Righteous Insanity

Another school, another town, another community asking why

My heart went out to the students and families of Chardon High School. I heard about it from a text from an acquaintance who is from that area originally. It seems like so long since we had one of these incidents. We'd almost forgotten about Paducah, Columbine, and so many more. And yet here it comes around again. The boy looks like all the others we saw before - quiet, reserved, with warning signs no one really heeded. 

I wrote "The Waiting Room" in the wake of Columbine, and toured it with Youth for Christ Louisville. I wish that it was no longer relevant. It's the story of seven kids and the boy who shot them in the school halls coming face to face. It's message has nothing to do with video games or goth music or guns. It's love. If kids could learn to love each other, especially the "forgotten," maybe we could prevent the next tragedy - murder, suicide, whatever form it might try to take. 

It's been revised (about a year ago) to update the language and dialogue a bit. Feel free to update some more as you so choose - if you choose to use it. 

This script is free, and always will be, so long as it's needed. 

Download The Waiting Room by clicking here. 

Want to be a sketch writer? Here's what you need to watch

If you want to be a comedy sketch writer, here are the people you need to watch:

  

Nichols and May - Best sketch comedy duo ever. Period. The two were known for building hilarious sketches with the audience giving them only the first and last lines of the scene. They released three albums of their work, and a number of sketches are popping up on Youtube lately. They are the gold standard.

 

Monty Python - After SNL, probably the most famous sketch show ever featuring an incredibly talented ensemble. Versatile, clever, unpredictable, the Pythons pushed the bounds fo sketch comedy further than it had ever been pushed before. If you want an extra treat, look up At Last the 1948 Show, a sketch show with John Cleese, Graham Chapman, and Marty Feldman that preceded Monty Python.

 

Saturday Night Live - The current cast seems to have hit a groove and realyl connected with an audience. That said, you need to check out the original cast (75-79) and the second golden age cast (87-93) that include Dana Carvey, Mike Myers, Phil Hartman, Adam Sandler, and Chris Farley. I'd also recommend looking up the 84-85 season when Martin Short, Christopher Guest, and Billy Crystal came in for a year. Lorne doesn't play a lot of that stuff because he wasn't the boss then, but they made some of the funniest sketches ever including my all time favorite, the male synchronized swimmers.

 

The Kentucky Fried Movie - The first feature film from the guys who went on to make Airplane and the Naked Gun movies was a sketch compilation featuring some hilariously over the top stuff. The 80's film Amazon Women on the Moon is sort of a follow up to this one. It's not as funny but still has some memorable bits, including the funeral roast and David Alan Grier as a man born without Soul. Both films are rated R for a reason. Not for the easily offended.

 

Piper's Pit - Rowdy Roddy Piper set the standard for every other wrestler hosted chat/sketch show that followed. No one is his equal. Roddy's stuff was usually unscripted. He knew how to provoke a guest and an audience. Very effective at working a crowd. The Rock was probably the one other man who could move a crowd in the same way. He never had a "show" like Piper, and most of his bits were solo, but many of his promos are legendary and worth a look.

 

In Living Color - This show was really the anti-SNL. It featured an African American cast with two token white cast members - one of which happened to be Jim Carrey. It was also taped, and unlike SNL, upstaging and improvisation were encouraged. Damon Wayans, David Alan Grier, and Jim Carrey became overnight stars when the show premiered, but In Living Color really peaked in season three with the arrival of Jamie Foxx and the show's funnest character, Ugly Girl. Word up!

 

The State - The show that influenced me the most in my early years of writing. Shades of the Pythons and SNL can be seen in their work, which is loud, over the top, self-deprecating, and shameless. Cast members went on to produce Reno 911, Viva Variety, and Wet Hot American Summer, and Thomas Lennon and Ben Garrant are two of the hottest screenwriters going today.

 

Mr. Show - The crudest of the shows listed here by far, Bob Odenkirk and David Cross put together a show that took sketch writing to a new level as an art form. Other cast members included Sarah Silverman, and Brian Posehn, and the voice of Spongebob, Tom Kenney. Their sketches flow together much like the Python sketches did, and repeated viewings give you a much broader picture of what each episode is really about. These guys also took profanity to new levels, so again, not for the easily offended.

Why Writer/Directors Should Listen to Their Actors

This is one of the most famous scenes in movie history. It has been copied, mocked, duplicated, and quoted since the movie was first released more than 25 years ago. It's one of the most iconic scenes in the movie.

It was also not in the script. Not one word.

Ben Stein was lecturing the extras who were in the classroom during their down time. Writer/director John Hughes heard him and decided to film him giving his lecture. Hughes told him just to teach something he knew well, so Ben Stein gave his famous lecture on the Laffer Curve completely unscripted.

This is a lesson to all of you writers and writer/directors who are too proud, too stubborn, too stuck up to let anyone (anyone? anyone?) give you input on your script. Be open to the ideas of others, especially the creative talent you have on set interpreting your work. They may end up making you look more brilliant and funny than you actually are.

If your name is Woody Allen, you may ignore this. You have more than earned that right.

30 Seconds or Less skit book - Now with 40% more funny!

In 2008 Righteous Insanity released the ebook "30 Seconds or Less," a collection of sketches that lasted 30 seconds or less. These blackout skits are ideal fillers for youth events, video packages, and just about any other place you might need a quick laugh or a few seconds of funny. 

Now that book just got even better! Introducing the newly expanded "30 Seconds or Less" with 40% more funny. That translates to 12 brand new skits added to the 30 from the first book. 

of course the best part about this deal is that the book is still 100% free. Just go to the Righteous Insanity Free Stuff page and download your copy now. You will laugh. You will come away saying, "We have to do this one." 

Helping Your Actors to Break Out

Katie was not a shy girl. She was bright and friendly and never met a stranger. But put her on stage and she shrunk. She was soft-spoken, reserved, hesitant. She knew her lines and knew her cues. She just didn't have the guts to really let go.

 

Then one day it happened. In the middle of a free-form improv, Katie ran up on stage, knocked on the imaginary dorm room door and shouted, "Angela, your pregnancy test is here!"

 

That was all it took.

 

In that moment, Katie let go and opened herself up. She never held back vocally or emotionally on stage again. Not that she didn't need coaching and direction, but she was no longer a shrinking violet on stage.

 

I've seen dozens of moments like this over the years, and as a drama teacher, there's nothing sweeter. Seeing a kid click, seeing them have their moment when they let go and discover they can do it is unlike anything else.

 

Many of these moments came in acting workshops I taught in churches and at youth conferences. "Acting Out Your Faith," as if came to be known, is an actor's training program that takes the approach that acting is a game. It's a fun and proven method for bringing out the best in kids, teens, and even adults.

 

And it's free.

 

No, I'm not traveling and teaching any more, but you can download the entire workshop in an easy to follow ebook totally free from Righteous Insanity's website.

 

Download it. Read it. If you have questions, email me and ask. Then give it a try for yourself. See if it doesn't make a difference in your drama ministry - and your actors!

Acting Out Your Faith - New resource for drama teams!

For several years, I had the privilege of traveling the country not only performing but teaching drama to others who were using it in ministry. During that time, I write and refined an acting workshop called Acting Out Your Faith, a step by step training course that gave actors the tools to build up their acting skills through improvisation. It's been more than six years since I last went out and taught the class (though I used elements of it in my recent position at Christian Academy of Indiana). Now anyone can bring this acting workshop to their troupe with the new ebook, Acting Out Your Faith.

The ebook contains the entire workshop, a program that begins with playing simple group games and progresses through beginner and intermediate improv games. As the games grow more complex, actors are introduced to more challenging concepts that will help them become more than just people reciting lines on stage. Latter exercises focus on understanding and learning to re-create emotions and natural reactions on stage in order to reproduce those things in scripted dramas.

Acting Out Your Faith can be taught as a full day of teaching, broken into several one hour sessions, or condensed into a shorter program. It includes acting games that can be brought back and used again and again as your drama team grows and develops as well as games that can be used in performance improv.

Oh by the way, it's also a lot of fun. The emphasis is on de-mystifying the craft of acting and helping new and inexperienced actors gain confidence that yes they CAN do this. There are also several spiritual applications you can stop and share along the way.

Acting Out Your Faith is a solid training regimen for any age acting group. I've had students as young as five and as old as, "I won't tell you my age, but let's just say I remember when Elvis was young," and everyone's taken away something new that helped them grow as an actor.

I almost forgot the best part - it's free.

Download Acting Out Your Faith free on Righteous Insanity's Free Resource page. While you're there, check out the other great freebies, including script books and the classic resource book Drama Ministry for the Dramatically Challenged.

 

A Christmas Gift for Beulah

Great play if you're looking for one, available at http://shop.righteousinsanity.com in the Holiday scripts section (under Christmas plays, of course). I'd love to do this one again myself. Very happy with the puppet version too. 

Christmas Skit Now Available!

For a limited time, we've added 34 of our most popular holiday skits to the Righteous Insanity store available individually as instant downloads. Whether you're shopping for kids, grown ups, teens, singles, or any other audience, we've got something you'll love. 

Visit the Christmas skit store and get all the skits you need for $5 each. Or get them all for only $30. 

Use the coupon code "cybermonday" now through Friday, and take 40% off your order. 

Mondays are Free Skit days!

Starting this coming Monday, every Monday I will be posting a free skit - ideally, a new one - on the blog. 

I've had some great writing opportunities come up - paid stuff, thank you, Lord! - that has been a huge blessing, but it's taken some of the time away that used to be focused on skits. In order to keep that going, and keep the edge, I've made it my goal to publish a new skit every week on Mondays. 

That's not to say there won't be and extra 1 or 2 during the week. Just to say that once a week, on Monday, there will be a freebie posted right here. 

If anyone has any special requests, topics you've never seen but think should be covered, email me. I can't promise I'll cover every request (although if you take advantage of my writing service, I'll write whatever you want, but if I see something I like, you might just see a script come from it. 

Beavis and Butt-Head are back!

Youth ministry folks - Beavis and Butt-Head are back. Why not indulge your inner Cornholio and pick up the classic skit book from Righteous Insanity, "Be-Nice and BIble-Head." The book was originally available exclusively through Youth Ministry Stuff, Ltd. and features a number of Mike Judge inspired skits. Now you can download it straight to your computer for free. 

Get Be-Nice and Bible-Head and a few other fun skit books on Righteous Insanity's Free Stuff Page.