Comedy Education: Classes, Improv Schools, Writers' Rooms and the Self-Taught Route

There is no single way to become a comedian, but there are a handful of well-worn routes: improv and sketch training centres, stand-up classes, university programmes, writers' rooms, mentorship and the long, cheap, painful school of open mics. Each teaches something different and costs something different. This guide explains how comedians actually learn, where the routes lead, and how to choose.

It is about the learning paths themselves. For step-by-step advice on writing and performing, see our practical guides: how to start in alt comedy, how to workshop material and comedy writing techniques. For comedy as a way to teach other subjects, see learning through comedy.

The routes at a glance

Improv and sketch training centres

The most formal comedy education in North America happens in improv theatres, which run graded class programmes alongside their shows.

• The Second City (Chicago, founded 1959) is the oldest and best known. Its training centre feeds its touring and main-stage companies, which have produced generations of Saturday Night Live cast members. See our page on the Chicago comedy scene.
• iO, founded in Chicago in 1981 by Charna Halpern and Del Close as ImprovOlympic, developed the long-form structure known as the Harold. Close's teaching shaped modern improv; the book Truth in Comedy (1994) sets out his approach.
• The Upright Citizens Brigade, founded by Amy Poehler, Matt Besser, Ian Roberts and Matt Walsh, brought Close's methods to New York and Los Angeles and became a central training ground for alt comedy writers and performers. Its history is on our UCB page.
• The Groundlings (Los Angeles, 1974) focuses on character and sketch. Paul Reubens developed Pee-wee Herman there; Phil Hartman, Lisa Kudrow, Will Ferrell, Maya Rudolph, Kristen Wiig and Melissa McCarthy all came through it.
• The Annoyance (Chicago) is known for a looser, more irreverent approach associated with Mick Napier.

Training centres teach skills that matter beyond improv: listening, committing to a choice, building on someone else's idea, finding "the game" of a scene. Many of the most successful sketch writers learned to write sketch through improv. Their weakness is that they can produce a recognisable house style, and that the class fees add up over several levels. Our page on improv comedy explains the form.

Stand-up classes

Stand-up is the hardest form to teach, because so much depends on an individual point of view that only develops on stage. Classes are still useful for one thing: getting you through your first few minutes with the basics right. A good class covers setups and punchlines, cutting words, mic technique, structuring a five-minute set and dealing with nerves, and usually ends with a showcase in front of friends.

The warning that nearly every working comedian gives: a class showcase is not a real gig. The audience is friendly, the time is generous and nobody has paid to see a stranger. The real learning starts at open mics afterwards. Adult-education colleges and comedy clubs in most big cities run beginner courses; look for teachers who are still performing and ask former students what happened after the course ended.

Comedy degrees

A small number of universities now offer comedy as a degree subject. Emerson College in Boston has a comedic arts BFA, and Columbia College Chicago runs a comedy writing and performance programme in partnership with The Second City. In Britain, comedy is more often taught inside drama or performance degrees; the academic and former stand-up Oliver Double, for example, has long taught stand-up at the University of Kent and written books on the form.

Degrees offer time, theory, history and collaborators. They cannot offer what stand-ups say matters most: hundreds of hours in front of strangers. Historically many comedy writers came through university humour publications instead, the best known being the Harvard Lampoon, which produced writers for The Simpsons and late-night television. Student comedy societies like the Cambridge Footlights played the same role in Britain.

How TV comedy writing rooms work

The writers' room is where much American TV comedy is made, and for many people it is the real comedy education. A typical sitcom room works like this:

1. The showrunner leads the room and has the final say. Below them are executive producers, co-executive producers, supervising producers and staff writers, in roughly that order.
2. Breaking story. The room works out each episode's plot beat by beat on a whiteboard, pitching ideas and jokes.
3. Drafting. One writer (or a pair) goes away to write the script.
4. Punch-up and rewrites. The room goes through the draft line by line, pitching better jokes. This is where most jokes on many shows actually come from.
5. Table read and rewrites follow, often several times, until the episode is shot.

Late-night shows work differently: writers submit jokes and sketch ideas daily, and the host and head writers pick what gets on air. Writers are usually hired through a "packet" of sample material.

Rooms are a superb education because you watch experienced writers solve problems in real time. But they are hard to enter. In the streaming era, many productions moved to short-lived "mini-rooms", which became a central issue in the 2023 Writers Guild of America strike. The resulting agreement set minimum staffing rules for some rooms, but entry-level jobs remain scarce.

Alternatives to the writers' room

If you cannot get into a room, and most people can't, these are the routes comedy writers actually use:

• Writing fellowships and workshops run by networks and studios, such as NBC's Late Night Writers Workshop, which train small groups of writers and can lead to staff jobs.
• Sketch teams at improv theatres, which give writers deadlines, collaborators and an audience every month.
• Making your own work. Broad City began as Abbi Jacobson and Ilana Glazer's web series; Issa Rae's web series Awkward Black Girl led to Insecure; High Maintenance started online before HBO. A finished, funny thing is the strongest writing sample there is.
• Writing partnerships. British TV comedy often works without rooms: sitcoms are frequently written by one writer or a pair, as with Peep Show or Fleabag. Finding a writing partner is its own kind of education.
• Open submissions. Some radio and online sketch outlets have historically accepted unsolicited material. The BBC's Writersroom accepts scripts in open windows.
• Satire, podcasts and newsletters. Writing for a satirical site or building an audience through a podcast or newsletter gives you regular deadlines and a body of work. See starting a comedy podcast.

Mentors and the open-mic apprenticeship

Most stand-ups learned the old way: by going to open mics several nights a week for years. The open mic is a terrible teacher in many ways. The audience is mostly other comedians, the rooms are often empty, and feedback is unreliable. But it is the only place you get enough repetitions.

Mentorship in stand-up is usually informal. Newer comics learn by watching headliners every night at a club, opening for a touring comedian, joining a writing group with peers, or getting notes from a more experienced friend before a festival hour. Many comedians credit a single older comic who told them honestly what was not working. If you find someone like that, record your sets and ask for specific notes, not general encouragement.

Self-teaching: books, podcasts and specials

Comedians are unusually generous about explaining their craft, so the self-taught route is well supplied.

Books

• Truth in Comedy by Charna Halpern, Del Close and Kim "Howard" Johnson: the foundational long-form improv text.
• The Upright Citizens Brigade Comedy Improvisation Manual (2013): the clearest practical guide to finding the game of a scene.
• Born Standing Up by Steve Martin (2007): a memoir that doubles as an account of teaching yourself stand-up through years of trial and error.
• And Here's the Kicker (2009) and Poking a Dead Frog (2014) by Mike Sacks: long interviews with comedy writers about how they work.
• Stewart Lee's How I Escaped My Certain Fate (2010): his scripts with footnotes explaining every decision.

More recommendations are on our list of essential alt comedy books.

Podcasts

• WTF with Marc Maron, for long conversations about how comedians got where they are (see Marc Maron).
• The Comedian's Comedian, Stuart Goldsmith's interviews focused on process.
• Good One, Vulture's podcast in which comedians break down a single joke.

Watching like a student

Watch specials twice: once for pleasure, once with a notebook. Note how long setups are, where callbacks land, how the hour is structured. Our list of the greatest alt comedy specials is a good syllabus.

Choosing your route

• Want to do stand-up? Take one beginner class if it helps your nerves, then go to open mics as often as you can. Read, record, repeat.
• Want to write for TV? Write specs and original pilots, join a sketch team, apply for fellowships, and make something of your own.
• Want to act in comedy? Improv and sketch training centres are the clearest path, especially for sketch and sitcom.
• Want to make strange, alternative work? Mix routes. Many alt comedians studied theatre or art, did improv, ran their own nights and taught themselves the rest.

Frequently asked questions

Do you need to take classes to become a comedian?

No. Many stand-ups are self-taught through open mics, and classes cannot give you stage time or a point of view. But improv and sketch training centres are a major route into TV comedy, and a good stand-up class can shorten the early learning curve.

How do TV comedy writing rooms work?

A showrunner leads a group of writers who pitch ideas, 'break' story outlines together, assign drafts and then punch up scripts as a group. Writers usually enter as staff writers or via a writers' assistant job, often after submitting a spec script or a packet of sample material.

What are the alternatives to TV writing rooms?

Writing fellowships, late-night packet submissions, sketch teams at improv theatres, satirical publications, podcasts, and self-made web series. Many shows began as web series made by their creators. In the UK many sitcoms are written by one writer or a pair rather than a room.

Can you get a degree in comedy?

Yes, a few universities offer them. Emerson College in Boston has a comedic arts degree and Columbia College Chicago offers a comedy writing and performance programme with The Second City. In the UK, some drama departments teach stand-up as a module.