropriate vice.

Take your original reversal and do something else unexpected with it. That gives you your ending.

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