Steve Martin and Jerry Seinfeld, and Yo-Yo Ma and Emanuel Ax

The New Yorker Radio Hour

WNYC Studios and The New Yorker

Politics, Arts, News, Wnyc, Books, David, Storytelling, Society & Culture, Yorker, New, Remnick

4.2 • 6.2K Ratings

🗓️ 17 November 2020

⏱️ 40 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Between the two of them, Jerry Seinfeld and Steve Martin have nearly a century of experience in the delicate art of telling jokes. In a conversation with Susan Morrison during the 2020 New Yorker Festival, they discussed their long careers, learning how to adjust to new cultural forces, and the process of aging. Plus, Yo-Yo Ma and Emanuel Ax perform a piece of music that they have both been playing for more than forty years: Beethoven’s Cello Sonata No. 3 in A Major. “This is such open, hopeful music,” Ax said. Yet Beethoven signed one manuscript of the music, “amid tears and sorrow.” “I thought this was a good piece for this moment,” Ma told The New Yorker’s music critic Alex Ross. “Because people are suffering, and we do think that music can give comfort.”

Transcript

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0:00.0	This is The New Yorker Radio Hour, a co-production of WNYC Studios and The New Yorker.
0:10.3	This is the New Yorker Radio Hour. I'm David Remnick. At the New Yorker Festival last month, Jerry
0:15.8	Seinfeld and Steve Martin joined the New Yorker Susan Morrison, and they talked about the art of creating
0:22.1	those little explosive devices that we call jokes.
0:26.9	Now, I know that both of you feel very strongly about the technique and the craft of writing
0:33.5	jokes.
0:34.5	And I'd love to hear you describe each of you the process, your process for coming up with a bit,
0:40.4	shaping it, refining it. You know, how long does the whole thing take? And how does it start?
0:47.5	Well, that's an easy question. That's so easy. I'll let you go first.
0:51.7	The thing I like about writing comedy or any kind of writing is there's no rhyme or reason
0:57.1	to it.
0:58.7	Nobody knows how to do it.
1:02.0	Nobody has figured out anything.
1:05.1	So everyone's free to do it.
1:07.7	And I kind of like that complete chaos of the process of, especially jokes.
1:15.3	I was talking to somebody today and the guy said, quick question. And I just said, what is a quick
1:21.8	question? Why is it any different from any other question? Is it going to be less words? Does it mean my answer is short?
1:29.2	It's just one of these annoying little things that people say.
1:32.6	So I will write something like that down and see if it annoys other people the way it annoys me
1:39.2	by talking about it in front of an audience.
1:42.3	And if it does annoy them, I'll just play with it.
1:45.8	I found that performing live, it's just an ongoing exercise with a line. You trim it, you make it
	...

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