From Jay Surti, Clerkenwell Speakers
On Wednesday 29 January, Clerkenwell Speakers, together with three other London clubs, put on a humorous speech workshop dubbed ‘Belly Laugh Night’. The event, held in the Loose Cannon, in front of a 150 strong crowd, was a resounding success. It featured a fun warm up session from Division L champion and District finalist and Clerkenwell President Ayse Lowe, hilarious speeches from Division B and K champions and District finalists, Glen Savage and Stephen Edun and a fantastic speech and interactive workshop by UK & Ireland Humorous Speech Champion, Ola Oralepo.
Ayse kicked off the evening, getting the crowd warmed up with snippets from her speech ‘Culture Clash’ and making everyone giggle with her sales pitch for dodgy Turkish pirate DVDs of the D71 Contest.
Stephen then took to the stage giving a fantastic rendition of his speech ‘Start Where You Are’. Stephen used self deprecating humour, personal experiences and exaggeration to enhance his speech and endear himself to the audience.
Glen gave the crowd a master class in using word plays, puns and rather risqué humour to maximum effe
Then District Champion Ola had the crowd in stitches with his speech ‘Think Outside the Box’. Ola’s speech was very theatrical with many cultural references and he deployed the full range of humorous devices including set up/punchline, puns, exaggeration, irony and understatement.
Glen gave the crowd a master class in using word plays, puns and rather risqué humour to maximum effect in his highly entertaining and clever speech ‘Tantric Toastmasters’.
After the break Ola gave an entertaining and informative interactive workshop on how we can use humour to spice up our speeches. Ola structured his advice according to the acronym ACTS.
A is for Attitude
Ola advised us that all we need as subject matter for a humorous speeches is personal experiences and the willingness to share them. He explained that our attitudes to our surroundings can provide fertile material for speeches.
C is for Catharsis
Old told us that giving humorous speeches can have a cathartic effect, which benefits us and makes our speeches authentic. Ola explained that self-consciousness is the biggest block to humour and he encouraged us to embrace our insecurities and turn them into speech material.
T is for Target
Every humorous speech has a target and Ola advised us to choose that target wisely. The safest target? Yourself! If you laugh at yourself you give the audience permission to laugh with you. This is known as ‘insider rights’.
S is for Speech
Ola told us about a number of humorous devices that we can employ in our speeches and gave examples of each device in action, including:
- Set up punch line = surprise: ‘That was below the belt – a bit like her chest’ (Stephen)
- Puns: ‘Premature evaluation’ (Glen)
- Irony: ‘Because I have integrated so well’ (Ola in Nigerian dress)
- Exaggeration: ‘3 month waiting list to get mugged in Croydon’ (Stephen)
- Understatement: ‘That must have hurt – yeah stings a bit’ (Ola)
Inspired…? Why enter your club's next contests? Our club International Speech contest (which members who have completed 6 or more speeches from the Competent Communicator are eligible to enter) is on 12 March. Find out when yours is and have a go! We bet Ola, Ayse, Glen and Stephen are glad they joined the Autumn contests!
