Jo Sunday Tells Me How to Write a Joke
Meet Jo Saturday Night Live.
Jo Sunday is a treasure. Jo’s been a friend of mine for a couple of years now, so this feature was a total blast. Jo’s the best. We shot in August, just days after finding out they’d be joining Saturday Night Live as a writer for Season 51.
I texted Jo the morning of our shoot to see if they had any ideas for our date. “I’ve been meaning to go rollerskating even though I don’t know how,” they wrote back. I brushed off my skates and we headed to Pier 2 in Brooklyn Bridge Park. Here are a few highlights from our conversation:
Where do you get your funny from?
Arguing with people, causing problems, and being a contrarian.
What do you think is funny?
I have a hypothesis about original comedy. It’s like ballet (and maybe I could be wrong, because this is from watching Dance Moms): You learn the foundations, and then you put them together to make choreography, right? Comedy is the same way; there are the building blocks. When someone falls down, when someone doesn’t know something, that’s funny stuff.
But what excites me most comedically is when I make something that’s hard to talk about feel light and fun. I like anything that’s both high and low. I like tricking the audience. I feel very aware of the relationship I have with the audience and I think that’s why I like live stuff so much.
What are some early memories of comedy?
I grew up in a Kimmy Schmidt situation, so I truly missed a whole wave of my generation’s media heroes. Whenever we had family events, all the adults would go down to the basement and watch Ghanaian standup and I would sneak on the stairs to listen.
Once I started getting hip to comedy it was Mad TV and College Humor. ‘Girl the back of your head is ridiculous’ went so viral in my middle school.
Fast forward to college, it was Ayo Edebri. It was Jacqueline Novak’s Get On Your Knees… that legit changed my life. It was John Early and Kate Berlant. Cat and Pat. Those really were, like, the mamas and the papas.
What do you look for in a friend?
I look for night owls. Smart people, in all the different ways that smart can be. Anybody who makes my brain go bzzzz. And somebody who’s funny as fuck. I like ambitious people. I like drive. I like people who are excited to create.
I feel friendship so palpably. I literally feel more alive when I make a new friend.
What were you like in high school?
High school was pretty iconic because I was such a theater kid. A lot of my comedic sensibility is related to the books I read in high school and the musicals we put on. One of my go-to voices that I dip into for my stand up is this sort of sad, witchy voice that’s really influenced by Morticia Adams.
How do you write a joke?
Often it starts as a conversation with someone else. And then I talk to myself in the shower, or while I get ready, or on long walks. And then I just kind of talk and talk and talk until I make myself laugh.
In a lot of my comedy, I’m playing this person who’s not quite me, but is this delusional, larger-than-life version of myself. I think a lot of it comes from noticing the gap between my delusion and the way that other, more reasonable people around me think. I tend to find that funny.
“Get home safe” came to me because people kept getting mad that I was walking home alone at night without getting scared. And then the first moment that I felt truly afraid walking home alone at night, I was in the park, pitch black, only had my phone light, (which was about to die) and my fear was that a wolf was gonna get me. A wolf! The funny part was realizing, oh, I’m scared of the wolf, but everyone else is scared that I’m gonna, like, get R-A-P-E-D.
How do your jokes get better?
So much of the process is just saying the joke over and over and over again. I have this joke, ‘Do you guys actually like my comedy or are you laughing as political action?’ It’s evolved so much. The joke started because I used to wear my hair in an afro, and white women would be very excited and overcomplimentary about my afro in a way where I was like, ‘Are you complimenting me? Or are you proud of yourself for, like, finding me beautiful?’
I took the afro part out of the joke because it’s hard to picture something that’s not in the room, and I wanted to make it more present to the audience in front of me.
This is why I find so much value in doing 8 to 10 sets a week. Between Sunday and Friday, something really can become different. I also love figuring out the rhythm and the music of my comedy. I’m proud that there’s a certain musicality to my comedy.
What do you want to be known for?
I want to write something paradigm shifting, like Fleabag, or Girls, or I May Destroy You. I really, really want to be known for impacting the genre. No one can make a one-woman-ish TV show without being in conversation with Fleabag. No one can make a show about four girls hanging out in the city without being in conversation with Lena Dunham. Like, that’s totally my dream.
Do you have a catchphrase at the moment?
Someone recently pointed out to me that I say the phrase, ‘it’s clear as day’ a lot. So maybe that. But if I had a catchphrase, I think it would be something like, like, ‘I battle against the darkness that consumes...’
What’s New York City’s best kept secret?
Local tailors. Oh, my God, I have such a good relationship with my tailor. His name is Bob. I just totally, totally love him. They fix you right up, and it’s less money than you think.
Where were you on January 6?
During the day, in my bed. At night, I was at the club.
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