The Motivation Show
How to Write a Funny Speech with Emmy Winners Carol Leifer/Rick Mitchell
Published: 31 March 2025 at 22:25 Europe/London
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Episode notes
Emmy Award winning comedy writers and performers Carol Leifer (writer for Saturday Night Live, Hacks, Curb Your Enthusiasm, Modern Family, The Larry Sanders Show, Seinfeld, and...10 Academy Awards shows!) and Rick Mitchell (writer and producer for Ellen Degeneres and TMZ) are the co-authors of How to Write a Funny Speech...for a Bar Mitzvah, Graduation & Every Other Event You Didn't Want to Go to in the First Place.
The foreword is written by Carol Burnett...so just imagine how funny this book is.
They teach you how to write and give a flawlessly funny speech for any occasion so you can look awesome, make some people laugh, and get it over with. They have the best tips and tricks up their sleeves like advice for making tasteful jokes that charm your audience and flatter the socks off your honoree.
We discuss:
-How did the two of them get to know each other and collaborate
-How hard is it to break in as a comedy writer?
-How did the idea for this book originate and how
did they arrive at the long and unique book title?
-How many iterations of a comedy sketch do you typically
go through before they feel they have reached the holy grail for that skit.
-Carols favorite comedy skits she is most proud of?
-Do they have any stage fright or jitters and how
do they handle it and advise the rest of to?
-Did they ever struggle in the business?
-How long should a speech be and what are some of the signs that someone’s special occasion speech is just too darn long?
-What you should never do in your special occasion speech
-The #1 mistake people make right out of the gate at a special event speech and
how should a great speech start
-A writing trick you can do when you first start writing a speech but
are not really in a gung ho mood to write
-What should the meat of the speech consist of? (stories)
-What are some of the reasons you should feel good after the speech?
