as you prepare for the International Speech Contest

[Jim Chamberlin]

Dear Lewis,

 

I'm sending an article, based on a presentation I've given many times at Toastmasters Leadership Institute.   About half of it is pertinent to preparing for the International Speech Contest, so I thought it would be of interest to you.

 

If you have a draft of your speech, I'd be willing to look at it and comment.  Or I could even drop by your office and listen to it and give feedback in real time.

 

Good luck!

 

Jim

 

HOW  TO  GIVE  A  WINNING  HUMOROUS  SPEECH

Jim Chamberlin

 

You can win the Humorous Speech Contest this Fall.  Yes, YOU!  Follow a few key principles and you can be the center of a laugh riot.  Seriously!  I’m not kidding!  (Yes, I am.)

 

There are two main aspects of humor.  The first is SURPRISE.  That’s when you expect one thing to happen, such as if you’re on the Metro and you think it’s going to Greenbelt, and you get there and the doors open and (holy mackerel) you’re really in Foggy Bottom.  

 

The second aspect is to tell about SOMETHING TERRIBLE that happened to you.  For instance, I went on a first date a while back, and things turned quickly terrible.  I was lucky to live through it.  The good news is that it happened to me the day before my club’s Humorous Speech Contest.  So I tossed the speech I was going to give, and simply told about my terrible experience, and folks thought it was so funny that I wound up winning District with it!  Now if it that terrible date had happened to them, they wouldn’t be laughing, I guarantee.  But since it happened to me, they laughed their heads off. 

 

Most of us have had bad things happen to us.  John Kennedy was once asked how he got to be President.  He replied “They sank my boat.”  He was referring to the sinking of his PT boat in World War II, which at the time was anything but funny.  Not only did he live through it, but he came to see the transcendent humor in the situation. 

 

Think of stories that are told about you at family Thanksgiving dinners year after year, or stories that are repeated at college or team reunions.  That’s the kind of material that we all have, and that provides a rich reservoir for humor.  The best part of it is, when you give your speech you get to relive it, so that gives you credibility and charisma!

 

There are some topics to avoid.  Most of these are common sense. They include true tragedy, politics, drugs, drinking, the handicapped, bodily functions, sexual plumbing, sexism, religion, racism, and ethnic jokes.  Booger jokes, too.

 

OK, OK, some of these can be screamingly funny.  I’m not saying that they aren’t or can’t be funny.  I’m simply suggesting that if you want to win, don’t risk alienating a single judge.  If you tread in these waters, which I don’t recommend, you’d better be sure to make the joke about yourself, not the other guy, because if you do, it will be seen as very mean-spirited.

 

Tips for preparing your speech

 

10.  The actual words of your speech are just the beginning.  Make it big and make it weird, with exaggerated gestures, expressions, and  funny noises.  Your audience should be in a constant state of surprise and awe.  “What’s he gonna do next?!”

 

9.  Keep your audience attention at all times.  If you make up words, be blatant, so your audience won’t think you made a mistake.

 

8.  Don’t laugh at your own humor.  If you do, you defeat the 2^nd principle of what’s funny – a terrible thing happening to you.  If it was really terrible, you wouldn’t be laughing now, would you?

 

7.  Use short sentences and cultivate parallel structure.  Lists of three are rhetorically pleasing, and keep your audience off balance.  Create an expectation and then put the funny at the end.  “life, liberty and the pursuit of hippopotamuses”  Surprise! 

 

6.  Develop the musicality of your voice.  Think of every syllable of every word as a musical note. 

 

5.  Vary the rate of your speech.  Throw in some manic episodes so your audience will think “This guy’s crazy!”  But there should be blatant pauses as well. Pauses are great to create anticipation.  The audience thinks they know what’s coming, then surprise them with something else.

 

4.  Whatever you do, project it to the far corners of the room.  Make it bold and believable.

 

3.  End the paragraph with a punch line.  End the sentence with a punch word.  Surprise should follow surprise after surprise.

 

2.  Props – hey, I’m not much of a prop guy -- but if you use them, make sure you can get them into the speech and then back out of the speech with a minimum of effort, and distraction.  

 

1.  Get closure, emotional and rhetorical, by tying your conclusion to your introduction.  If you can tie your speech title into your introduction, as well as your conclusion, that’s ideal.  In my “Spiderman!” speech, the speech starts and ends with, you guessed it, “Spiderman!”  Along with the Contest Master’s repeated introduction of me (name, title, title, name), that gives four repetitions of the key phrase and helps judges remember you when they are casting their ballots. 

 

Tips for Actually Competing

 

Most of these tips are relevant for the International Speech Contest just as well as the Humorous Speech Contest. 

 

10.  Memorize your speech.  Time should slow way down when you give it.  Just as a major league baseball player sees the rotation of the baseball and adjusts his swing, you should be able to adjust to the room in the here and now, and make subtle changes in delivery to stay as funny as possible.  If you’re struggling to remember the next line, you can’t be fully in the moment in the room.

 

9.  Review the Humorous ballot.  Know what criteria the judges are considering.  Imagine listening to yourself and rate your speech.  Get advice from fellow Toastmasters who have judged Humorous Contests in the past.

  

8.  Practice, practice, practice.  Ask clubs if you can come to practice your speech.  Most clubs would be delighted.  You’ll improve, by getting valuable feedback and suggestions.  You’ll also gain confidence.  There’s nothing like a live audience.  If you know that George is going to be your competitor, that’s all the more reason to go to George’s home club to practice.  Of all the many friends I’ve made in Toastmasters, the ones I cherish and respect the most are some of the Toastmasters I’ve competed against.  Most are more than willing to help you improve!

  

7.  Get there early to minimize fluster factor, especially for new   venues.  The first time I competed at Division level I couldn’t figure out how to get into the GEICO building, and it was a dark and stormy night.  By the time I finally figured out how to get into the building, I was beyond salvage. 

  

6.  Don’t eat a big meal before the contest, and don’t eat at the   contest.  This will cut down on the broccoli between your teeth and the salsa stains on your shirt. 

  

5.  Scope out the lighting, the acoustics, the path to and from the front of the room and the & Contest Master.  What could possibly go wrong?  Well, if you’re in front of an overhead light, the audience might not be able to see you.  If there’s an air conditioning unit in the back, that part of the room might not be able to hear you.  And if there are some steep steps between where you’re sitting and the Contest Master, you might fall down the steps.  Like I did. 

  

4.  Don’t alter your speech at the last minute.  Some well-meaning friends of yours will invariable suggest lines to “improve” your speech.  Kill them.  It’s your speech, darn it!  It’s in your auditory and muscle memory!  You change it on contest night at your peril. 

  

3.  Don’t use the lectern.  Notify the Contest Master to move it.  There should be nothing between you and the audience.

  

2.  Nail the niceties at the start of your speech.  Keep it simple, clean, immediate.  “Madame Contest Master, Fellow Toastmasters and Guests”.  If you don’t get it out of the way first thing, the audience will wonder if you’ve forgotten to say it, and while they’re wondering, they won’t be fully listening to you.

  

1.  Plan for an early conclusion.  Usually the higher you go in competition, the longer the laughs.  Know exactly where you should be at green 5 mins, yellow 6 mins, and red 7 mins.  Know what you can cut to finish on time.  When you see the red, finish as fast as you can.  The funniest speech of my Toastmasters career ended gloriously at 7:31, and resulted in my inglorious disqualification.  I did that so that you won’t have to!

 

What else?  If you’re really serious about being funny, two more tips:  Get videos and DVD’s of past Humorous Contests from District 36 videographer Mike Nolan (email ver...@starpower.net).  Join Humorously Speaking (club # 3636) a specialty club that is composed of Toastmasters composed entirely of funny bones.  (http://humorously.freetoasthost.ws). 

 

Good luck!  Here’s laughing at you!

 

______________________________________________

 

Jim Chamberlin is Area 32 Governor and a former District 36 Humorous Contest Champion.  This article is based on his course at Toastmasters Leadership Institute.   His email is chamberl...@yahoo.com.