Funny: The Pilot

Introduction:

Two people, trying to think of something funny. That's it. This is us, this is our idea of comedy (sort of) No plot, just jokes. It's not even properly finished, let us know what you think.

Written By Justin Shough.

Justin: Come on that’s funny right?

Alex: What? Us re-imagining James Bond but with a Chinese guy as 007? How exactly is that funny?

Justin: Come on! James Chong...It writes itself

Alex: You realise we would get hunted down by Chinese secret service agents who think we are being racist? Besides how many Chinese people do you know called James?

Justin (thinks: Maybe he’s right...Jackie Chan might break my legs...I need my precious legs)

Justin: What do you know about the chinese secret service? Anyway I’m sure they would be flattered

Alex: Well, let’s put that bright idea in the "I’m going to kill you if you don’t think of anything actually funny" pile

Justin: It’s a good pile, homeless people could live within its warm folds

Alex: Yes, while in the mean time we can’t come up with a decent idea for a comedy program and our lives are in the gutter, well your life is...mine is relatively gutter-free

Justin: That’s highly debateable; anyway my idea was far better than yours

Alex: The Dog That Knew Too Much© is comedy gold

Justin: Admit it, it’s just Lassie with bells and whistles

Alex: It’s nothing of the sort, it’s got British Comedy Awards written all over it.

Justin: Yeah mainly because you took a marker pen and wrote that all over it

Alex: I'm not listening. Anyway, the set up for the show, a dog... that witnesses a grizzly murder in downtown Manhattan

Justin: I thought it was set in London?

Alex: Yeah but that’s the genius, if we set it in Manhattan we get to travel presumably first class all expenses paid courtesy of our pals at the BBC or Channel4 if they pick us up instead and why wouldn’t they? Anyway the dog is the only one that can solve the murder, and call it divine intervention or whatever but a rookie NY cop befriends him and together they solve this crime, and that’s just the beginning, I’m thinking big, *comedic pause* syndication big

Justin: So, it’s some kind of Turner and Hooch, Lassie, The Horse Whisperer hybrid?

Alex: You obviously read the promo poster I designed on my laptop!

Justin (looks at laptop screen, reads out poster): The Dog That Knew Too Much, funnier than Turner and Hooch, more emotional than Lassie, starring Alex Gilmour as a rookie NY cop with a moustache more hilariously epic than Tom Selleck

Justin: Okay, here are the flaws and get your notepad rookie because there are several, nobody is ever going to read a poster with a tag line that long, and why do you get to be the lead? And where’s my mention? Turner and Hooch wasn’t even funny, and you can’t even grow a moustache

Alex: They could computer generate it, like with Tom Hanks in the Road To Perdition, double click on somesortofamoustache© on the desktop of my laptop

Justin: It makes you look like Osama Bin Gilmour, a new age terrorist

Alex: Anyway, shouldn’t you be going to work or something?

Justin: No, you know we both booked today off worked so we can brain storm ideas for our show

Alex: It’s just I thought I could have some alone time

Justin: Why? Your not going to cut me out of your life forever and write your own comedy show are you?

Alex (laughs manically): Actually I thought I might go on a magical mystery tour, maybe have a hard days night maybe take a trip down Abbey Road, maybe put a gun on you…some sort of a revolver...do you see where I’m going with this?

Justin (looks blankly): You’re what now?

Alex: You might say I’m going to listen to Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band

Justin: Are they a new band? Like the awesome The Bravery? It was an honest mistake!

Alex: No, the Beatles...I’m talking about the band that defined a generation, the band that if McCartney and Starr were dead would be playing a gig to God in heaven right now, I can’t believe you compared the Beatles to The Bravery, who does that lead singer think he is? Some kind of less offensive version of Marilyn Manson or something!

Justin: You can’t disregard the cultural relevance of The Bravery, they grabbed the 1980’s by the bollocks and brought them back into the 006, the 006 man!

Alex: What about if we make some kind of musical comedy, a mus-com if you will

Justin: No it’s already been done by The Mighty Boosh, that show is like fire, you can’t touch it, unless your prepared to get burned, after all the boosh is loose and it’s coming at you like a lion with wings

Alex: I have no idea what you just said, but fine. Back to the drawing board, not that we actually have a drawing board

Justin: What about if we made a comedy about us trying to make a comedy

Alex (looks directly at camera): Do you really, believe for a second that anybody would actually buy into that idea?

Justin: What about a comedy about the life and times of Cilla Black

Alex: Well it would be a lora lora laughs ha, ha!

Justin: A throw away joke, but a good one!

Alex: What about a sci-fi comedy, that’s original

Justin: Starship Beaverprise it is then

Alex: No

Justin: Deep Space Beaver?

Alex: It doesn’t always have to have something about beavers in it

Justin: Without the beavers it’s just Red Dwarf but a comedy

Alex: Wasn’t Red Dwarf a comedy?

Justin (laughs manically): I didn’t hear anyone laughing

Alex: That’s some nice laughter

Justin: Thanks, I think that when we get our comedy show we should have canned maniacs laughing all the way, but seriously Doug Naylor and Rob Grant, creators and writers of Red Dwarf are like my all time sci-fci comedy heroes

Alex: Its okay you don’t have to feel guilty, it’s not like there are two less funny people sitting somewhere bad mouthing us

*cut to Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant*

Gervais: It’s just two people talking, where’s the character driven plots?

Merchant: Yeah and why aren’t they doing any funny little dances?

Gervais: Why did you have to bring up the dance?

Merchant: Come on you looked like a gorilla at feeding time

*cuts back to Alex and Justin*

Alex: Ha, ha!

Justin: Something amusing is it?

Alex: Well...

Justin: Oh, is it too high brow for me, wouldn’t I get it

Alex: Oh, with that again

Justin: You called me a hobo twice yesterday

Alex: I merely said you reminded me of a hobo because you hadn’t shaved in a few days, don't be offended...you carry the hobo-look so well! Your the next generation of hobo, that is more widely accepted than all previous generations!

Justin: I’ve been burnt before, by you and your high standards. Nothing is ever good enough

Alex: Come on, plenty of things have been good enough

Justin (pulls list of things that haven’t been good enough for Alex out of his back pocket): Okay, movies: the lord of the rings trilogy wasn’t long enough, the matrix sequels didn’t make sense, Spiderman...Kirsten Dunst’s wig wasn’t sexy enough, Munich was boring, boring! It was real life events!

Alex: We both thought that about the matrix sequels!

Justin: Music, Travis’s 12 Memories wasn’t as good as The Man Who, X&Y was a bland and uninspired follow up to a rush of blood to head which in itself was an ill conceived cash in on Coldplay’s debut Parachutes, John Lennon should still be alive…Okay I will give you that one

Alex: Where the hell did you get that list from?

Justin: From the man at the Choices video outlet in town, that’s right...be careful who you talk to in this crazy messed up world of killing maniacs

Alex: I see

Justin: Comedy ideas...this what really concerns me, none of my ideas have ever been up to scratch, beavers in space "wouldn’t work", a comedy about someone trying to convince everyone around him that he is a famous actor in Hollywood you said was the kind of crap they put on NBC on Monday nights, and what about Home Alone: The Legendary Adventures starring non other than child actor McCauley Culkin himself!

Alex: He’s not still a child you fool, and those ideas rank among your worst. Now have you quite finished?

Justin: Yeah, sorry I’m not entirely sure where I was going with that

Alex: Shall we ring the BBC again see if we can get an interview
Justin: You know what happened last time, they screwed us around on the phone for hours and we must have spoken to about a dozen robot voice menu messages before I finally hung up

Alex: We spoke to Jeremy Clarkson though, I think they put us through to him by mistake, he said some of our ideas were outrageous

Justin: No, he’s a robot too…haven’t you ever seen Top Gear? He’s a mechanical monster

Alex: So I’ll press re-dial yeah? You get back to writing from China with love or whatever your calling your Eastern Bond epic

Justin: I was going to call it never say 決して again actually but whatever

Alex: You see, comedy has to have boundaries you can’t just shove a flute in your ass and play a tune on it and think people are going to think it’s funny, it depends what the tune is obviously, comedy, like music has to have limits…a place where you mustn’t go

Justin: I think you’re wrong, we need to be embracing the comedic boundaries, pushing the button, lifting the envelope and other such Synonyms

Alex: Whatever

Justin: Come on don’t get a hump on, not again

Alex: Again? Shut up

Justin: Come on, people were calling you Mr Camel from down the way

Alex: What the hell does from down the way mean?

Justin: I don’t know, it’s a place, the music man came from down the way, it’s an expression

Alex: Bollocks, there’s a fitting expression for you

Justin: Come on don’t start on me, you’ve seen my medals for bravery and heroism I could take you out in a second

Alex: Your scout’s medals? It’s not like you served in 'Nam

Justin: You don’t want to take me on, I once went one on one with a grizzly bear out in the wilderness, I put his head on a spike

Alex: You mean you once tapped a tame bear on the shoulder in the zoo then ran off because you thought he was looking at you suspiciously

Justin: I could have taken him

Alex: You would have been a light snack for him. He would have taken you down like the Christmas decorations

Justin: Still, I’ve seen things, been places you couldn’t dream of...you ever watch Spooks? I almost joined the MI5 those guys have nothing on me

Alex: Really?

Justin: Yeah!

Alex: Scouts honour?

Justin: Stop messing with my mystique, you know I’m trained in martial arts

Alex: You mean arts and crafts?

Justin: Whatever! Where are my new glasses? I want to work on some ideas

Alex: What these? Jesus, they look like you should be going to go to a Star Trek convention or a LAN party or something

Justin: Very funny

Alex: I’ve been using these as drinks coasters, they make you look sadistic

Justin: Well I’ve been meaning to get some new ones

Alex: Since 1995? Anyway!

Justin: What about a comedy/drama, called never the twain shall meet?

Alex: wow what a great idea!

Justin: Really? You really think so?

Alex: No I was humouring you

Justin: Fine, but I don’t see you coming up with any better ideas!

Alex: That’s because my mind works like a wily old fox, full of cunning...coming up with ideas so insanely epic it could shake the very foundations of the universe to hear them!

Justin: Well I think the universe is up to at least one of your ideas, I’m pretty sure the Earth isn’t going to implode if you tell me!

The Earth Implodes/To Be Continued.